nature is that which gives birth

We use the word “nature” all the time, yet its single meaning is elusive.

The word connotes the outdoors, National Parks, the passing seasons, and teevee shows about great white sharks.

But what do these things have to do with “human nature”? In this usage, “nature” is synonymous with “character.”

If so, “nature” is both in- and out- side of our selves.

Semantician Raymond Williams believed “Nature is perhaps the most complex word in the language”

I beg to differ. The idea the word “nature” represents is, by its very nature , simple.

We look to its history, as it was re-defined over time:

c.1300, “essential qualities, innate disposition,” also “creative power in the material world,” from O.Fr. nature, from L. natura “course of things, natural character, the universe,” lit. “birth,” from natus “born,” pp. of nasci “to be born,” from PIE *gene- “to give birth, beget” (see genus). Original sense is in human nature. Meaning “inherent, dominating power or impulse” of a person or thing is from late 14c. Nature and nurture have been contrasted since 1874.

From this constellation of meanings, I extrapolate that nature gives birth to, and is, the cosmos. It gives birth to us, too, and determines our character.

Not complicated: nature is that which gives birth.

Related posts:

1. Readings for Jefferson’s Roots: Stoicism, Deism and “the laws of nature and of nature’s god”
2. Whatever we do to nature, we do to ourselves
3. as long as there is “nature,” there are “natural human rights”
4. Biocitizen interviewed by the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies
5. A closer look @ our superorganism