The nature–culture divide is the notion of a dichotomy between humans and the environment. It is a theoretical foundation of contemporary anthropology that considers whether nature and culture function separately from one another, or if they are in a continuous biotic relationship with each other.
In East Asian society, nature and culture are conceptualized as dichotomous (separate and distinct domains of reference). Some researchers consider culture to be "man's secret adaptive weapon" in the sense that it is the core means of survival. It has been observed that the terms "nature" and "culture" can not necessarily be translated into non-western languages, for example, the Native American scholar John Mohawk utilizes the term nature to describe "everything that supports life on the planet," specifically when discussing the limits of science to ever fully understand nature's complexity.