On Nature, Makers and Creators
The difference between a maker and a creator cannot be overstated. They are fundamentally different. This difference forces us to remember our place on the earth and in the universe.
How can this be, since most people use the two words as synonyms? The answer is simple and it can lead to a much greater understanding of things. People make things. What does this mean? We gather resources and put them together in a fashion that is useful to us. In this sense, a computer and a wheel are not really different. They are things that are made. Perhaps this sounds ridiculous to you. A wheel can be nothing more that stone carved into a circle, while a computer requires all sorts of materials, countless hours, and several very specific sets of expertise and methods to produce. Yet it, like a wheel, is made.
A computer is a collection of materials that are put together for a purpose, it is made. Hardware is the collection of raw materials. Software is code and signals that only exist in a computer. Software does not physically exist; it is only code and electronic signals organized and displayed to perform functions that humans find useful, such as creating networks, word processing, etc. So a computer is made. Where do the materials for it come from? From nature. The sand, metal, plastic and other materials that make a computer come ultimately from the earth. We did not make the earth, or those raw materials. But they were created.
As makers but not creators, we are ultimately slaves to the forces of nature and the raw materials it provides. Heschel wrote “We are endowed with the ability to conquer and control the forces of nature. In exercising power, we submit to our will a world that we did not create, invading realms that do not belong to us. Are we the kings of the universe or mere pirates?” I would submit that we are pirates, and that we are absolutely not able to conquer and control the forces of nature. A maker ultimately is a pirate of nature. Humans think they have mastered the earth because of our skyscrapers and computers. These achievements are things that we made that on some level allow us to destroy nature. But we still cannot create, we can only make. All technological advancement comes from making, and much of it leads to destruction. We can make a gun or a bomb, we can use it to destroy nature or other humans, but we cannot create the materials used to make these weapons, we must find them. How ironic that we can only destroy nature using materials that we cannot even create. Even when we destroy, in our moments of greatest cruelty, we are mere makers. Even when we build the highest skyscrapers and the most advanced supercomputers, we are still mere makers. Humans can never be creators. We cannot create nature or resources, we can only use them either for purposes that suit us or destroy them, and often both.
What is the meaning of all this? It means we must have more humility, not only to nature but to ourselves. The need for humility for nature has been abundantly proven by recent earthquakes in Haiti and Chile, and by the Tsunami in Southeast Asia. Even as we make more and more advanced things, nature, which was created, can still ultimately conquer us. These events prove our reliance on nature, and our inability to conquer what was created, only to use and profit from certain elements of it. This gives rise to what might seem like a contradiction, the ability to destroy nature without conquering it. Conquering implies control, which is why we can never conquer nature or the planet earth until, if ever, we can ourselves create water, natural resources, and life out of thin air. If this never happens, than we can never truly conquer nature. Even if we destroy our planet, we will have done so using resources that the planet itself created! Nature is not immune to having its manifestations and creations used against it by humans. But it cannot be conquered because humans can never create these things on our own.
This shows the hollowness and the stupidity of people who blame human behaviors for natural disasters. They claim that these disasters are God’s wrath for some humans participating in whatever they consider to be a sin against God. But Heschel writes, “Nature is deaf to our cries and indifferent to our values. Her laws know no mercy, no forbearance.” The processes of nature that result in earthquakes do not kill people because of their actions or beliefs, but because we cannot conquer nature, we cannot conquer creation. We cannot control nature, we cannot conquer it. Our skyscrapers and supercomputers could not stop the tragic earthquakes and tsunamis. We cannot and should not blame people for these events. We can only remember our place as humans in a world we did not create. To claim that natural disasters are God’s response against sins is to disrespect the free will of humanity and to ignore the fundamental nature of this earth – that it is a created thing that we mere makers cannot control.
