2018 / Environmental Generational Amnesia, Urban, Virtual nature

Technological Nature and Human Well-Being

Citation

Kahn, P. H. (2018). Technological nature and human well-being. In van den Bosch, M. & Bird, W. (Eds.), Oxford Textbook of Nature and Public Health: The role of nature in improving the health of a population (pp. 160–164). Oxford University Press. doi.org/10.1093/med/9780198725916.003.0003

Link to file

Technology is steadily replacing real nature with substitutes: a video of a forest playing on a screen, a robotic pet, a garden tended online from a couch. These replacements may feel pleasant, but they are not the same thing. Researchers reviewed three forms of technological nature: a nature window, robot pets, and a telegarden. They found that while interacting with these substitutes is better than experiencing no nature at all, it is measurably worse than interacting with the real thing for physical and psychological well-being.

Accepting these substitutes over time is problematic. When people’s deepest experiences with nature come through a screen, they begin to treat the substitute as normal and the standard for what counts as a healthy relationship with nature trends downward with each generation. This is environmental generational amnesia: no one recognizes the loss of nature because no one has experienced the healthier baseline to compare it against.

When people lose touch with what real nature feels like, they also lose the ability to imagine what thriving communities could look like, and they ask too little of urban sustainability, settling for cities that are technically alive rather than places where people genuinely flourish.

Abstract

In terms of physical and psychological well-being, does it matter that on a worldwide level we are replacing interactions with actual nature with technological nature—technologies that mediate, simulate, and augment the natural word? Research from three forms of technological nature are reviewed: a technological nature window, robot pets, and a telegarden. Results suggest that while interacting with technological nature is better than nothing, it is not as good as interacting with real nature. A concern with accepting technological nature is that it can shift the baseline downward for what counts as optimal well-being, as people across generations lose experiences with healthy baselines, a process referred to as environmental generational amnesia. One result is that we ask too little of the idea of urban sustainability, confusing biological living with human flourishing.