has a blueprint for what is required for a balanced and diversified
community. For example, a healthy river that is carrying energized
water will create on its banks trees that it needs to keep it cool and
protect its vitality.
James Lovelock and Lynn Margulis recognized this creativity by
naming the Earth 'Gaia' after the classical Earth goddess. They
described how the Earth behaves like an organism, and how the
conditions for life on our planet are maintained within very narrow
limits, in spite of the enormous variation in the Sun's radiation, and
the effect of harmful cosmic rays. This seems to work in a similar
way to the self-regulating system in the human body that maintains
the blood temperature in the narrow range essential for health
(around +37°C/98.4°F). A mechanistic scientist would insist that
this is just a computer function, but computers don't operate with
purpose and meaning.Spiritual science
To say that purpose and meaning are more to do with belief or
religion is, I believe, a mistaken view. Purpose can be ascribed to
living systems. Watch a community of bees at work, and there is
a significant purpose! Meaning is usually associated with sen-
tient beings. Being creatively human is difficult without a sense
of meaning in one's life. Schauberger didn't talk much about God,
but as we shall see he recognized in the extraordinary fecundity
of Nature, and indeed in all of her processes, an indisputable
sense of meaning and purpose. If it makes more sense to you, call
it 'spiritual' science.
It is not necessary to postulate a God that created every living
thing and who is behind all the subtle energies in Nature. Proba-
bly the idea, found in so many religions, of God as a being like
superman whose support can be called on for your little or big
power plays is in much the same category as that of regarding
Earth's resources as private property for exploitation. The concept
of co-creation — that all of creation participates in and con-
tributes to the creative process, is often more acceptable to the
thoughtful searcher.
We are clearly influenced by the beliefs of the culture into which
we are born. The worldview of contemporary Western society rep-
resents an enormous shift away from what has been the norm of
HIDDEN NATURE