寻找“土地之神”
(本文首次发表于2005年2月23日出版的《中国青年报》，之后由Y.C. Huang 翻译成英文发表在美国纽约《乾坤》杂志2006年第7期P36-45。)
我们对真实而完整意义上的自然越来越陌生，不再有机会像史前人那样，像田里的农民那样、像海边的渔民那样，感受她的呼吸，领会她的喜怒表情，对大难来临前的种种预兆漠然置之。
编者按：
“如果我们敬天如父、 爱地如母，那么天地就会爱护、养育我们如自己的子女。反之如果人类叛天逆地、一意孤行，那么就会灾劫连绵、自取灭亡。”{（“敬天畏地”）《乾坤》第四期，2005}
“寻找土地之神”是中国著名的景观规划专家俞孔坚教授呼吁人类关注城市建设及现代化科技带给自然和大地的伤害，而最终祸及于己的一篇力作。俞博士从一个专家学者的角度，作出精辟深入的分析，令人感受深刻！人类对于破坏、毒害大地之行为应该感到懊悔可耻，并作出反省！
此文发表于印度洋海啸灾难之后，及美国纽奥尔良Katrina 飓风灾难之前。然而，俞教授在本文指出人们妄顾人地伦理关系而傲慢无知的恶果，在纽奥尔良飓风中惊心触目地应验了。本刊秉承一贯倡导天地人和谐相处的宗旨，曾于《乾坤》第五期以[天地乾坤]为题，指出地球生态恶化，人类正面临毁灭性灾难得可能，疾出“拯救地球”的呼声，与俞孔坚教授之理念可谓不谋而合 。故此编辑并翻译此文，作一中英精简版以馈赠读者，冀望更多世人从危机中醒悟！
Seeking The Deity Of The Land
"Unlike prehistoric people, the farmers in the field and the fisherman by the sea, we no longer have the opportunity to feel the breath of Mother Nature, to comprehend her feelings. As a result, we completely ignore the many omens that occur right before a great disaster descends (Yu)"
"If we respected the heaven like our own father, and loved the earth like our own mother, the heaven and the earth would nurture us like their own beloved children. However, if we betrayed the heaven, abused the earth, and behaved willfully, we would face neverending disasters and dig our own graves." ("Respect Heaven and Earth", Chien Kun Vol.4, 2005)
In the following article, Professor Yu explores a similar subject from an academic perspective, and came to alarming, indepth conclusions. After reading this article, we experienced a profound and resounding impact. Humans should be ashamed of the way we have ruthlessly damaged and poisoned Mother Earth. This article was written after the Tsunami disaster in the India Ocean but before the Katrina disaster in New Orleans. The Katrina disaster, which occurred when the concrete levees protecting the city were breached by the flood waters, was exactly what Dr. Yu warns of in the following article.
Chien Kun Magazine has been advocating the ideal of humans in harmony with Heaven and Earth. In our column, ’Home Planet’ in Vol. 5, we pointed out the dire crisis of the eco-system deterioration, and warned that human beings could be facing obliterating disasters and must start action to save the Earth. Our voice has echoed Dr. Yu’s warning by coincidence. Hoping that more people can awaken to the severity of eco-crisis, we have taken excerpts from this article and translated it for our readers.
(From the Editor of Chien Kun, Vol.7/2006: 36-45)
Catastrophe in "Paradise"
The tsunami disaster in the Indian Ocean led to extensive international discussions, which involved many aspects including science, religion, and philosophy.
I am a civil planner as well as a landscape arcitect, and the main goal of landscape planning and design is to coordinate the relationship between humans and the land. Therefore, I will be concentrating on this angle. The reality I base my thoughts on is: This disaster happened in a civilized "paradise". Beautiful gardens and luxurious hotels were turned into rubble in a short period of time. It took away nearly 300,000 lives, including many civilized people who were armed with modem scientific knowledge. Conversely, the pre-historic tribes who lived on remote islands survived the disaster free from harm. Scientists detected the earthquakes, and scientific knowledge predicted that tsunamis would follow, yet it still could not spare the overjoyed people from their deaths.
