SRI Saturday: Forming Connections
Place a group of college freshman in a secluded place, ancient to the world but brand new to our eyes, and there will be a sense of wonder, perhaps fear, and a desire to explore. Although getting to take time to get to know the island on our own terms was crucial to the “sense of isolation” all of us were encouraged to have, the faculty-led sessions were especially critical when it came to truly understanding the land we were on. Two concepts in particular really resonated with me, not solely because of how they contributed to my understanding of Santa Rosa and its environment, but because of how they contributed to my overall world view.
The first idea was introduced in Allison Alvorado’s discussion of the theory of island biogeography, which describes how the size of an island and its distance from the mainland can be used to estimate the amount of diversity on that particular island. she explained that animals on the island have developed certain adaptations that have caused them to differ from their mainland counterparts. It is a slow evolutionary process but after generations and generations, the island has become a diverse and divergent ecosystem completely unique from anywhere else in the world. The other concept that I found to be perhaps the most profound of everything I learned this weekend had to do with Matt Furmanski’s discussion of how nature is art in and of itself. He gave us a lot of perspective and insight into how Santa Rosa has come to exist in the way it does now in terms of biology and in art- how the island is not solely an academic setting to be studied, but how it has also served as his artistic muse. A recurring theme throughout Matt’s lecture was how we all exert our own forces in this world, the same way that the world exerts forces upon us. He discussed how naturally occurring ripples in the sand and arches in the trees on the island allow something like the wind, which is otherwise an invisible force, to become a tangible, visible component of the environment.
These lessons both developed from an analysis of the distinctive characteristics of Santa Rosa, just through different lenses. Every singular aspect of the environment on the island, from the tiniest insect to the highest-velocity gusts of wind, has created the pieces of a never ending and ever-growing puzzle. The “sense of community” that we were encouraged to find on the island seems to have been two-fold. One, of course, was the sense of a growing bond between the people we came to the island with. The other, however, already existed on the island before we went there. The entire island lives and breathes because each entity there, sentient or not, plays a pivotal role in its overall survival. Like a well-oiled machine, the island must be composed of equal parts art and science, evolution as well as origin.
