ABSTRACT
Nature must relate to more than biology because all living things depend on non-biological systems. Nature takes an even-handed approach to human wellbeing, and people understand this through two seemingly opposite ideas. The first embodies intense competition; Tennyson wrote of nature as "red in tooth and claw," which captures predator–prey realities in the natural world. Humans are embedded in nature and have a sophisticated understanding of it. It follows that how humans organise ourselves is similarly embedded. Humans are utterly dependent on societies and economies for food and water, air, and all the resource materials that humans use to create the civilisation around them. Whether people think of the pollution of air, land and water, species loss and habitat destruction, the loss of stratospheric ozone, the acidification of the oceans, and the threat of catastrophic climate change, the pressure that human development is placing on nature's ability is greater than ever.
