Biophilia is the love for living beings, which is genetically coded into humans. It explains why we care for animals and why some people dedicate their lives to saving them. Biophilia is also incorporated into modern architecture to make people feel more comfortable and productive. However, some question the hypothesis, suggesting that caring for animals or the environment may have evolved to change perceptions of others and gain power in society.
Biophilia can be translated as love or desire for living beings. Erich Fromm used the term in the mid-20th century to describe this human longing. However, he really became popular with the publication of the 20 book The Biophilia Hypothesis, which was co-written by Edward O. Wilson and Stephen Kellert.
According to Wilson, and others who support this hypothesis, we don’t love the natural world just because it’s beautiful or emotionally exciting. Instead, we love it because we’re genetically coded to do so, and caring for “nature” is the key to survival. Part of this theory looks at why humans are so attracted to not only human babies but other small mammals as well. From an evolutionary point of view, killing the young of other mammals would be detrimental to the entire population and partly to human survival. So, with few exceptions, we have attached tenderness and affection to baby animals so we don’t eat them and endanger our very survival.
Some humans seem to be more affected by biophilia than others. A sheep farmer, for example, might not ooh and aah at little lambs, but might instead consider them a commodity. Other people may suffer from biophobia and be distinctly uncomfortable in natural environments, hating any insect or animal that might appear or even like grass or trees. Some people, on the contrary, seem to thrive when in outdoor settings or indoor settings that show a lot of nature. An indoor waterfall in a building or office building with large windows and lots of plants can appeal to our innate biophilia and make us more comfortable.
This desire to relate to other natural elements in the world may partly explain why we care for animals and why some people dedicate their lives to saving animals. If something in our evolution has made us particularly susceptible to biophilia, we can only thrive in work or hob that helps us stay connected to some natural non-human element of the world at all times. Certainly, some animals may have evolved biophilia as well, especially towards humans. We may find cats and dogs especially fascinating since they interact with us more than most other animals.
There are some who question the biophilia hypothesis. For example, it doesn’t fully explain why humans evolved to take care of things that weren’t part of their DNA structure and didn’t necessarily have anything to do with survival. Richard Dawkins proposes that caring for other animals or the environment may have evolved not so much because we need to feel connected to nature, but because such caring changes perceptions of others. It makes others feel that we are superior humans, and therefore have an advantage in terms of attracting mates and have more power in society.
There are even some who feel that biophilia is taken to an extreme. Some criticize vegans, for example, for never participating in the killing of animals, to the point that they won’t eat honey because it could kill bees, or eat eggs even when they’re not fertilized. Vegans counter that animals were not put on earth to be exploited. Without saying which opinion is right or wrong, it should be said that the use of animals has been around for about 10,000 years.
An interesting derivation of the biophilia hypothesis is its incorporation into modern architecture. Some buildings are now specifically designed with ‘natural’ and ‘organic’ elements in the hope that the people who have to work there will feel more comfortable and be more productive. This provides a big difference from the typical “cubic” style office of the past, and some companies even allow people to bring their pets to work. The California company AutoDesk is known for its liberal work practices in this regard.
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