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DAY 5

Underlying Patterns: Earth

We have forgotten what we can count on.

—Terry Tempest Williams, Breadloaf Writers’ Conference, 1997

It takes both a macroscopic and microscopic perspective to understand place. Macroscopically, we can reflect on basic occurrences over the past 4.5 billion years that have affected the Earth’s land forms, temperature, and capacity for sustaining life, as well as ongoing influences such as the eruptions of volcanoes, recomposition of the atmosphere, and the movement of tectonic plates. We can consider patterns of rhythmic variation—rhythmicity—that affect relationship to place moment by moment, such as the Earth’s rotation, which contributes to the cycles of day and night, weather, and the tides. Fluctuations in electromagnetic fields, gravitational pull, light and sound waves, and air pressure trigger such diverse responses as the migration of the monarch butterfly and the opening and closing of the night-blooming datura, as well as influencing our human moods, biological rhythms, actions, and interactions.

Sangam Ritual Series, sculpture by Michael Singer. Aspen Art Museum, Aspen, Colorado. Photograph by David Stansbury.

RHYTHM

The concept of microscopic and macroscopic perspective can seem distant. But a film called Powers of Ten, made by the husband and wife team, Charles and Ray Eames, in 1977, offers direct experience. It begins with two figures lying on a picnic blanket on the shore of Lake Michigan in Chicago; then in ten frames to the second, we move by steps out into the universe until we are out of the galaxy. Then we reverse the process, returning in dizzying speed to the couple on the lawn. But then we go further: through the skin and inside the body into the cells, electrons, and empty space—as far in as we were out, to the power of 10. It stretches our imagination to watch this ten-minute film. I have seen it many times, and each viewing leaves me breathless, as it exposes the macrocosmic and microcosmic patterns that underlie our lives.

When we went through the Grand Canyon by raft, we passed from recent time to distant past and back in seven days—a journey of three billion years at least. The river was the connecting link, moving us through time. When we stopped at Redwall Cavern, a natural overhang (some 500 feet wide and 150 feet deep), our guide pointed out a crinoid “sea lily” stem fossilized in limestone, resting on the fine sand beach (400 mya). Tracing its curves, I reflected on spiral patterns present today in the chambered nautilus, with its mathematically exact proportions, and also in the Milky Way galaxy, in a single strand of muscle fiber, and in our DNA. I felt the delicate beauty of an early attempt at efficient form, a rhythmic pattern amplified through time.

Understanding place also requires a microscopic view to discern the primary building blocks that comprise our universe. Scientists have postulated that the universe is made of molecules (groups of atoms), atoms (made of particles), and subatomic particles held together by such basic forces as gravity and magnetism. Since the general acceptance of quantum mechanics in the 1940s, the distinction between matter and motion has been blurred. Pārticles, or waves, sometimes described as energy fields, constitute all aspects of our universe as far as we know, disrupting any notion of fixed and solid matter. Stars, trees, dogs, the paper of this page, and our bodies are composed of the same fundamental particles. In this view we can recognize the interconnectedness of cosmological community: humans are inextricably linked with the universe as an unfolding evolutionary process. As Carl Sagan reminds us, “We are made of star stuff. Our whole being depends on the universe.”

Big patterns are both frightening and hard to perceive. Part of the pleasure or terror involved in engagement with the natural world can be a feeling of insignificance as we recognize ourselves to be a small part of a much larger whole. Stories have been created throughout human existence to help explain the origins of life and our place in the cosmos. Models reflecting religious, philosophical, poetic, and scientific views are available, although the scientific is dominant in contemporary Western education. Based on posing questions, observation, and testing, scientific ideas are presented as theories that change when new facts are discovered. Sometimes, several theories exist simultaneously until one is proven more accurate. It is useful to remember that at the advanced level of every discipline, there are more questions than answers. Our individual insights may provide new perspectives on the stories that shape our lives.

Creation Myth, drawing by Micha Sam Brickman Raredon, age seven.

