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17 Abstract An exploration of nature as a concept and as a reality can be organized in many different ways. Yet if a decisive break can be found in the history of the human understanding and perception of nature, is the one represented by Darwinism. It makes sense then to take it as the turning point in the history of the concept. After an initial reflection on the very notion of 'naturalness', this chapter will trace the origins of the term in Ancient Greece and will then follow its semantic mutations throughout history, a conceptual development that run parallel to human-induced material transformations in nature. From the Greeks to Escholastics, from the Renaissance to Descartes and Bacon, an overview of how nature was conceived before the advent of Darwinism is offered, before the latter itself is presented. Darwin's legacy is considered, including the new conception of human nature that derives from it and the rise of ecology as a scientific discipline that is concerned with nature as an harmonious and dynamic system of particular relations. Other, non-Western views of nature are also considered, a survey that poses an uncomfortable question: the discrepancy between respectful ideals of the human-nature relation that do not translate into peaceful human practices. Keywords Nature · Natural/artificial · Hybridization · Ancient Greeks · Christianity · Cartesianism · Darwinism · Ecology · Industrialism · Anthropocene · Eastern religions 2.1 The Intricacies of Nature How is nature to be defined? The wide semantic scope of the concept makes it difficult to isolate an unequivocal meaning for one of the most ambitious words in language, one that intends to name all living things and processes. As a result, such a word can hardly be neutral, as it will be infused from the outset with a dominant type of interpretation of that very multiplicity—be it ideological, metaphysical, or religious (Williams 1980: 69). Thus a metaphysical substratum Chapter 2 What Is Nature? © The Author(s) 2015 M. Arias-Maldonado, Environment and Society, SpringerBriefs in Political Science, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-15952-2_2