This tsunami disaster was a serious warning. We must start to think carefully about the ecological safety of our modern country and modem cities in the throes of today’s urbanization trend.
Contemplation 1
The land’s ecological safety is the first priority. Several thousand years of technological development has not been able to lessen the threat of natural disasters, which can occur at anytime right beside us. Forests, beaches, rivers, and cities are all actually latent with the potential for disasters. Many civilizations in human history were eliminated suddenly by natural disasters. The development of Chinese civilization, in a certain sense, is a history of recognizing and coping with natural disasters. Historians believe that the formation of the first Chinese dynasty, the Xia, was mainly due to the necessity of organizing a large labor force to deal with the flood disasters.
Next to the problem of overpopulation, the ecological security of the country is the most severe challenge facing modem China. We challenged traditional family ethics and western religious ethics to successfully resolve the problem of over-population; however, who will be the "Deity of the Land" that can provide the ecological safety for this over-burdened soil?
Contemplation 2
The "superman" mentality and the world of "virtual reality" cause disasters to descend upon us. Facing 3000,000 dead bodies and the miracle of the survival of the prehistoric tribes, one cannot help but ask: in dealing with natural disasters, are we human beings progressing or regressing?
There was an American science fiction movie, which described humans fighting off aliens using airplanes, canons, and armored cars to supplement their mental toughness; however, these weapons were quickly destroyed by the aliens’ mysterious weapons. In the end, it was actually human’s soft and beautiful music that overcame the aliens.
By building machines, we have strengthened and extended our limbs. By developing computers and information technology, we have expanded our brains. We have made ourselves into "Supermen". Contemporary technology has forced us to live in a highly abstract world.
Concrete levees designed to withstand a "500-year-record" flood surrounding our cities, allow us to live beside a river, yet do not permit us to know whether the river is high or low; or allow us to live right next to the ocean, yet not be able to hear the tides going up and down. We channel and control the flow of water, yet don’t know where the water comes from, or what organisms live in it. We flatten mountains and fill valleys, as a consequence, we forget about the rise and fall of the landscape. More and more, we have become strangers to nature. Unlike prehistoric people, the farmers in the field and the fisherman by the sea, we no longer have the opportunity to feel the breath of Mother Nature, to comprehend her feelings. As a result, we completely ignore the many omens that occur right before a great disaster descends.
How an urban society can coexist with the natural system so that modem city-dwellers can sense the nature, is the fundamental requirement that we need in order to build a new, harmonious relationship between humans and the land.
Humans have an inherent awe and love for Mother Nature. Awe, because for millions of years, she has been bringing disasters to humans, hence engraving this reality deeply into our genes. Love, because she bestows humans with food and shelter. This natural heart of appreciation in a human being is the soil that nourishes the concept of divinity and religion. It is also the original source for sensing the potential fortune and misfortune of the land around us, and for appreciating its beauty. If we become overly dependent on our power as "Supermen" which modern technology bestowed us, abandon our natural ability that has evolved over tens of millions of years, and completely bury the concepts of divinity and awe, natural disasters will surely descend. The birth of "Superman" declared the death of the "Deity". And once the "Deity" dies, so will humans.
Therefore, before we can save humanity, we need to revive the "Deity", and to accomplish this, we must abandon the "Superman" mentality and go back to being real, ordinary "human beings".
Contemplation 3
Reacquainting ourselves with the value of cultural heritages. The prehistoric Tribes survived the tsunami disaster, this showed us the value of native cultural heritages. These cultural heritages include both nonmaterial and material heritages. The experiences humans acquired form natural disasters were often preserved through them. The nonmaterial heritages include our ancestors’ admonishments, customs, and mysterious taboos. The material ones are the native cultural landscape on the earth, the products of experiments of human and land interactions, and the marks left on land during human’s contest and harmonization process that went on with the natural forces over a period of thousands of years. All these heritages are worthy of preservation and our appreciation.
