“In every step through nature one receives
much more than one is looking for”.
— John Muir
Some years ago, when I was still a young beardless young man, I met Ulises. He was a
writer and a professor of Logic at the high school where I began to study when the
summer of that year had only a few days left. During the course of my academic life I
always studied in a closed classroom, until Ulises, a few days after starting the course,
took the class for a walk through the gardens that guarded the high school building.
After a few minutes a portentous shadow marked our halt: in front of us and from above,
an ancient ahuehuete (which in Nahuatl means “old man of the water”) without a name
was silently watching us.
Every two weeks Ulises took us to the house of the ahuehuete to give us the class of
Logic; without realizing it, the reasoning of one of the branches of Philosophy slipped
almost naturally into our memory, to the point of becoming entangled in the synapses of
each one of us (the students of the third group of the first year). Having the voice of
nature as background music while Ulises taught us how to use truth tables provided us
with a serene scenario ideal for determining whether the conjunction of two propositions
was true, false, or contingent.
Within the wide repertoire of benefits that being in a natural environment can offer us
during the learning process —benefits that you can experience in Logic classes— we
have the possibility of promoting physical activity; our anxiety and stress levels
decrease, making it easier to concentrate on the teacher's words, while the
development of relationships with the other members of the class improves.
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