According to contemporary astrophysicists, an explosion about 4.6 billion years ago formed an interstellar cloud of gases (mostly hydrogen and helium) and dust (containing carbon, silicon, oxygen, iron, and other elements) that eventually formed our solar system. Within this swirling cloud, gravitational forces attracted dust particles from the dense gases and combined them to form solid rocks, building up massive globules called cold planetisimals. Thus, about 4.5 billion years ago, according to the geological record, the planets of our solar system were forming.¹

The extremely hot proto-sun at the center of this swirling mass began to radiate heat and light into the galaxy. The planets close to the Sun, including Earth, were literally baked by this “external heat engine.” The Earth’s earliest atmosphere, created from the release of gasses from its interior due to heat and chemical reaction, lasted only a short time because of a weak gravitational field. Gradually, Earth retained a suitable atmosphere to modify temperature and allow the first life forms to develop. The chemical composition of this 40–60 mile thick gaseous envelope has evolved several times, affecting and being affected by life forms on the surface. Light from the massive fire of the Sun travels 93 million miles before arriving at Earth’s surface—a journey that takes about eight minutes. Gravitationally bound to the Sun, planet Earth rotates on its axis every 24 hours, circles the Sun every 12 months, and orbits the center of our galaxy, one orbit every 220 million years.

It is speculated that the Earth was initially composed of the same materials at all depths. However, gravitational collapse and the disintegration of radioactive materials produced an “inner heat engine,” which warmed the Earth and possibly created oceans of molten rock. As the liquid, boiling-hot surface of molten rock gradually cooled and formed a crust, the heaviest materials, like molten iron, were gravitationally drawn to the center. Through time, the Earth developed differentiated layers, unique chemically and mineralogically from inner to outer. This included a solid iron inner core and a liquid iron outer core (that together constituted one third of the mass of the Earth), a partially molten mantle, and a light rock crust, with no continents or oceans. The oldest rocks that have been found on Earth, offering evidence of these changes, are dated at 4 billion years.

Energy flows naturally from hotter areas to cooler areas, and volcanoes erupted and spewed their molten contents, including gases, solids, and liquids, full of chemicals, up to the surface. One theory suggests that this process changed the chemical composition of the atmosphere from a mixture of hydrogen and helium gas, held in by the Earth’s gravitational field, to a mixture of gasses that included water vapor, carbon dioxide, and nitrogen. It is also postulated that meteorites, partially composed of chemically bound oxygen and hydrogen, bombarded the Earth, releasing these chemicals as water vapor and increasing the water resources of our planet. High up in the

TIME LINE:

4.6 bya	Explosion and interstellar cloud of gases
4.5 bya	Earth forming
3.8 bya	First water
3.4 bya	First life, photosynthetic bacteria (single cell)
1 bya	First sexual reproduction
750 mya	Multicelled organisms (cell colony)
500 mya	Hydra and starfish (radial symmetry)
400 mya	Bony fish, first land plants and animals (bilateral symmetry)
350 mya	Amphibians and insects radiate; coniferous trees
280 mya	Reptiles radiate
250–200 mya	Pangaea and Panthalassa
225–65 mya	Dinosaurs
180 mya	First small mammals and birds appear (reptiles rule)
135 mya	Angiosperms (flowering plants) widespread
65 mya	Continents in current positions
50 mya	Early primates radiate (hunkering)
22 mya	Early apes (brachiation)
5 mya	Hominoid/hominid (ape/human) split
3.7	Homo erectus (bipedal alignment).
2 mya–
10,000 ya	Glaciers (widespread 65,000 ya)
1.8 mya	First stone tools
130,000–
75,000 ya	Homo sapiens

Dates indicate longer, overlapping periods of time; they also change with new findings. bya, billion years ago; mya, million years ago; ya, years ago

The first time I went snorkeling forever changed my view of life on land. There, below the undulating surface film of the Caribbean, was an underwater world as complex and diverse as any I had known. Trigger fish with their tiny mouths, colorful parrot and butterfly fish, angelfish with vertical stripes, serious-looking grouper and schools of ephemeral bonefish moved through the waters. Amid the living corals, sea plants, and algae, undulating sting rays, giant sea turtles, creeping starfish, and sand dollars inhabited this unique terrain. Later I learned that familiar mountains and valleys are also present in the sea floor, a vast expanse covering two-thirds of the globe. In fact, John McPhee reminds us, in Annals of a Former World, that what is topsoil becomes ocean floor, and what is ocean floor becomes topsoil in a continuous rhythm of change.

