Bad start on page 4 and 5 by creating and enforcing a false dichotomy between the human and natural; between "the natural and the human world" (pg 4).
The author wants us to agree that humans are not natural by convincing us that the work of humans is unnatural. Or at the very least that only some of what humans do can be considered natural and that it should somehow be distinguished from the unnatural. Like all animals, humans change the environment they live in. Following this same chain of logic, we must wonder why the author doesn't profess views that the ant hill is the unnatural work of the ant, beaver dam as unnatural creation of the beaver or bird nest as the unnatural work of the bird. This doesn't seem carry any overt contempt for humanity but at a minimum there is a clear misunderstand or disregard the nature of humankind that one should be hesitant to introduce to your children.
Worse yet, the authors don't grasp the scope of human change in the environment when they point to a river and claim "it was there long before people came to live near it" (pg 4). This is a dubious example given how we do reroute rivers to suit our own ends and once rerouted are no less likely to build near it shortly afterwards as before routing it as long after doing so.
The above knocks this down to 2/5 stars despite that the problem only exists on pages 4 & 5. It is tempting to knock another star for the use of the Gall-Peters projections without comparisons to other projections... but I guess it is first grade work and easy enough to supplement with other projections and a globe.
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