In "To Build A Fire" what do the dog, weather and man represent?

This story is designed to show the might of nature and how
man is still subject to various natural forces that are beyond our control. Even though
man has become the master race in so many ways, this story reminds us of how fragile we
are and how nature is still stronger than we are.

Thus we
can argue that the weather, and in particular the intense cold that eventually kills the
man, symbolises the strength of nature. The man himself symbolises the arrogance of man
in ignoring the might of nature and his own fragility. Note how the follwing quote makes
reference to both the weather and the man:

readability="12">

Fifty degrees below zero meant eighty-odd
degrees of frost. Such fact impressed him as being cold and uncomfortable, and that was
all. It did not lead him to meditate upon his frailty as a creature of temperature, and
upon man's frailty in general, able only to live within certain narrow limits of heat
and cold, and from there on it did not lead him to the conjectural field of immortality
and man's place in the
universe.

Note the way that
the cold is clearly linked in with the power of nature, and the man is shown to be
unable to grasp his own "frailty." Interestingly, the dog, throughout the story seems to
be able to do what the man cannot. He is an instinctual creature, and as such, he
recognises the danger inherent in the freezing cold conditions, although the man is
blind to this, having lost or distrusting his instincts. Although we are told that the
dog did not know anything about "thermometers," the narrator tells us that "the brute
had his instinct," which is what saves it and ensures that the man
dies.