Marine protozoa, radiolaria.

Earth’s evolving atmosphere, it was cool enough for water vapor to condense into liquid water; it is possible that rain occurred over millions of years, creating the first oceans. Sedimentary rocks, marking the earliest presence of water on the earth, have been dated at 3.8 billion years.

Molecules of many chemicals were washed out of Earth’s surface rocks, and shallow pools eventually filled with diverse groupings. One theory suggests that, when conditions such as temperature were right, a unique combination occurred that included molecules called amino acids; another theory postulates that amino acids came to Earth as a component of meteorites. Whatever their origins, amino acids became part of complex molecules that could make copies of themselves, and these molecules were incorporated into cells that could then replicate.

The elements that compose amino acids and cell structure are actually part of larger cycles. Carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus are crucial to the existence of all living things. Carbon is stored primarily in deep oceanic sediments (and is essential for building physical structure and storing energy); nitrogen is present in gaseous forms in the atmosphere (and is a large component of many enzymes that break down carbon compounds and release energy for the body’s use); and phosphorus is bound in the continental crust, where it weathers and becomes available for uptake (for the building blocks of DNA and cell membranes). To exist, all organisms depend on consistent ratios of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus cycling through the land, water and atmosphere.

Cells are the structural building blocks of all living beings. As the first living organisms, they exhibited the basic characteristics of life: the ability to reproduce, metabolize, and respond to changes in the environment. Earliest life forms were single-celled prokaryotes, similar to modern-day bacteria. The geological record shows that, about 3.4 billion years ago, self-feeding (autotrophic) prokaryotes, like blue-green algae, evolved; they could make their own food through photosynthesis, a metabolic process using carbon dioxide, water, and sunlight to form simple sugars for energy storage. From these unique, single-celled, photosynthetic bacteria, more complicated forms evolved, such as plants that could also make their own food, converting sunlight to organic matter by photosynthesis and releasing oxygen. This process once again changed the chemical balance of the atmosphere.

According to the fossil record, bacteria were the only organisms for the first two-thirds of Earth’s history, dating back over 3.4 billion years ago. They reproduced exact copies of themselves by cell division. Sexual reproduction, combining genetic material from two parents, began around 1 billion years ago. Multicellular plants and animals first appeared 750 million years ago. The first land plants and insects evolved around 400 million years ago. The first birds and mammals developed over 180 million years ago. It has been 65 million years since the dinosaurs disappeared. Glaciologists tell us that over the past 2 million years and as recently as 10,000 years ago, large glaciers covered the North American and Eurasian continents and smaller glaciers occupied alpine valleys. Evolutionists remind us that hominids have walked the Earth for a mere 5 million years, with anatomically modern humans, Homo sapiens, appearing in Africa around 130,000 to 75,000 years ago. Reflecting on underlying patterns of temporal evolution offers a perspective of other than human scale to our present experience of place.

The theory of plate tectonics, or continental drift, has been generally accepted since the 1960s, suggesting that Earth’s crust is divided into about twelve continental plates that float on the partially molten magma of the mantle and move with convection currents. It is proposed that 400–500 million years ago there were continental blocks (paleocontinents) whose movements and collisions are recorded in mountain belts. Although the specific locations of these early blocks are conjecture, fossil records and rock compositions help geologists configure their possible locations. Geologists propose that some 250 million years ago tectonic plates collided to form a single massive continent, called Pangaea, that stretched from pole to pole, surrounded by a universal ocean, Panthalassa. Around 200 million years ago the supercontinent separated into land masses that would eventually become the northern continents (Laurasia) and a southern supercontinent (Gondwana).