At the same time, we must recognize the fact that in this age of urbanization, with overpopulation and limited resources, we cannot expect the prescientific "wizards" and "gods", or the remaining cultural landscapes to provide for the safety of 1.3 billion lives in China. A new age needs a new "Deity".
Contemplation 4
What is the purpose of scientific technology? And now that we have it, what else do we need? The Titanic sank not because the ship wasn’t solid enough, but because people relied too much upon its solidity. Our current strategy for the ecosafety of our land and cities is just using enormous manmade constructions and unilateral scientific technology to build "armored vehicles" to fight against nature. If we study the recent history of flooding in China, we can see that the most severe damage resulted from our overreliance on using "armored vehicles" to fight a persistent and lengthy battle with nature. For example the flooding that resulted from the collapse of levees and dams.
In the Indian Ocean Tsunami disaster, science seemed to bear no responsibility, because the scientists detected the earthquakes and informed people that tsunamis would follow. Therefore, it’s not that science was useless, only that it was not completely and comprehensively incorporated into human’s belief and ethical systems.
During the prescientific age, religion and ethics were firmly built into human’s moral principles and behavior. All natural phenomena were treated as signs of either "fortune" or "misfortune." For instance, ancient Chinese Feng Shui believed that curvy and continuous rivers are "fortunate," and good for inhabitancy. Modern day ecological studies confirm that curvy rivers help to reduce the force of flooding, and cut down on flood damages. Yet today, our engineered defense against flooding is to build a dam for every river, and to cut out every curve. Scientific knowledge did not help us wisely utilize, adapt to, and reform nature; on the contrary, we used the knowledge in only the most shallow and limited sense.
In summary, the relationship between humans and the earth should not be a contentious one, full of struggle, but should strive for "Harmony." We should not use scientific technology to create "Supermen" to fight nature, but instead, coordinate the relationship between humans and the forces of Mother Nature. Science should be equipped with the wings of ethics so it can become the angel that propagates beauty; otherwise, it will only become the "Satan" that destroys nature and the human race.
We must seek for the modern day "Deity of the Land", through scientific technology and knowledge about nature, experiences and lessons about natural disasters that are passed down through cultural heritages, and ecological ethics, to protect us from natural disasters.
Putting down the knife that slew the Land "Goddess", reconstructing ecological ethics.
During the 1999 World Architecture Congress, Professor Wu Liang Yong et al described in "Beijing Chapter": Our time is the age of "Great Development" and "Great Destruction."
We have not only abandoned our ancestors’ heritage of prominently promoting harmony between humans and nature the poetic cultural landscape, but have also failed to learn the lessons from the urban development of the western nations, using scientific theories and methodology to deal with the relationship between humans and the land. The natural system of the earth,a living "Goddess", has suffered different degrees of destruction throughout the urbanization process.
During the past two decades, modern urban construction in China has largely been paid for with the price of enormous waste and the sacrifice of the health and safety of the natural system. Wise planning and design could have prevented these destructions, which include:
1 Fragmentation of the land: the disorganized expansion of cities, freeway webs that paid no consideration to the environment, and a variety of land developments, constructions and irrigation projects, all gradually tattered the once continuous and complete landscape. The continuity and integrity of the natural process has been severely damaged.
2 Water systems handicapped: the irrigation system, a major part of the landscape of a civilization, is severely compromised. Once the product of the combined efforts of humans and the natural process working together over thousands of years, it is now subject to the burial of river channels, flow obstructions, channellization, and the destruction of wetlands. 3 Disappearance of biohabitats: the natural lands have disappeared; riverbeds and vegetation grounds have been replaced by levees and "beautification planting". Trees used to fence farmlands and the roadside trees have been cut down for road expansion projects. The cultural landscape and biohabitats around ponds, bushes near residences, cemeteries, and trees planted for good Feng Shui, are all disappearing at an alarming rate.
