Nature and Culture

This article develops a theoretical framework for trust in science. The framework is created to facilitate analysis of the growing environmental youth movement’s trust in and relation to climate science. This article provides a critical review of previous theoretical discussions of trust in science–public relations and recontextualizes and continues the discussion. This is accomplished by adopting a discourse analytical perspective on trust, knowledge production, and the construction of social order. The study shows how trust and the assessment of trustworthiness lie at the core of knowledge production and the construction of social order as well as how a problematization of trust as a truth-accepting practice is essential to understanding the growing environmental youth movement and its relation to science.

This article aims to explore the assumptions and implications of the iconic representations of human–geosphere intersections using geopolitical theology concepts to overcome the current mathematization of space as the main impediment to achieve spatial justice. Based on the ideas of noosphere and pneumatosphere, developed by the prominent Slavic figures of the 20th century, V.I. Vernadsky and P. Florenski, the authors suggest that geoethical dilemmas as backcasting prospective modeling may help to explore contingent scenarios that go beyond institutional frameworks and political ecology analysis. The article describes the current situation in human–geosphere intersections and explores the problem of mathematical models as a scapegoat to deal with ontological uncertainty, and finitude as the main problem of the Anthropocene based on the cultural paradigm of Technopoly.

Amid accelerating environmental and socioeconomic shifts, cultural landscapes and Indigenous lifestyles form a dynamic, reciprocal system, continuously reshaping each other. This article presents a conceptual framework exploring how transformations in cultural landscapes influence Indigenous practices, which in turn shape future landscape evolution. The framework operates across three interconnected levels: external forces, landscape changes, and community effects, emphasizing interaction pathways and feedback loops. Through systematic application to the Balinese Subak system, this study demonstrates the framework’s utility in decoding complex transformation processes. Key findings reveal that communities maintain cultural continuity through dynamic knowledge integration combining traditional wisdom with modern innovations. Rather than simple replacement, hybridization processes create social-ecological arrangements maintaining both cultural integrity and adaptive capacity, informing policy and conservation strategies for cultural landscape management.

Pewen (Araucaria araucana) and Pewenche (people of the pewen) have been affecting each other’s ecology and survival for centuries. Pewenche have been shaping pewen forest ecology by moving seeds, planting trees, protecting them from threats. In turn, pewen is fundamental in Pewenche economy, culture, and spirituality. The meaning of pewen for Pewenche people is related to their historical and reciprocal interactions, or living with pewen. In this article, I am going to argue that by living together, pewen and Pewenche have been making each other, or engaged in a process of becoming-with. Also, this interaction shapes how pewen conservation is understood. Pewen and Pewenche entanglements challenge conservation efforts rooted in a human–nature dichotomy. Ignoring this relationship reinforces social inequalities and reproduces colonialism through conservation.

Gina Caison. 2024. Erosion: American Environments and the Anxiety of Disappearance. Durham and London: Duke University Press.

Jonathan Staal. 2024. Climate Propagandas: Stories of Extinction and Regeneration. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.