Naturalism is a personal philosophy of life and everyday living. (El Niño special feature)

El Niño Phenomenon special feature

Naturalism is a personal philosophy of life and everyday living

Naturalism offers practical solutions to the many undesirable effects of excess capitalism being inflamed by consumerism - and the strong El Niño phenomenon* we are currently facing. Naturalism speaks of a healthy and harmonious relationship between man and his environment which is the key to the principle of sustainability. - AVRotor

 Dr Abe V Rotor

  Living with Nature - School on Blog

 

Harvest Time, mural detail by the author. 

 Air pollution, Paris France 

All over the world people are "going back to Nature." They eat food grown without or least chemicals, wear clothes made of plant fiber, live in homes designed with the natural landscape.

They have learned to avoid genetically modified food, cuisine of unknown ingredients, and vitamin capsules claiming panacea. They shun from drug dependent medical treatments.

They find more time with family, friends, hobbies and relaxation. They have become wiser to know the difference between necessity and want, affluent and austere living.   

Many are moving out of the city and settle down on homestead, or country home in various versions of our own Nipa Hut where simplicity and self-sufficiency make living happy and healthy.  

These new breed of environment-friendly advocates are less dependent on the supermarket and the shopping mall. They have freed themselves in many respects from the burden of postmodern living, a kind of freedom from the clout of a materialistic culture, from the entrapment of corporate domination, from the artificiality of things made beautiful, and from the restlessness in living on the fast lane.  

Challenges of naturalism 

1.  Kamachile tree killed to give way to a road -  a requiem to a small living world.  

Naturalism is not new to us, by human nature we love the environment, we are hurt if it is destroyed; a tree is akin to our well-being as it gives food, oxygen, and shade.

It buffers strong wind and filters dusts. It anchors the soil from erosion as it binds silt before it is washed away.

A half century old kamachile (Pithecolobium dulce) deliberately killed (see girdle) to give way to a barangay road. Bantay Ilocos Sur.

It absorbs carbon dioxide which we and animals exhale, and exchange it with life-sustaining oxygen.

A tree is home of many organisms. The death of one big tree means the death of its tenants and symbionts, and displacement of transient organisms like birds, insects and reptiles. It's indeed a requiem to a small living world.

2. Red sunset - indicator of dirty, poisonous air
It may be romantic, but sad. The air we breath is a potpourri of gases spewed by cars, factories, and products of modern living from automizer to Freon.

Many of these substances do not settle down to earth but remain up in the sky visible as smog, a contraction of smoke and fog. It is the invisible materials that destroy our health, affecting all eight systems in our body with our lungs the most vulnerable and the entry to various organs - heart to kidney to brain. Red sunset means foul air over Metro Manila

When it rains these gases are carried down, funneled by the watersheds down to rivers and lakes and ultimately to the sea. Even areas away of the path - farms and pastures decline in productivity.

It's a long stretch of destruction that continues and worsens as long as pollution is not checked.

And what would be the long term consequences? Acid rain destroys the very base of production. Dioxin, the most potent man-made poison, kills at very low dosage. Rain water is no longer potable, even as it feeds the wells and spring.

3. Rising sea and tidal wave consequences of global warming 

The sea is rising, the shoreline shrinking. 

Because many cities sit by the bay and on river banks, displacement of millions is expected to worsen. On low lying islands in the Pacific like Kiribati of the Micronesian group of islands residents are forced to leave their homes permanently. 

Seaside battered by tidal waves in Morong, Bataan 

We can only imagine how difficult it is to leave home and never see it again.  We call forcible evacuation as ecological migration.    

Swamps are formed and spread out;  salt intrusion destroys farmlands, fishponds are submerged, salination changes the structure and composition of lakes and rivers. To what extent? We can only guess how our children and grandchildren will inherit the worst scenario. 

The Arctic has been reduced to one half, the edges of Antarctica are falling off, the glaciers are disappearing. Greenland is being watched closely - its melting is likely to cause a considerable increase in sea level enough to change the map of the world. 

