Quotes about nature

„The richness I achieve comes from nature, the source of my inspiration.“

—  Claude Monet French impressionist painter 1840 - 1926

„Constructive process is a process of development and learning is a process of reconstruction of nature.“

—  Sukavich Rangsitpol Thai politician 1935

Learning

„Beginners learned how to establish parallels, by means of the Game's symbols, between a piece of classical music and the formula for some law of nature. Experts and Masters of the Game freely wove the initial theme into unlimited combinations.“

—  Hermann Hesse, book The Glass Bead Game

The Glass Bead Game (1943)
Context: Under the shifting hegemony of now this, now that science or art, the Game of games had developed into a kind of universal language through which the players could express values and set these in relation to one another. Throughout its history the Game was closely allied with music, and usually proceeded according to musical and mathematical rules. One theme, two themes, or three themes were stated, elaborated, varied, and underwent a development quite similar to that of the theme in a Bach fugue or a concerto movement. A Game, for example, might start from a given astronomical configuration, or from the actual theme of a Bach fugue, or from a sentence out of Leibniz or the Upanishads, and from this theme, depending on the intentions and talents of the player, it could either further explore and elaborate the initial motif or else enrich its expressiveness by allusions to kindred concepts. Beginners learned how to establish parallels, by means of the Game's symbols, between a piece of classical music and the formula for some law of nature. Experts and Masters of the Game freely wove the initial theme into unlimited combinations.

„If you truly love nature, you will find beauty everywhere.“

—  Vincent Van Gogh Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890) 1853 - 1890

„The natural distribution is neither just nor unjust; nor is it unjust that persons are born into society at some particular position. These are simply natural facts. What is just and unjust is the way that institutions deal with these facts.“

—  John Rawls, book A Theory of Justice

Source: A Theory of Justice (1971; 1975; 1999), Chapter II, Section 14, pg. 87-88
Context: Occasionally this reflection is offered as an excuse for ignoring injustice, as if the refusal to acquiesce in injustice is on a par with being unable to accept death. The natural distribution is neither just nor unjust; nor is it unjust that persons are born into society at some particular position. These are simply natural facts. What is just and unjust is the way that institutions deal with these facts.
Context: We may reject the contention that the ordering of institutions is always defective because the distribution of natural talents and the contingencies of social circumstance are unjust, and this injustice must inevitably carry over to human arrangements. Occasionally this reflection is offered as an excuse for ignoring injustice, as if the refusal to acquiesce in injustice is on a par with being unable to accept death. The natural distribution is neither just nor unjust; nor is it unjust that persons are born into society at some particular position. These are simply natural facts. What is just and unjust is the way that institutions deal with these facts. Aristocratic and caste societies are unjust because they make these contingencies the ascriptive basis for belonging to more or less enclosed and privileged social classes. The basic structure of these societies incorporates the arbitrariness found in nature. But there is no necessity for men to resign themselves to these contingencies. The social system is not an unchangeable order beyond human control but a pattern of human action. In justice as fairness men agree to avail themselves of the accidents of nature and social circumstance only when doing so is for the common benefit. The two principles are a fair way of meeting the arbitrariness of fortune; and while no doubt imperfect in other ways, the institutions which satisfy these principles are just.

„Separation and division is not a natural state, it is an unhealed state. That which we push away strives to be integrated again regardless of how much we wish that it would just go away.“

—  Teal Swan American spiritual teacher 1984

„All the loving acts that two human beings are capable of, the simple act of holding hands can often become the most intimate. Why is this so? Basically, because the nature of the hands and feet is such that the energy system finds expression in these two parts of the body in a very singular way. Two palms coming together have far more intimacy than the contact between any other parts of the body. You can try this with yourself. You don’t even need a partner. When you put your hands together, the two energy dimensions within you (right-left, masculine-feminine, solar-lunar, yin-yang, etc.) are linked in a certain way, and you begin to experience a sense of unity within yourself. This is the logic of the traditional Indian namaskar. It is a means of harmonizing the system. So, the simplest way to experience a state of union is to try this simple namaskar yoga. Put your hands together, and pay loving attention to any object you use or consume, or any form of life that you encounter. When you bring this sense of awareness into every simple act, your experience of life will never be the same again. There is even a possibility that if you put your hands together, you could unite the world!“