The expansion of cities and the development of infrastructures are necessary, but the land is limited, and we must keep in mind that the natural system has its own structure. Coordinating the relationship between cities and nature is by no means a matter of "quantity". It is, more importantly, a matter of space structuring and "quality". This means that as long as we go through a careful scientific land design process, we can greatly reduce the interference that city building and the establishment of infrastructure impose upon the ecosystem, and avoid a great deal of destruction.
We have enough scientific and technological knowledge to accomplish this, but, the crucial point is: do we have the ethics to treat the land properly?
The power of "Superman" cannot replace the ecological service of the natural system.
We have invented many kinds of physical and chemical compounds to combat biological and non-biological pathogens, to eliminate whatever we thought would do harm to our bodies. The effect has been the constant weakening of our immune systems. The WHO (World Health Organization) has warned repeatedly that the newest strain of viral flu could possibly kill tens of millions of people. Therefore, the most scientific method of preparing for the disease is to strengthen our bodies, and build up our own immune systems.
The same situation applies to our cities. We undertook all kinds of construction projects to protect our cities from the destructive forces of nature. The mighty engineering structures created by humans are not only strikingly costly, they also completely segregate cities from nature. Consequently, the natural balance of the water system was destroyed, the power of floods grows ever stronger, and rainwater, a rare natural resource, just gets dumped into the ocean.
The Earth is a living "Goddess," not only does she produce , she also digests and has a process of self-purification. She regulates all sorts of abundances and deficiencies. All these are eco-services nature provides for humans. However, during the planning of cities and their construction, we failed to comprehend and cherish the complimentary services of nature. Furthermore, we most cruelly destroyed and poisoned the flesh and body of the Land "Goddess," shattering her functionality. This includes such acts as dismembering her body --- farmlands, grasslands, and fields of the earth; ruining her bones and muscles --- mountains of the earth; damaging her kidneys --- the wetlands system; cutting-off her blood vessels --- the river systems; and poisoning her lungs --- forests and bio-habitats. Eventually, even a small snow or rainstorm will be able to paralyze the entire city of Beijing; A flu virus can turn into SARS and bring all the cities in the country into the threat of death.
The wise solution for urbanites to strengthen our resistance and immunity to natural disasters is not by arming ourselves with moder "High Technology", but rather to let the natural system fully perform its ecological functions, and allow nature to carry out its wonders. In this way the immunity of all the living systems of the Land will be strengthened.
Rebuild the elegance and beauty of landscape; construct an eco-safe framework through "reverse-planning(negative planning)."
In 1962, a landscape architect and eco-planning pioneer In McHarg led his students to study coast on the eastern seaboard of the United States. They were stunned: many rich folks were busy building their villas right in middle of a danger zone, which would be engulfed when the next round of large ocean tides approached. He warned those self-assured people to move away from the territory as soon as possible, otherwise, disaster would strike. Regrettably, his warnings were ignored. A few months later, strong tidal waves did swallow those handsome houses.
McHarg cried out: People should listen to the landscape architects because they will tell you which places are inhabitable, and which are not; this is the real essence of landscape planning and regional planning. We are trying to educate you about survival, and about how to make wise moves in front of nature. However, by learning from the Tsunami disaster in the Indian Ocean, we found out that history keeps repeating the same tragedy, and it is rooted in mankind’s disrespect and ignorance.
A couple of days ago, an Australian professor, who is currently working in Indonesia on the reconstruction of the territory hit by the Tsunami, wrote me a letter. He stated that many hotels and towns suffered such extensive damage because they committed a number of classical planning errors: the designs did not follow the laws of nature.