4. Floods, Floods - Modern Noah's curse

There is flood at any given time and place on earth.

Certain theories are down-to-earth occurrences, like flood.  A fine day and suddenly a thunderstorm dumps water equivalent to a month's rainfall.  

The pattern of rainfall has drastically changed.  Rain forming mechanism is now influenced by loss of green cover, sprawling settlements in megacities, swirling atmosphere stirred by air transportation.

Altered water course by reclamation and dams, pollution in air changing  its composition, abuses in land use policies - or no policies at all.  These among others bring Noah to memory. But didn't Noah - like us - helped cause flood by cutting down forest after forest to build superstructures like Noah's version of a "floating world?"
 
5. Garbage - by-product of affluence
 
Affluence has a bigger and worse by-product - poverty.

Cities make a Janus face, one happy, the other sad; one of high rise buildings, the other of shanties; one of high social standing, the other of marginal existence. 

And yet garbage is a "resource whose use is not being tapped, or yet to be tapped." "Garbage is ones waste, but another's need." These of course are but rhetoric, adages. 

Payatas, Smokey Mountain, and similar sprawling dumpsites all over the world, speak of an antithesis of progress, a world of the poor and dejected, degenerated from the advances of civilization. 

 
Payatas dumpsite in QC, a garbage community
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*El Niño–Southern Oscillation is a global climate phenomenon that emerges from variation in winds and sea surface temperatures over the tropical Pacific Ocean. Those variations have an irregular pattern, but do have some appearance of cycles. The occurrence of ENSO is not easily predictable. El Niño is one of the most powerful drivers of global weather, climate conditions and hunger. El Niño conditions have started and are expected to strengthen through 2026 and continue into 2027, potentially becoming one of the strongest on record and raising concerns for food security in vulnerable regions. WFP and our partners are taking early action now, helping people prepare for floods, droughts and storms before they hit, which also helps reduce humanitarian needs. Wikipedia/Internet

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About the former Living with Nature on the Internet and Radio 

738 DZRB AM with Dr Abe Rotor and Ms Melly Tenorio Mon to Fri 8-9 evening class.  Winner of 1st Gawad Oscar Florendo for Developmental Journalism 

Living with Nature-School on Blog was initiated by the author in May 2010 as a conduit of Paaralang Bayan sa Himpapawid (People's School on Air), offering the website viewer and the radio broadcast audience a simulcast audio-visual session of a particular topic/s for the day. The website (avrotor-blogspot.com) made the lessons available jointly or independently open worldwide.        

Within the period May 2910 to July 2015 alone, there were more than one million pageviews.  Topics of interests (top ten) were indicated, so with the participating countries, on daily, weekly and monthly basis other than the continuing total visitors record. PBH audience, other than blog viewers, were monitored by its sponsors (DZRB-PBS), which has 32 stations nationwide and worldwide access on the Internet. There were two satellite websites - Naturalism - The Eighth Sense and A Naturalist World of Dr Abe V Rotor. Selected articles from the Blog  were published in a series of books (Living with Nature Series), and in the author's column (Okeyka Apong) in Bannawag Weekly Magazine.  
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Let's Save the Endangered Giant Clam (Tridacna gigas)

Let's Save the Endangered Giant Clam (Taklobo)*

Dr Abe V Rotor

Living with Nature School on Blog [ avrotor.blogspot.com ]*

Former Professor, UST Graduate School

Author and his students lift a living specimen of the Giant Clam 

(Tridacna gigas) from its natural habitat during an on-site study

off the coast of Masinloc, Zambales.

 

A seven-kilogram Tridacna gigas is examined by students in 

Environmental Science from the UST Graduate School

Natural habitat of taklobo at 6 to 14 feet on coral reef 

of San Salvador Island, east of Masinloc, Zambales.

Facts about the giant clam, Tridacna gigas.

1. In the Philippines it is called taklobo. It is the largest living bivalve mollusk and one of the most endangered clams.

