Man Vs. Nature

One day, the sun and the wind watched a poor, lone traveler as he made the long journey back to his home. The wind said to the sun, "watch, I will blow strong enough that he loses his cloak". And so the wind blew and blew as hard as it could, but the man just held his cloak tighter and tighter to keep himself warm. Then the sun said "watch me, I can get him to take off his cloak much more easily". The sun grew brighter and brighter such that its golden rays warmed the man until he took off his cloak and carried it in his arm. "Look", said the sun as it gloated to the wind, "it is I who am more powerful than either you or him". After many days, the man reached his home where he was warmly greeted by friends and family. He shared with them the news he'd learned from far-off places during his long journey. The desire to gain new knowledge is why he had set out in the first place. There was a feast to celebrate his return, and thereby, he reluctantly related the story of the wind and the sun.

No one in his village believed him except the blacksmith, who was not well-regarded anyway. The blacksmith said to the traveler "let us make a bond now, so that your children and my children might learn from each other. In this way, our descendants will never again be helpless against the forces of nature." It was so, and as the generations came and went, the descendants of the two men kept a close relationship with each other. Eventually, one of those descendants became adept at predicting the weather, and so the machinations of the sun and wind were foiled to an extent. Though the traveler and the blacksmith were long gone by this time, the lessons they taught to their children had a power not even the grave could overcome. The sun and the wind, now angry at the power of mankind, went to complain to their good friend death. Death was a proud fellow and mighty as well. As it heard the tale of the sun and the wind, it conspired a way to humble mankind and teach them a lesson.

In his fiendish workshop, Death brewed up various plagues with which to cull the human herd. When the time was right, Death unleashed the plagues, and all across the earth, people fell stricken with various diseases. The air was filled with coughs, moans, and the stench of the dead. Once more, the descendants of the bond set to make things right. By this time, they had formed a powerful guild which had spread to many lands. The guild worked not just to solve whatever problems arose, but to constantly study nature so as to increase their knowledge. They had discovered and invented a few medicines already, which helped stem the tide of the new plague, but there was still much more work to be done. The wisest among them collaborated and thus developed a much more thorough understanding of sickness. Armed with this new knowledge, they were able to create new medicines which cured the plagues Death had unleashed. Thus, mankind was saved once more from the ravages of nature. 

Centuries passed, and mankind grew more prosperous and numerous than ever before. Nature herself was beginning to get worried, for although humanity was one of her many children, she saw that they were throwing the world out of balance. Reluctantly, she made it so that a huge volcano would erupt. The ash cloud spread into the sky and all around the earth whereby it blocked out the life-giving sunshine. Crops began to wither, and the weather got so cold that the time was called "the year without a summer". Harvest after harvest failed, food became scarce, and famine became commonplace. Countless people starved, and this time, the guild was powerless to help them. Nature, feeling pity for humanity, relented and let the climate return to normal. The guild did not want to get caught off guard again, and so they worked to build up a food surplus and also to breed new crops and livestock for greater fertility and resilience. If such a disaster could happen once, it could happen again, they reasoned.   

In time, the human population returned to where it was before the year without a summer. The world was out of balance again, and so Nature decided it was time to take action once more. This time she made it so that huge swarms of locusts would devour the crops. Despite the best efforts of the guild, which was now more powerful than any government, it was fighting a losing battle against the insect menace. By a stroke of luck, they developed a poison which was only fatal to the locusts. However, by the time it was deployed, huge numbers of people had starved to death, for the food surplus was not enough to last the siege of the locusts. Nature saw what she had wrought and again relented. She sent mild winters so that humanity could recover from the disaster. The world's population began to rebound, but this time much more slowly. There was a great fear that the locusts would return, and since the poison was the only defense, it was being sprayed proactively. Although the poison did not kill anything besides locusts, it did reduce human fertility. It took years for the guild to notice this and determine the reason. This led to a great debate.

If the poison was not used, the locusts might return to inflict the same calamity. If the poison continued to be used, human fertility would be reduced which would make it more difficult to recover from some other disaster. The wise men and women of guild, who now called themselves scientists, decided to determine what was the maximum number of people the earth could support under various scenarios. By an extraordinary coincidence, the number that was determined to be sustainable indefinitely was very close to the number Nature preferred to keep the world in balance. Various efforts were made to stay close to that number, and humanity prospered as never before, for that had all kinds of technology and few natural disasters to worry about. Nature looked down on them with kindness and satisfaction as the world was balanced and at peace. Centuries passed, and the old lessons were unfortunately forgotten. The population grew and unbalanced the earth, just like before. Nature let out a weary sigh as she guided a huge meteor on a path to collide with the earth. Before, she had grown tired of the dinosaurs and now she was tired of humans. Such is the way of things.