Simard: Just fine without us. I have two daughters and so I have to care. I went to university with a lot of cynical people. And I thought, this is no way to live your life. I don't really have a choice. I have an obligation to my children. I put them here on this earth and I'm going to look after them as best as I can.
Hawkins: That's a fair comment. That would be the motivating factor for anybody with kids. It's their future. And really their Earth. We shouldn't be leaving them something that's unmanageable or something that they have to work so hard to keep alive.
Simard: I work a lot with Aboriginal people and in Canada and, you know, they have a responsibility, they feel an obligation to their culture and their families and their communities. And they take it very seriously, like their culture and ceremony and art. And it's all about their obligations to the Earth and to the generations coming after them. And I asked my postdoc research assistant, who is Aboriginal, what do you do with these sociopaths or the narcissists? And she says, well, we essentially shun them. They get dispatched to the woods, we get rid of them because you can't have a sustaining society with these crazies in there. And I thought, yeah, you know, in our society, we vote them in to become presidents of the United States, for Pete's sakes.
Hawkins: Shows you how gullible we are.
Simard: We've lost our way. Right. We've lost that really important feeling of responsibility that, you know, it's not about rights. It's about responsibility, too. And that's what really makes me mad about this whole rights thing -- you know, gun rights, and 'I'm not going to wear my damn mask. It's my right.' It's like, come on, you also have a responsibility.
Hawkins: What do you say to folks who consider such tree studies fey, say it's just an exercise in anthropomorphism?
Simard: Yeah, I get that. I get that. I think it's a real European kind of way to dismiss things. It's like as a scientist, it's almost like saying you're cheating or you're not a good scientist. And to me, it's like it's an essential part of what we're doing, because when we remove ourselves from science, like, say, we're the objective observer and we're above all that, which, you know, is the attitude that we have dominion over nature, that we're superior, that we're just objective observers. Well, missing so much of the picture when we do that. And we don't see nature as equal with us, that we are dependent and interdependent. And, you know, the trees are as important to us, for example. And so, you know, bringing me into the science, I think, is an essential part of teaching or helping people understand that we are all in this together. We're all one. We are part of this world. The trees, the poles, the birds, the bats are our relations too and we need them all. And I think that this this anthropomorphizing is just a copout. It's bullshit.
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