2. It lives on shallow coral reefs of the South Pacific and Indian oceans, up to 20 meters deep.

3. It weighs more than 200 kilograms (440 pounds), and measures as much as 1.2 m (4 feet) across. It has an average lifespan in the wild of 100 years or more.

4. Although larval clams are planktonic, they become sessile in adulthood. Growth is enhanced by the clam's ability to grow algae in symbiosis. The creature's mantle tissues act as a habitat for the symbiotic single-celled dinoflagellate algae (zooxanthellae) from which it gets its nutrition. By day, the clam opens its shell and extends its mantle tissue so that the algae receive the sunlight they need to photosynthesize.

5. T. gigas reproduce sexually. They are hermaphrodites (producing both eggs and sperm), but self fertilization is not possible. Since giant clams can't move across the sea floor, the solution is broadcast spawning. This entails the release of sperm and eggs into the water where fertilization takes place.

Let's save the giant clams. It's better to be assured they are alive on the seafloor than to have their fossils in our home.~

 

Tridacna in its natural habitat - lighted seafloor.  Right, Tridacna graveyard. 

Shell is highly prized for locally and for export.  Collection and selling 

of Tridacna shell is strictly prohibited. 

 

Mrs Cecilia Rojas Rotor, author's wife. poses before a giant Tridacna shell as holy water receptacle in Mount Carmel Church, QC

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*Why are giant clams endangered in the Philippines? Giant clams, which can weigh up to 200kg and live for more than a century, face an existential threat from illegal poaching – and very likely organized crime – which has spiked in the last few years across Philippine and Indonesian waters, conservationists have warned. Internet Apr 26, 2023

References: Living with Nature by AVRotor; Marine Biology: An Ecological Approach by JW Nybakken; Wikipedia.

 Lesson on former Paaralang Bayan sa Himpapawid with Ms Melly C Tenorio 738 DZRB AM Band, 8 to 9 evening class, Monday to Friday

Take a Break with Nature. (Article in Progress)

Take a Break with Nature

Dr Abe V Rotor

“Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.” 

– Lao Tzu

 

Red cabbage, nature's progeny of diversity,

ruined by genetic engineering, lately,

global warming besieging our planet today,

man's interference and folly to pay. 

 

Cheers! To our old folk's technology,

revival of the basi wine industry,

at par with Champagne, Port, Sherry,

pride of our pre-colonial history.

Next to the real things in the city,

are memories of nature on the wall;

re-enactment inspires our resolve

to make a better world for all. 

“Adopt the pace of nature. Her secret is patience.”

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

Open the gate, set yourself free

    from confinement of Good Life;

Nature awaits you in the country,

sans worry, stress and strife.

“Earth and sky, woods and fields, lakes and rivers, the mountain and the sea, are excellent schoolmasters, and teach some of us more that what we could learn from books.” — John Lubbock (Lubbock made significant contributions in archaeology, ethnography, and several branches of biology.)

 

It is a new world, second part,

renaissance in our times today;

through new generation's art,

save our living world, we pray.

 

Nature's game is universal, joyful and sane,

just keep with her rules, and be her friend.

"A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor and his leisure; his mind and his body; his education and his recreation." – Anonymous (often attributed to L.P. Jacks)

EcoArt 2: Paint Nature on Old, Ugly Walls

EcoArt 

Paint Nature on Old, Ugly Walls

"Make a forest grow on dead concrete,

in our hearts, joy and reverence." - avr

Wall Murals painted by Dr Abe V Rotor

A child from the neighborhood delights in hugging a make-believe 

concrete tree before a wall mural background painted by the author 

at his residence in QC Metro Manila

The magic of art is transformation:

ugly to beautiful,

ruthless to kindness,

useless to valuable,

aesthetic to functional,

dull to creative,

academic to practical,

prosaic to expressive,

static to dynamic,

passive to active

fantastic to realistic,

inertia to momentum,

ad infinitum.

