For centuries, we’ve had an intuitive sense that connecting with “nature” is good for our wellbeing. But what’s the hard evidence? What exactly is “nature” anyway? Should we be wary of it being prescribed as a catch-all cure for complex problems? And what impact does nature writing itself actually have? Science writer Lucy Jones talks to Alice Bloch about her prize-winning book ‘Losing Eden’, which surveys the mass of research – from the work of Carl Jung to cutting-edge neurology, medical and social science – on why our minds need the wild.
If you want access to more fresh thinking, why not subscribe to New Humanist magazine? Head to newhumanist.org.uk/subscribe and enter the code WITHREASON to get a whole year's subscription for just £13.50
Hosts: Alice Bloch and Samira Shackle
Exec Producer: Alice Bloch
Sound Engineer: David Crackles
Music: Danosongs
Image: Gemma Brunton (photo), Ed Dingli (artwork)
Reading list:
Lucy Jones (2020) ‘Losing Eden: Why Our Minds Need the Wild’
Richard Mabey (2005) 'The Nature Cure'
Mary-Jayne Rust (2020) 'Towards an Ecopsychotherapy'
Carl Jung, collected works.
Richard Smyth (2019) ‘In search of the "nature cure"’, New Humanist magazine.
Inside The New Space Race, with Nicholas Schmidle
Black Resistance and Racist Policing, with Adam Elliott-Cooper
(M)otherhood and Choice, with Pragya Agarwal
Quantum Physics & Philosophy, with Carlo Rovelli
Bonus: Rutger Bregman and Philippe Sands - Are Humans Naturally Good? From How To Academy
Learning from our ancestors, with Alice Roberts
How to Fix the Internet, with Chris Bail
Writing and Recovery, with Michael Rosen
The Cosmos & Us, with Jo Marchant
Deporting Black Britons, with Luke de Noronha
Activism and Belief, with Rosemary Hancock
Desire in the age of Consent, with Katherine Angel
Looking back in anger at 'Cool Britannia' with Jason Arday
Escaping the logic of work, with Mareile Pfannebecker
Sensuous knowledge and black feminism, with Minna Salami
The symbolic power of charity, with Jon Dean
Taking sex robots seriously, with Kate Devlin
Faith, fraternity and the Orange Order, with Joe Webster
Introducing With Reason
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
The Modern West
Just Dumb Enough Podcast
Voices of Misery Podcast
House of Whimsical Terror
Stuff You Should Know
Timcast IRL