This planet gives humans enough space to live. It’s not that we don’t have enough land to build our cities on, but we usually build them in the wrong places, and use the wrong methodology. Almost all seashore and riverside cities compete with nature by increasing the height of levees to fight flooding, and wrestle for space. If a disaster had not struck for 100 years, it could possibly happen in the 101st year. If a disaster has a history of only "once in 500 years", it does not imply that it cannot, or will not, occur tomorrow. If a city was built in the wrong place, it doesn’t matter how pretty it is, it can vanish overnight. It happened at the La Family Ruin in China 4,000 years ago. The same thing happened to the ancient Roman city of Pompeii. The Tsunami disaster of the Indian Ocean was an even more harsh lesson for us.
The fundamental solution would be to respect the natural process of the earth, and by scientific analysis of the natural processes and the disaster processes, establish a landscape security pattern and ecological infrastructure, which will fully and completely maintain the living systems of the land and its eco-service functionality, instead of just using them for any single function.
We must correct the way we design and build cities, --- the kind that are based upon the size of the population and the land requirement to plan and expand our cities, and then attempt to strengthen their defense systems to resist natural disasters. We should reverse the whole process; that is, work according to nature’s process and how much safe-space she provides for humans. We can then properly choose our habitats, and determine the configuration and plan of our cities.
In the past, our cities were sliding toward disasters on a slippery, dangerous rail. Today, during a never before once-in-fivethousandyears opportunity in the urbanization process, we have the ability to adjust the humanland relationship. We now have the resources and must reverse the course in our urban development and planning. That is, to perform "reverseengineering": We have to first establish an ecological infrastructure, a fundamental landscape security framework for the Land and our cities, and use this framework to define the planning of urban development. Otherwise, disasters will sooner or later descend upon us.
With the resurrection of the Deity, humanity can survive for generations to come
During a time of speedy urbanization and with the rapid deterioration of the environment in America, McHarg lamented, why couldn’t we save some natural lands in our metropolitan areas, so nature could provide its free services for the people? Why couldn’t we have highly productive farms in the cities to feed those in need? Why couldn’t we utilize the natural systems to construct open spaces in the cities, so the urbanites could enjoy them for generations? Why do we reside in places where we shouldn’t? And why do we not follow the natural process and patterns to design our homes, but rather, constantly clash with nature?
The Chinese saying goes: "when one is put in a desperate situation, he will be forced to find a way to survive." After going through "Superman’s" arrogance, overreliance on technology and having a lack of faith in our industrial age, killing the "Goddess" of the Land, and bringing upon this neverending cycle of disasters, the new era of modern science needs to bring about the revitalization and reincarnation of the "Goddess".
Due to their ignorance and fear of nature, humans created the "divinities" of the prescientific age; those divinities or deities either had horrifying faces, or they were fearsome and sacred beyond approach. However, in today’s highly scientific and technologically advanced age, what we need is a "Deity" whom we can befriend, communicate with, respect, and yet still be able to approach. Mother Nature, with her natural processes and laws, she is respectable because of her unlimited power; amiable because of her openmindedness and generosity; She is also so weak and thus deserves our sympathy, and because we know her so well, we can communicate with her openly.
Compared with the ignorant pre-scientific superstition toward "divinity", we humans should be substantially more self-confident today! Through the complete understanding of the natural process via scientific knowledge (not our unilateral selfcentered arrogance), humans should have gained this confidence. There is no need, nor is it possible, for the human race to overpower nature for survival on our own. Nature can actually help us to have better, healthier lives. Knowledge of the humanland relationship should eventually become a new form of ethics of the Land. Love and respect for the natural process and framework is the fundament of this new ethics, and it should be elevated into a law, so it can regulate all of people’s behavior towards the land.
In conclusion, the "deities" of the prescientific age cannot assure the ecosafety of the modern urbanites, nor can the industrial "Superman" protect us from natural disasters. Only with the integration of scientific knowledge and the new ethics of the land, can there be the coming of the modern "Deity", who can guide us in wise planning for an ecologically safe environment.