"We build too many walls and not enough forests." 

(A nature-inspired twist on Isaac Newton's famous bridge quote)

Cover the scars of the city with the wildness of the earth.

Concrete can bleed, but concrete can also bloom.

Abandoned walls, visible and invisible,

disturb our peace, but who cares?

The essence of mythology and history,

 forgotten in time and space.

Relics and ruins these walls stand for,

affront to dignity and beauty;

cruel to the eye, fateful and uncaring,  

waking up our guardian's  duty.

Outer side is replica of the inner side,

like Blake's analogy of a dog 

starving at its master's gate predicts

the ruin of state, a prologue.

Art, art, wake up to this urgent call,

cover the scars of indifference,

make a forest grow on dead concrete,

in our hearts, joy and reverence.

"Imagine a city where everyone could draw whatever they liked... 

awash with a million colors." — Adapted from Banksy, a pseudonymous England-based street artist, political activist, and film director. He has never publicly confirmed his identity.

Bring home the stream, valley, trees 

filled with birds and breeze;

art, for thou art sacred and beautiful,

to these children after school.

"Painting from nature is not copying the object, it’s realizing one’s sensations."

— Paul Cézanne (French Impressionist painter)

   Old wall transformed into waterfall,

for birds to gather from the sky,

   abode in the wildlife like our home,

all creatures that crawl and fly.

"If you can paint one leaf, you can paint the world." 

— John Ruskin, an English polymath – a writer, lecturer, 

art historian, art critic, draughtsman and philanthropist. Wikipedia

Picnic by a wall mural of nature,

game and make-believe gesture.

"Nature is painting for us, day after day, pictures of infinite beauty." — John Muir,

"Father of the National Parks", a Scottish-born American naturalist, author, environmental philosopher, botanist, zoologist, glaciologist, and early advocate for the preservation of wilderness in the United States. Wikipedia

Imagine the wall, bare and empty,

without these kids, jolly and happy.

"To the artist there is never anything ugly in nature." — Auguste Rodin

(French sculptor generally considered the founder of modern sculpture.)

*Painting a nature mural on a cracked, weathered, or "ugly" wall is a powerful act of transformation. It uses the organic textures of decay to breathe new life into a space.

Here are curated quotes and sayings—ranging from art history masters to urban poetry—perfect for pairing with, or inspiring, a nature wall transformation. AI Overview

"I paint flowers so they will not die." — Frida Kahlo,

(Mexican painter whose were greatly inspired by the nature and artifacts of Mexico.) 

Reverse Evolution in Man's Hand in 10 scenarios

  Reverse Evolution in Man's Hand in 10 Scenarios

“Man has reversed the process of evolution and he has put into his hands the pattern and trends as he wishes, playing the role of his Creator.” - AVR

Dr Abe V Rotor

Reversed Evolution, acrylic painting by the author 2022

1. The world everywhere, from the tundra down to the rich tropical forests, faces unabated threats to wildlife destruction, as human activities continue to defile nature not only of its flora and fauna but of natural habitats.

2. While the target of conservation is the protection of plants and animals particularly those that are considered to be facing extinction and are being endangered, the greater concern of ecology is the protection of natural habitats and ecological systems.

3. On another front of human activities often characterized by man’s quests for the “good life” through industrialization he believes to be the prime mover of progress and development, the production of unwanted by-products threatens the earth’s dynamic processes, Already the emission of gases from burning fossil oil has resulted to two serious consequences; thinning of the ozone layer, and the building up of heat of the atmosphere resulting to global warming.

4. As human population continues to escalate which is going to double the present 8 billion mark within a decade, more and more people now believe that only by heeding the Malthusian prediction that our world may be spared of unimagined scenario of mass starvation and death.

5. On the other hand, quests for new frontiers of science has led us to the fore – unlocking the code of heredity that may soon replace conventional breeding, resulting thus far in the production of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO) and Genetically modified Food (GMF).