—  Sadhguru, book Inner Engineering: A Yogi's Guide to Joy

Source: Inner Engineering: A Yogi's Guide to Joy

„The different accidents of life are not so changeable as the feelings of human nature. I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an inanimate body. For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart.“

—  Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus

Source: Victor Frankenstein in Ch. 5

„Nature is my manifestation of God.
I go to nature every day for inspiration in the day's work.“

—  Frank Lloyd Wright American architect (1867-1959) 1867 - 1959

„Russia became a juicy chunk of the Third World, with immense reserves of cheap labor, a vast treasure of natural resources, and industrial assets to be sold off at giveaway prices.“

—  Michael Parenti American academic 1933

2 MEDIA AND CULTURE, Yeltsin's Coup And The Medias Alchemy, p. 140
Dirty truths (1996), first edition

„Your true passion should feel like breathing; it’s that natural.“

—  Oprah Winfrey American businesswoman, talk show host, actress, producer, and philanthropist 1954

„Of course, the human soul will always have the power to reject God, for choice is essential to its nature, but I cannot believe that anyone will finally do this.“

—  Leslie Weatherhead English theologian 1893 - 1976

Source: The Christian Agnostic (1965), p.287

„We are in an age that assumes the narrowing trends of specialization to be logical, natural, and desirable. Consequently, society expects all earnestly responsible communication to be crisply brief. . . . In the meantime, humanity has been deprived of comprehensive understanding.“

—  Buckminster Fuller American architect, systems theorist, author, designer, inventor and futurist 1895 - 1983

1970s, Synergetics: Explorations in the Geometry of Thinking (1975), The Wellspring of Reality
Context: We are in an age that assumes the narrowing trends of specialization to be logical, natural, and desirable. Consequently, society expects all earnestly responsible communication to be crisply brief.... In the meantime, humanity has been deprived of comprehensive understanding. Specialization has bred feelings of isolation, futility, and confusion in individuals. It has also resulted in the individual's leaving responsibility for thinking and social action to others. Specialization breeds biases that ultimately aggregate as international and ideological discord, which, in turn, leads to war.

„From this amphibious ill-born mob began
That vain, ill-natured thing, an Englishman.“

—  Daniel Defoe English trader, writer and journalist 1660 - 1731

Pt. I, l. 132.
The True-Born Englishman http://www.luminarium.org/editions/trueborn.htm (1701)

„Instinct reveals itself as self-concentrating, self-edifying it is limitation. Intuition produces self-denial, self-destruction； it is expansion. Culture can develop both. If it develops instinct, animal nature appears. Then culture destroys the intuitive capacity which men have even found in a primitive state.“

—  Piet Mondrian Peintre Néerlandais 1872 - 1944

Source: 1940's, A New Realism', 1943-1945, p. 17

„In nature's economy the currency is not money, it is life.“

—  Vandana Shiva Indian philosopher 1952

Source: Earth Democracy: Justice, Sustainability, and Peace

„For me nature is not a landscape, but the dynamism of visual forces - an event rather than an appearance.“

—  Bridget Riley British painter 1931

Quoted in Karl Ruhrberg et al., Art of the 20th Century (2000), p. 344.

„Because normal human activity is worse for nature than the greatest nuclear accident in history.“

—  Martin Cruz Smith American writer 1942

„Postmodernism is what you have when the modernization process is complete and nature is gone for good. It is a more fully human world than the older one, but one in which "culture" has become a veritable "second nature."“

—  Fredric Jameson American academic 1934

Introduction
Postmodernism: Or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (1991)