A Civilization Built On The Shoulders Of Giants,
How much of our rocket building society do we owe to trees? Much, much more than the credit and reverence human society gives them.
For starters we literally owe our humanity to them. Stepping up on the evolutionary hierarchy from digging-rats to monkeys, from claws to fingers with opposable thumbs would be impossible without branches.
Trees are the instructors and learning devices that shaped those ancient paws we used to bury ourselves away from predators, into the hands we used to build civilization.
Besides hands, they shaped our long arms, long legs, and highly mobile shoulders. The tridimensional maze of branches is also the thing that made us have such a high degree of head movement.
The wonderful colored vision we have, and all the ways it enriches our experience, is a consequence of a genetic mutation that was further selected because it served our ancestors to identify ripe fruits from the background canopy. Thus we acquired an extra type of cones that opened a whole new chromatic spectrum.
Fire is one of the stepping stones of human civilization, and it wouldn’t be possible without wood. Burning logs has helped us stay alive in the most extreme conditions, resisting ice ages and leading to our expansion in the northern hemisphere. Fire is also possible only due to the rich oxygen atmosphere.. and trees release 1/5 of all the free oxygen molecules. Trees and humans breathe together, trees have the pair organs that keep our lungs working.
The modern fire of the industrial revolution is itself based on the huge biomass of dead trees! After decomposing underground, due to pressure and chemical reactions, the energy locked in the trunks turned into our oil and coal.
Trees absorb carbon dioxide through their leaves and break it down, releasing oxygen into the air. One mature tree can produce enough oxygen for up to 18 people, depending on the size and type of tree. Trees also remove particulates, lead and poisonous gases from the air, cleaning it up for us.
Cooking food is thought to be the most important enabler of brain growth in the history of our species. Otherwise digestion itself requires a high number of calories and other bodily resources, so much that the organism would have no extra means to invest in the brain. Without cooking fibrous tubers and leaves with fire, we would of had to eat much more to extract the nutrients, and consequently spend more time digesting. Also fruiting trees considerably enriched our diet.
The resin of various species served as medicine or as a very important adhesive for making tools and hunting weapons. Scientists have found evidence that as far as 80.000 years ago birch bark tar was used in northern Europe, prepared with the help of fire. Otzi’s 5,300 year old copper axe was crafted with birch bark tar.
Wood was the single most important building material in our history. It served to shelter us from harsh weather, to give structure to tables, chairs, ladders, handles, pipes, boats and oars.
We sailed the seas and oceans on ships put together entirely from trees(!), from the ship’s wheel, rudder, masts, to the barrels that stored food and water.
Wooden ships contributed to cultural growth connecting faraway lands, enabling the exchange of materials and know-how.
Another monumental leap in our progress that we owe to trees was the use of the wheel. Our ancestors had to use at least one part made out of wood to make the wheel work, and this carried out up to the 20th century. Carriages, carts, wheelbarrows, they all were made with the use of timber. The dream of flight was itself achieved mostly due to the structural properties of wood.
There is no “human” without trees!
Trees would do fine without humans.. we would not exist without them. Trees are our ancient parents, playmates and teachers, they fed us, protected us, kept us warm, cleaned our air and gave us oxygen. Yet by some unknown reason the only thing i learned in school was that ‘trees produce oxygen’. Our lack of reverence combined with the mindless monetization of our forests are testimonies to our spiritual and moral state.
image: stevenhyatt, wri.org