The northern Atlantic ocean was formed around 180 million years ago, when the northern continents formed a crack, followed by sea floor spreading, which separated Eurasia and the Americas. The southern Atlantic ocean was created around 130 million years ago when South America broke away from Africa. By 65 million years ago, India was connected with Asia, and Australia separated from Antarctica, producing planet Earth as we know it today. Plates continue to collide, affecting mountain ranges above and below sea level, with results such as volcanoes and earthquakes. They also slip past one another, as in the San Andreas fault in California, resulting in bedrock drop.

Glaciers once covered most of North America, and many of the features of our current landscapes are products of glacial activity. Over the past 2 million years and as recently as 10,000 years ago, glaciers advanced and retreated several times. They wore down mountain ranges; deposited large rocks (glacial erratics), pebbles, sand, and clay; and created lakes, ponds, and deltas. Around 65 thousand years ago glaciers covered nearly 17 million square miles of Earth’s surface, and sea levels were more than 400 feet lower than today. Land bridges connected previously separated areas, supporting migrations to new territories.²

Musician Mike Vargas speaks of rhythm as “when things happen.” He explains that it has to do with the timing of events within a given time frame: there is rhythm in a moment and there is rhythm across a span of hundreds of years.” Consider the placement in time of a cough or of the periodic eruption of volcanoes along the Pacific Ring of Fire. “Listen to the sounds around you for ten minutes,” he suggests. “Note when they happened, for how long, and how they interact in time: the on-goingness of a waterfall, the chirp of a cricket, a blast of a car horn.” In his view, rhythm is everywhere in a landscape, including the words on this page.

TO DO

Bonding with gravity10 minutes

Lying on your back in a comfortable position, eyes closed:

• Let your weight be supported by the Earth. Notice any part that seems to be “hovering” weightlessly above the surface. Try to soften or melt all of your body toward gravity.

• Now lift your head about an inch off the ground, feel its full weight and relax it back to the Earth.

• Lift a leg off the ground; feel its weight; relax it to the Earth.

• Lift your pelvis off the ground; feel its weight; relax it to the Earth.

• Lift an arm off the ground; feel its weight; relax it to the Earth.

• Notice your full body weight resting on the ground.

• Begin slowly to pour the contents of your body toward one side and roll onto this surface (bring your arms along). Feel your weight drain into the Earth.

• Continue to roll slowly, pouring the fluid contents until you are resting on the front of your body. Release your “bellital surface” into the ground.

• Roll, very slowly, onto the remaining side, pouring your contents.

• Return to your back and nestle your whole body into the ground.

• Slowly begin the transition to standing, remaining aware of your fluid contents moving with the pull of gravity.

• In plumb line, remain in open attention, noticing any sensations (thoughts, emotions, images) that occur. Add vision and continue awareness of gravity.

Bonding with gravity underlies all other movement patterns. We must be able to release our weight down in order to push away, stand, walk.

Timeline45 minutes

On a large piece of paper, alone or with a group:

• Draw a timeline of the history of Earth, from the origin of this planet to the present day. It does not need to be an actual line; consider other ways of representing time. Include information you remember from your studies and details from textbook sources.

• Find a scale that spans millions and billions of years, as well as recent history.

• Add three dates that are unique to your area of study or interest: the birthdate of Martin Luther King, the date humans landed on the moon, or the first performance of The Rite of Spring.

• Write about the origin of your version of the evolutionary story: teachers, films, books, church lessons, photographs, talking to friends, family discussions, visits to museums, television shows, computer games.

• Read your story aloud to yourself or a small group; show (and revise) your timeline.

De-evolutionary sequence45 minutes

Begin standing in vertical alignment, eyes open:

• Let your plumb line fall forward to initiate a walk, like Homo sapiens, moving with multidimensional agility 130,000 to 75,000 years ago (ya).

• Explore your earliest hominid heritage in the African savannas, sharing food in family groups, before the erect stance, 5 mya.

