Our planet’s environment and ecosystems may have shaped human development and society, but humans have transformed the planet in the pre-modern world. The study of pre-modern human-nature interactions provides insight into how human perceptions of the environment have changed. We seek to understand and learn how society and its relationship with nature evolved. The multifaceted environment is expressed in geography, geology, biology and its divisions, and philosophy. Multidisciplinary thinking creates the complete picture and reveals the peculiarities of human interactions and natural phenomena.
We seek to understand human nature, life, activity, and thought in their interaction with the rest of nature through changes induced by time. How does the ecological history of the world take shape and through what eras has passed? It is worth starting the discussion by saying that culture and nature have always walked side by side, and this acquires a somewhat blurred framework. The man was interested in the environment and incorporated it into his worldview.
The ecological history of the world reflects how humans perceived nature and incorporated it into their everyday lives, constantly altering the environment for their needs. The pre-modern era included many transformations on the part of humans: the first settlements, the accidental burning and disturbance of ecosystems and the changing composition of soil and rivers (Fitzgerald et al., 2018). These random and situational transformations were not like intentional harm, as a society looked for ways to cope with conditions for which evolution had not yet prepared.
Evolution is expressed in the formation of adaptations to environmental conditions. Changes in the environment for some generations led to new conditions for others, who had to adapt to the environment or change it to retain strong traits. In the Paleolithic era, one of the significant adaptations that took place – man made the first tools and learned what labor was. All the subsequent environmental transformations took place, which took hold and became part of the new era.
Paleolithic was characterized by periods of climate change, which forced humans to evolve and adapt to cold or hot conditions. Homo erectus, the first upright primates, existed during this era and could subdue fire and use it to their advantage, even though it may have caused occasional fires. The Lower and Middle Paleolithic embraced primitive forms of labor and socialization, but the active transformation of the environment led to the emergence of Homo sapiens – in the Upper Paleolithic.
The Upper Paleolithic was the heyday of Homo sapiens, where active socialization began. The changes in thinking and consciousness that were taking place led to the fact that man could learn how to use nature effectively. Homo sapiens learned how to calculate the migration of animals and how to hunt; they learned the plant life and were able to cultivate them (Fitzgerald et al., 2018). The animal and nature cults emerged, leading to worshipping certain species and assigning their significance. However, as muscle mass accumulated from meat products, society had to find fiber and water sources. Thus came the cultivation of crops, and a new era in human evolution began.
By the Upper Paleolithic, the Ice Age was over, and the climate became warm and comfortable for agricultural activity. The tools of everyday life and labor became more sophisticated to make products suitable for food from the crops grown. The emergence of agriculture was multidirectional: different resources and environmental conditions forced adaptation and development (Fitzgerald et al., 2018). Pre-modern agricultural society learned to use nature for its benefit by transforming it for crop and livestock production (Staubwasser et al., 2018). Farming was laid down to prolong the lives of communities, maintain health, and establish themselves in one place so as not to be tied to animal migration or weather changes. The shift to agriculture led to a society freely dispersing in search of suitable land and water resources that would allow for successful crop cultivation.
It is worth noting that the interactions between human beings and nature throughout history are the natural result of the planet’s transformation. Evolution is the factor that has evolved the relationship between humans and the environment, making it more and more complex and orderly. Taking this into account allows us to trace every moment of human history and understand why we have perfected the cultivation of valuable plant and animal species for so long. All of this knowledge together indicates that without the role of pre-modern humans in changing the environment, it would not have been possible to achieve modern successes in dialogue with nature.