Natural environment

Natural environment means all living and non-living things that are naturally on Earth.

In a narrow sense, it is an environment that is not influenced by people. The environment that is influenced by humans can be called "the built environment" or cultural landscape.

Terminology

For some, there is a difficulty with the term "natural environment" in that nearly all environments have been directly or indirectly influenced by humans at some point in time. In order to address this concern, some level of human influence is thus allowable without the status of any particular landscape ceasing to be "natural." Many natural environments are the product of the interaction between nature and humans. For this reason, the term ecosystem has been used to describe an environment that contains nature, and includes people. It follows then that environmental problems are human or social problems. Some also consider it dangerously misleading to regard "environment" as separate from "people."

Etymology

The roots of Natural Environment can be simply defined. 'Natural' can be described as something that occurs naturally, or of its own accord, on Earth. 'Environment' can be described as the surroundings of an object.

Related pages

• Ecology
• Environment
• List of environment topics
• Natural capital
• Nature

Other websites

• Wiki Good Globe
• European Environment Agency (EEA).
• EEA multilingual environmental glossary
• EU Environment Directorate-General
• Rehbar Development Foundation — Development Foundation/Organization working on Environment, Education and Health