[SinJin]

I agree with you TinyTree that since we have reached a level of self awareness, we must make conscious decisions to construct a future that we want. Like you said, we certainly could sit around at let the world become polluted and say "well, that's just nature", but of course then we would be left with a rotting planet, and no one wants that.

I guess the point I was trying to make is that we can use the word "manmade" to convey the idea that something was created by a human, instead of growing from the ground. But in the larger view of things, I don't think there is much of a difference. Nature created man, and man created the car, so nature created the car. There was nothing else that intervened during the process, no otherworldly consciousness or intelligence that acted apart from nature.

I still believe that everything acts within the laws that govern the universe (the toe) including intelligence and consciousness. I don't think it would be accurate for an alien race to look back on humans and say "wow, they really went against nature and destroyed themselves", because no matter what we do, we're acting under the direct influence of nature.