Her Biomimicry Institute describes its mission as helping "to solve humanity's biggest challenges through the adoption of biomimicry (nature~inspired innovation) in education, culture, and industry," which includes "the invention of healthier, more sustainable technologies."
Central to this work is rethinking one long~accepted view of life as based on competition. In an interview with Krista Tippett, she reminds us that the term "survival of the fittest" didn't originate with Charles Darwin, but with British philosopher and sociologist Herbert Spencer.
Benyus tells us that Darwin initially spoke of "survival of the fit," and I so love the shift that comes from dropping that superlative suffix. Just three little letters~~e, s, and t~~that together imply big things, like hierarchy, rivalry, victory over another, even a fight to the death. Survival of the fit loses that aggressive edge and stresses something else entirely.
Fit is defined as "in good health," and "of a suitable quality, standard, or type to meet the required purpose." What strikes me about the latter definition is its implication that what is deemed fit must be flexible, changing as conditions alter. Benyus suggests it can also imply "coming back to fittedness," growing new behaviors when former ones no longer sync with current realities.
The first definition also has something to give us. On every measure—immune system response, cognitive acuity, relationship satisfaction, psychological wellbeing—science is quite clear on the qualities that promote good health. Interconnectedness. Kindness. Nurture. Love. Darwin himself argued that sympathy, which today might be called compassion or altruism, is an important ingredient of natural selection, and referred to it as "the almost ever~present instinct."
"Those communities," he writes, "which included the greatest number of the most sympathetic members, would flourish best, and rear the greatest number of offspring." And as these sympathies become "more tender and more widely diffused...they extend to all sentient beings."
Charles Darwin speaking of extending compassion to all sentient beings? Darwin a Buddhist? Who knew?!! Sounds more like the Dalai Lama, who continues to maintain that human nature is essentially good, despite the death of over a million Tibetans from Chinese aggression.
Darwin was not a Buddhist. Nor was he an atheist, having written that "agnostic would be the more correct description of my state of mind." Yet his ideas on the importance of empathy put him more in sync with many faith traditions than we have been led to believe. Science and spirituality not in stark opposition but as partners, each trying in its own way to understand this thing called life. It does my heart good.
As does a quote from novelist Téa Obreht I recently heard in the sweet German film Faraway, now on Netflix. "Come on," Obreht writes, "is your heart a sponge or a fist?" I love everything about that quote. Its compelling tail end, of course, but the gentle, even friendly, nudging of those first two words makes me smile, though when written as a contraction it makes my smile broader.
C'mon indicates that, really, we already know this. We do, don't we? We know that kindness feels better than meanness, that cooperation gives us better long~term outcomes than struggle, that love can ultimately be a more powerful force than anger or hate or greed. To put it another way, we know that having hearts that are more like a sponges than fists promotes optimal fitness.
The choice is ours. We can keep our hearts tightly closed, ever ready to aggress, or we can promote better fittedness, softening to the pain and joy of the world. Benyus, medical researchers, the Dalai Lama, Charles Darwin, and Jesus to name but a few, would encourage the latter.
Another quote came to me recently, this one from poet Lucille Clifton. "In the bigger scheme of things," she writes, "the universe is not asking us to do something, the universe is asking us to be something. And that's a whole different thing."
So what is the universe asking us to be? Perhaps true to our essence, both individually and as a species. We are homo sapiens. Humans who are supposed to be wise, discerning, intelligent, and knowing, which are all meanings from sapien's Latin root sapientia.
Our species name asks us to not close our hearts into fists of aggression, meanness or even simple disregard, but to open them to wisdom and to love, consciously emulating life's genius, recognizing that we are connected one to another and acting out of that recognition. We are asked to let our sympathies become more tender and more widely diffused until they extend to all sentient beings.
Surely something to aim for, no? And that process begins in each moment, with each one of us and amid the individual conditions of the lives we lead. C'mon, my friend, you know it's true. Let's do this.
💖
Leia