 

6. The other frontier is man’s interplanetary travel beyond the distance of the moon, and for such ambitious adventure, man will have to learn to adjust to life in space and in the planets, he targets at visiting. Interplanetary travel takes years, many years Into the unknown man carries the environment of the earth in a capsule or bubble. Space biology studies not only the effect on man but to plants and animals as well – some kind of man-made ecological system in space. We have virtually started a new field, space ecology.

Ecological devolution in acrylic by the author

7. If a third world war is to come, what kind of war is it? People are in a quandary, even those who are witnesses of the last world war and different wars after that. On media, a third world war is really global and the enemy stalks, respecting no boundaries of politics, culture and faith. It will be a war everyone is concerned of – real or psychological, covering the ultimate warfare materiels - nuclear, chemical and biological.

8. On the concept of human habitat, how ideal can planning get close to it has been demonstrated in some models, which is far from the answer of what a human community should be. The crux of the problem is in drawing up a treaty between nature and man. Could this be an alternative to cities and high rise buildings?

9. Terms like ecotourism, ecomigration, ecozones, etc. are jargons often disguised economic programs, rather than ecological in purpose. As such, projects of this kind must be reviewed in the light of ecology rather than economics.

10. Zero waste management is ideal, it is a utopia of a modern world. But looking at the experiences of industrialized countries like Japan, Germany and Norway waste is just another resource waiting to be tapped. Why not? Isn’t garbage the excess of our wasteful luxurious living? ~

"Let's connect our children with Nature in everyday life.."

"Let's connect our children with Nature 

in everyday life."(Internet)

Living with Nature Center

San Vicente, Ilocos Sur

Wall mural of nature attracts children from the neighborhood

Dr. Abercio V. Rotor is a Filipino environmental advocate, educator, writer, and former government official best known today for his “Living with Nature” philosophy, his books such as Living with Nature in Our Times (National Book Award, 2008), and his leadership of the Living with Nature Center in Ilocos Sur. AI Overview

Dr. Abercio V. “Abe” Rotor is a contemporary Filipino figure whose work spans ecology, education, literature, and public service. His influence today is rooted in environmental advocacy, sustainable living education, and cultural preservation.

Key Roles and Contributions
1. Environmental Advocate & Author

o Promotes the Living with Nature philosophy, a holistic approach to ecological awareness, sustainability, and mindful living. blogspot.com

 

Living with Nature Center at San Vicente, Ilocos Sur

o Author of award‑winning books, including:

  .The Living with Nature Handbook (Gintong Aklat Award, 2003)
  . Living with Nature in Our Times (National Book Award, 2008)
  . Living with Nature in Our Home and Community blogspot.com

2. Founder & Head of the Living with Nature Center Located in San Vicente, Ilocos Sur, the center serves as:

o A botanical garden and wildlife habitat
o A community learning hub for ecology, agriculture, and culture
o A family museum and heritage site
o The center integrates art, nature, and education, reflecting Rotor’s lifelong advocacy. blogspot.com

3. Educator and Cultural Worker

o Conducts workshops, lectures, and community programs on ecology, sustainable living, and Filipino heritage.
o His blog Living with Nature – School on Blog continues to educate readers on environmental ethics, agriculture, health, and culture. blogspot.com

4. Former Government Official

o Served 22 years in government, including as director of the National Food Authority and consultant on food and agriculture in the Philippine Senate (1976–1989). blogspot.com
o Advocated for integrating economics and ecology in national development policy.
His Relevance “In Our Times” Internet

Today, Dr. Rotor is regarded as:

o A leading voice in ecological consciousness and sustainable living in the Philippines

o A mentor to students, researchers, and communities seeking practical environmental solutions

o A cultural steward preserving Filipino heritage through writing, art, and community engagement

o A public intellectual whose teachings resonate amid climate change, food insecurity, and environmental degradation

o His work remains influential because it connects environmental science with everyday life, culture, and national identity. Internet

Outdoor Summer Art Workshop at the Living with Nature garden,

San Vicente, locos Sur