EcoRes Forum

[G Dalla Casa]

I am in trouble if we can call "environment":
- a Living Complex of twenty million species of sensing beings;
- all ecosystems on the Earth, that are again sensing beings;
- all connections among them and with inorganic world.
Maybe there is a non-conscious approval of an anthropocentric view, with the thought "environment of man"?
We now know we are in the same position of a kind of cells in an Organism. The Earth is not "our house". But we don't think that a body-mind is the "environment" of neural cells, only for an exemple.
The consequence of the anthropocentric view of Western culture is the attack to Nature, the primate of economy and all what causes ecological problems.
I saw a map of the Earth with different colours in areas, due to heat and/or wastes. The most coloured areas (North Eastern United States, Japan, a part of China, North Italian plains, German Ruhr) made evident the terrible pathology that affects the Planet: economic growth.
That provokes greenhouse gases, wastes, and global warming.
I hope the Earth can stop economic growth in some way: but what is the price?
All the best. Guido

[T Knight]

Hi Guido,

The price is certainly less than the alternatives - if we don't stop economic growth...

We have more than enough money in the world to pay for this 'solution' - but it seems highly unrealistic that this money will be used in this way. When large amounts of money ARE positioned ostensibly for 'good' results, to improve the map which you speak of, the money invariably is attached to Western ways of doing things, which compounds and propagates the problem, and doesn't provide solutions.

Peace,
Tony

[J Bendik-Keymer]

I'm reading a fascinating paper by Steve Vogel of Denison University now. Steve presented it as a conference in September 2008 on climate change and human flourishing. In the paper, Steve argues that the environment is a key concept for conceptualizing the matter and manner of our alienation in capitalism (and I would perhaps add, in modernity, or in productivist economies, which include(d) the U.S.S.R. and P.R.C.). He argues that we should keep our focus on the environment as a concept highlighting the role our production has in shaping our world. And in particular, he uses the notion of the environment to understand how we can be alienated from it.

What I think is right about his approach is that he squares up with a fact about our form of life: we reshape things, and have now reshaped the planet. We make things, and now face making much of the planet a mess for all sorts of contemporary life. Dealing with what we have caused requires squaring up with the out of control effects of our agency. And a good part of that begins by recognizing that we make the world into an environment. We're that powerful, even though we are not powerful -or wise- enough to act as masters of the Earth (and even though the very idea of mastery is in a sense counter-natural). It's in line with thoughts like his that I'd suggest we ought to maintain the notion of the environment.

Now, I agree with the ethical and ecological sentiments underneath your forum topic. The question I'm posing is whether, ironically, it isn't maintaining the notion of the environment -but as linked to self-consciousness of our agency and economic form- that will allow us to get a grip on how we tear through the planet. So I'm not saying it's false or unethical to think of the Earth as a unified biochemical system, one that is -in large measure- self-regulating in that it has strong biochemical tendencies grown as it to check one thing with another and to balance its life support out over geologic periods. I think, rather, that it is ethical and true to think of the Earth in some such light as you are suggesting. My question is whether we don't also need to maintain the notion of the environment to square up with our agency and find a way to stop being alienated from it. For our agency leads out of our control in systemic dynamics that tear apart our world against our better intentions. I think that is Vogel's underlying insight.

[AA Thompson]

I appreciate this distiction between the Earth (as Gaia) and the environment (as, in a sense, man-made) and agree with Jeremy that, rather than demonizing the environment as objectionably anthropocentric, we would do well to face up to the fact that our agency is responsible for the conodition of the environment, which is - in fact - the home to which all life is presently adapted. In fact, it seems instrumentally valuable to come to terms with our relations to the environment (overcomeing our alienation from it) for the sake of the sense in which the Earth is intrinsically valuable.

My particular interest in this, of late, is *what it is to bear this responsibility,* in the sense of wondering what it is to live-up well to the role of being responsible for the environment/biosphere. Whereas Jeremy nicely outlined some of the strucutral features that guide our institutions and agency regarding the more-than-human world, I believe "putting a face on claimte change" also encourages us to look inward and ask what it would be to develope one's soul (character) as a member of humanity, when humanity has the role of being responsbile for the environment.

all best,
Allen