Man and nature
approaches to the delimitation of concepts
pp. 135-147
in: Jan Selmer Methi, Andrei Sergeev, Basia Nikiforova (eds), Borderology: cross-disciplinary insights from the border zone, Berlin, Springer, 2019Abstract
The very phrase «man and nature» implies a significant difference or even an opposition between these two forms of the living world existence. At first glance, the difference is obvious: man came out of nature, which is determined by the natural scientific laws, and built up his own world of culture, in which life is governed by social norms and laws. But we encounter some serious problems trying to draw a well-defined border between man and nature. These problems manifest themselves in two fields: in man (in opposing of biological and social bases of his behavior) and the world as a whole (in comparison of its two parts—natural and human (social, cultural)).