This chapter provides the metaphysical foundation for the Nature-Technology Political Spectrum by demonstrating that its two poles are in genuine zero-sum conflict for physical resources and processes. It begins by establishing that all physical matter exists on a continuum between nature (independence from human activity) and artifact (human-made objects). The core argument is that technology, as the predominant category of artifacts, fundamentally opposes nature by reducing the naturalness of the world through both the conversion of natural matter into artifice and the augmentation or replacement of natural processes. While acknowledging common ground against non-functional or unintended artifacts (e.g., pollution), the chapter concludes that the allocation of all residual physical material remains an antagonistic, zero-sum problem. Finally, the chapter tackles key metaphysical challenges, including the objection that artifice is intrinsic to human nature and the problem of locating the human being on the continuum. It resolves this by concluding humans are semi-natural and semi-artifactual, maintaining that choices regarding technology increase or decrease humanity’s relative proportion of naturalness. This proven, orthogonal metaphysical trade-off between the two values is illustrated by the incompatibility of the Naturalist and Technologist utopias with each other, while each of these utopias is fully compatible with all four quadrants of the traditional political spectra.