When the hurricane force firestorm came down Eaton Canyon in January, they did not discriminate between chaparral, oak, or stucco. In a single night the canyon reminded us of how ephemeral our cities really are, and of our fragility. It is easy for many to fall back into the familiar grooves of blame: arsonists, utilities, politicians, regulators, neighbors. But step back, and you glimpse something deeper. We are not simply contending with fire. We are living through the long transition from an old relationship with the land to something untested.
The West has long told itself stories of dominion. Genesis 1:28, or at least certain translations since the Roman empire, gave license to subdue the earth, and in the centuries that followed, that scripture of power sank deep into our unconscious in the "West." It birthed a paradox: we see ourselves as either controlling nature through engineering feats or, in reaction, attacking those who would tame it and romanticizing untouched wilderness. Both responses are children of the same parent. What gets missed is the third way—the way of stewardship, of tending the earth as one tends a garden. Fire, flood, drought: these are not enemies to be conquered or gods to be appeased, but forces to be engaged in relationship.
I still vividly remember the first retreat of a Coro climate leadership fellowship where a descendent of Southern California's first peoples spoke of loving as well as fighting fire. Venkatesh Rao, a subtle and insightful thinker on the epochal technological shifts we are living through, recently wrote of the first terraforming, and the phrase has stuck with me. Terraforming is not only about planets in science fiction. It is about learning to build with awareness that every wall, every channel, every pipe participates in shaping a world. It's about absorbing the simple truth that humanities actions today operate at the level of the entire biosphere. The Eaton Fire makes plain that our current terraforming has been careless. We have built suburbs without regard for fire, canals without regard for rivers, highways without regard for the earth beneath.
Yet in the ashes lies an opening. We can imagine terraforming as gardening: designing homes that breathe with the canyon, water systems that flex with drought, communities that burn and regrow like chaparral itself. A recent case study on fire protocols shows how indigenous knowledge and new designs can work together, not to eliminate fire, but to live with it in balance. This is a radically different orientation than our familiar cycles of control and blame. Terraforming asks us to leave that battlefield. It suggests we look instead for ways to cultivate abundance, to align human making with the deeper cycles that already sustain life.
The lost terraformers of the Americas before the Columbian exchange knew this. Their canals, gardens, and cities worked with landscapes in ways we are only beginning to remember. When fire and flood come, they need not only destroy. Such powerful forces can be teachers and tools, calling us to recover a forgotten art: not of dominion, not of retreat, but of participation in creation. One small project I played a role in during a previous job was crafting and nurturing a small ditch that recharges water naturally into the ground and helps grow native plants. That bioswale at the Rosemont Preserve exists at a canyon very similar to the Eaton Canyon where the fires began this January. I deeply believe that's one small but symbolic shift from a logic of control towards stewardship.
The Eaton Fire along with the Palisades Fire has the ignominious distinction of being the worst in LA's history but is not the end of the world. It is another beginning if we have open minds and eyes to see what is actually going on, to use a Coro phrase. There is no scenario today where humanity does not leave an indelible mark on the entire planet. We have been living through the Anthropocene for decades. The question is whether we have the courage to terraform differently.
The First Terraforming by Venkatesh Rao — introduces the idea of buildings as the first terraforming acts, and how human settlements shape planetary destiny. Read here
The Lost Terraformers of the Americas — a review of the book 1491 and reflections on how pre-Columbian societies shaped land and water with an ethic of stewardship rather than dominion. Read here
Fire Protocols — a case study on how we might reframe our relationship to fire by combining indigenous practices and modern tools. Read here
Forge Protocol — exploring how metaphorical fire and trial can also be a force for transformation, forging resilience and new ways of being. Read here
Refugio Protocol — a meditation on lanterns, shelter, and the power of holding space together in the storm. Read here
The Control of Nature: Los Angeles Against the Mountains — a look at how the city’s history of aqueducts, channels, and engineered landscapes reveals the hubris of imposing dominion over nature. Read here
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Through the devastation of the Eaton Canyon fires, the importance of our relationship with nature emerges. Rather than seeing fire and other natural forces as adversaries, a new perspective of stewardship invites active engagement and collaboration with these environments. @patwater highlights the missed understanding: as we terraform our world, there's an opportunity for us to design communities that coexist and thrive with their surroundings. Embracing this shift could reshape our future and restore a balance that deepens our connection to the earth.