The Magnificent Earth

Simply put, the Grand Canyon is awe-inspiring. Even if you don’t appreciate the forces of nature required to produce this landscape over millions of years, and the convergence of different factors – the power of the Colorado River, the fundamental bedrock geology, climate regimes that sustained the sculpting over eons – necessary to produce this awesome wonder, the breathtaking scenery alone, right here and now, is enough. And there are the cultural associations as well, with the Indian tribes’ long affiliation with the great chasm.

We kind of have a landscape here in Jamaica with the kind of power to captivate the imagination and ponder the forces of nature that occur over geological time, and how the products of these forces can inspire. I’ve said publicly before that I believe the Cockpit Country is the second most dramatic landscape in the western hemisphere. There has been so much hullabaloo in the local media and environmental circles about phantom mining of (non-existent) bauxite in the Cockpit Country, and the arguments have almost exclusively been based on biological/ecological grounds, not realizing that the region is far more significant globally for the physical landscape than its ecology (the Cockpit Country’s ecological significance doesn’t quite compare to the Amazon’s or Borneo’s, but its geomorphological significance is world-class).

The protection and preservation of these treasures is critically important, but it’s also important to place arguments into the proper context. Natural wonders such as the Grand Canyon and Cockpit Country are gifts that keep giving; they’re not going anywhere. The proper exploitation (I chose that word deliberately) – ecotourism or recreational tourism, bioprospecting, and, yes, even mining – of these gifts yield countless benefits without having to deprive us of these wonders. It all requires and depends on responsible people doing responsible things to preserve this magnificent earth.