Seeing and Understanding Connections Between Nature and Humanity

Abstract

This chapter discusses the concepts and approaches of environmental systems studies that are concerned with the health and ills of the Earth. These studies are a system of scholarship that aims to help us understand the relationship between humanity and nature, and to create a positive relationship between the two. A major role of environmental systems studies is to make the invisible visible or make the complex easier to see. These studies are structured as a collection of the knowledge required for that purpose by using a variety of academic principles and methodologies. Both macro- and micro-approaches are necessary for the studies. Based on an extensive knowledge basis of micro-environmental studies, macro-environmental studies take the broad overarching perspective to describe the relationships between human activities and the environment, at the level of the entire globe, continents, countries, cities, and watersheds and to analyze the environmental constraints on human activities and the potential scope of human activities within those constraints.