• Reach your arm up and grasp a branch with your hand, brachiating like our early ape ancestors to locomote through the treetops, 22 mya.

• Pause and squat, hunkering on a branch along with other early primates. Feel the arch of your foot grasping the tree branch, eyes and hands free to pick food and groom and to communicate with others in your community, 50 mya.

• Travel down to the ground, like a shrew or other small mammal, 180 mya.

• Move through the land like an early dinosaur, using your big tail, 225 mya.

• Crawl or creep on your belly, like your reptile ancestors, 280 mya.

• Slither like your amphibian ancestors, moving between water and land. Imagine a salamander, needing a wet environment for survival, 350 mya.

• Swim off into a muddy pool, out to the ocean, leaving behind the first land plants and insects. Feel the undulations of your bony fish spine, 400 mya.

• Explore the mobile radial symmetry of the starfish. Attach to the ocean floor like the hollow vessel of the sea squirt, feeding as water flows in and out, 500 mya.

• Imagine yourself part of a cell colony, unique but interconnected, like a coral or sponge, 750 mya.

• Return to the integrity of a single cell, like a photosynthetic bacterium floating in the ocean, responding to sunlight, 3 billion years ago (bya).

• Imagine yourself participating in the fluid matrix before the cell, the raining down of the first ocean waters, 3.8 bya.

• Reflect on the erupting of volcanos from the molten core, changing the chemical composition of earth and atmosphere, 4 bya.

• Consider the differentiating of layers as Earth formed, the cooling of the crust, 4.5 bya.

• Consider yourself part of a swirling gaseous cloud, one of the tiny particles of an exploded star forming the basic building blocks of our universe, 4.6 bya.

• Pause in open attention. Write about your experience. Read aloud, feeling the ground as you speak.

Place Visit: Attention to underlying patterns of Earth30 minutes

Walking to your place, eyes open, let your arms swing freely. Notice the rhythm of your walk and the contours of the land. When you arrive, stand in vertical alignment, eyes closed, and notice postural sway. Imagine the surface of the Earth moving under your body, the planet rotating on its axis, the solar system revolving around the Sun. Open your eyes, but keep your imagination active. Attend inclusively to the sensations of moving body and moving Earth. 20 min. Write about your experience. 10 min.

FARMSTORIES: SOIL

Each July when I was a child, we would drive the thirty miles to the Illinois State Fair and catch up on the farming news. We would drink fresh-squeezed lemonade, ride the double ferris wheel, visit our favorite displays, like the giant cow carved from butter, and walk through the animal barns. But in the hot and heavy afternoons we would go to the farming tents and try to judge the quality of a product by the personality of the salesman. We were given hats with their names, rulers and pencils for the kids, and pamphlets about fertilizers, hybrid seeds, pesticides, and herbicides. We chose Van Horn Hybrids, wore their hats, remained family friends.

Into our dark, rich soil we placed the fertilizers, eliminating the need for the fields of alfalfa to rest the earth. Into our dark, rich soil we placed the herbicides, eliminating the need for the carloads of high school students earning summer money by pulling the weeds from the corn, tending the crops that would fill their plates in winter. Into our dark, rich soil we placed the hybrid seeds, eliminating the rows of waving seven-foot-tall corn, replacing them with shorter stalks, more ears, denser rows—increasing the yield, decreasing the prices. The story is familiar. Rachel Carson told it well. Lick the tip of your finger, and on your tongue you will find many chemicals developed since World War II, most of which we know very little about.

It is was when writing about the dark, rich soil of Illinois that I found tears in my eyes. “There is no more topsoil in Kansas,” my neighbor tells me. Hearing that there are twenty thousand insects for every square foot of soil cheers me up. There they are engorging, aerating, resuscitating the earth. I’m not really a lover of insects, but the idea that some species takes soil seriously makes me happy.

Place your bare feet on the earth. Feel the ground beneath you. Know the connection.

Read aloud, or write and speak your own story about soil.