Why the Smithsonian’s new natural history exhibit proves we aren't strip-mining fast enough

The Smithsonian Natural History Museum’s latest exhibit, “From These Lands,” is a sweeping tour through the geological and biological heritage of every U.S. state. From the petrified wood of Arizona to the horseshoe crabs of Delaware, it aims to connect visitors with America’s vast natural history. I walked through the vaulted halls on Tuesday morning, taking in the sheer scale of the continent’s biodiversity. And as I stared at a magnificent slab of Pennsylvanian anthracite coal, I felt a profound sense of peace wash over me. I realized, perhaps for the first time, that we are doing exactly what the Earth intended.

There is a prevailing sentiment among the conservationist set that human industry is somehow an intrusion upon the natural order. This is, frankly, unscientific. When you look closely at the exhibits—the glittering veins of Colorado silver, the dense, combustible layers of the Dakotas' shale—you are not looking at a fragile ecosystem begging to be left alone. You are looking at a planetary cry for optimization. In a very real sense, the wetlands of Louisiana were merely waiting for us to invent the chemical refinery.

Take the California pavilion, for instance. The curators have dedicated an entire wing to the towering coastal redwoods, presenting them in a hushed, reverent light. But strip away the sentimental lighting, and what are you really looking at? Millions of board feet of premium, weather-resistant decking just standing there, rotting from the inside out while contributing absolutely nothing to the quarterly earnings of any publicly traded home goods supplier. The exhibit frames the age of these trees as a miracle. I see it as a grotesque failure of the timber supply chain. Leaving a resource in the ground for two thousand years isn’t conservation; it’s terrible inventory management.

I brought this up during a panel I moderated last month in Davos alongside the CEO of ExxonMobil and a former NASA administrator. We were discussing a recent Nature paper on the rapid depletion of the Ogallala Aquifer, and the mood was unnecessarily grim. I pointed out that the water isn’t gone. It has simply been structurally reallocated into the much higher-yield form of industrial alfalfa and high-fructose corn syrup. We haven’t destroyed the aquifer; we’ve promoted it. The exhibit in D.C. makes this exact point, albeit subtly, by placing the prehistoric fossils right next to the gift shop where you can buy them encased in synthetic resin. The evolutionary arc bends toward monetization.

I sought out the museum’s staff to confirm my hypothesis. They were, predictably, a bit too close to the subject matter to see the big picture.

Exactly. Unchecked exploitation would be inefficient. What we need is highly structured, deeply capitalized exploitation. Cresswell’s findings actually support my premise: the ecosystems are irreplaceable, which means their market value will only increase as we systematically replace them with strip malls. Scarcity drives innovation. The majestic passenger pigeon didn't go extinct; it was merely out-competed by the far more statistically significant poultry industry. It was a natural market correction.

The Gulf Coast display is similarly plagued by this narrow, tree-hugging orthodoxy. It spends an inordinate amount of floor space mourning the loss of coastal marshes, entirely ignoring the breathtaking artificial reefs we’ve seeded in the Gulf of Mexico. I am speaking, of course, of the offshore oil rigs. During a private luncheon last spring with a senior executive at Chevron, we discussed how these magnificent steel leviathans provide vital attachment points for barnacles and a resting place for exhausted migratory seagulls. The fossil fuel industry is, quite literally, building new habitats. Yet the Smithsonian focuses exclusively on the pelicans we occasionally coat in crude oil—a mechanism of natural selection that is merely testing the birds' aerodynamic resilience.

Linwood’s hostility is typical of the academic left, who refuse to recognize a successful replication of the primordial ooze when they see one. If a little petroleum in the water was good enough to kickstart single-celled life four billion years ago, there is no reason to assume a few million barrels won't accelerate the next leap in aquatic evolution.

Walking through the exhibit’s section on the American West, I marveled at the sheer volume of unused space our ancestors had to contend with. Entire states composed of nothing but dirt, scrub, and the occasional highly territorial ungulate. The sheer logistical triumph of paving it is staggering. When a wolf pack is displaced by a six-lane interstate, we are not witnessing a tragedy. We are witnessing the apex predator of the Holocene epoch—the multinational infrastructure conglomerate—claiming its rightful territory. It is Darwinism functioning at a corporate scale.

This is the breakthrough the environmental movement refuses to accept. They look at a mountain and see a sacred monument. I look at a mountain and see an inefficiently arranged pile of rare earth metals currently blocking a highway expansion. If the mountain didn't want to be flattened, it shouldn't have been composed of such highly profitable ore. The universe is a harsh place, and peer review has consistently shown that sediment is no match for a bucket-wheel excavator.

As I left the museum and stepped out onto the gloriously concrete expanse of the National Mall, I felt a deep connection to the pioneer spirit. We are not separate from nature; we are its ultimate expression. The Earth spent four billion years meticulously cooking fossil fuels beneath its crust, and it would be profoundly ungrateful of us not to burn them. The natural history of America is a beautiful story, but like all history, its primary purpose is to clear the lot for new construction.