Life is fundamentally one. ... The deep ecology movement is the ecology movement which questions deeper. ..The adjective 'deep' stresses that we ask why and how, where others do not.
(Arne Naess, developer of the philosophy of 'deep ecology' in 1972)
Arne Dekke Eide Næss, more commonly referred to as Arne Naess, died on January 12th, 2009. Naess was Norway's most well known philosopher. He was best known for having developed the concept of deep ecology which came about as a result of his reading of and admiration for Rachel Carson’s 1962 book “Silent Spring," and his many years of practical involvement in environmental activism and advocacy. By 1973, deep ecology had gained world-wide status as a significant philosophical movement. Naess' use of the phrase deep ecology was intended to indicate that human beings garner no more importance than other living species, ecosystems, or natural processes. In layman's terms, Naess would often describe his central point that all life, regardless of it's size, or shape, or abilities are each equally valuable as one of many interconnected parts of the Earth's biosystem, and Naess, concentrating on his idea of value explained that life is in "need (of) protection against the destruction of billions of humans.”
To a believer of deep ecology, human beings and the Earth's ecosystem constitutes a living environment in which humans constitute no more more than an intrinsically small part of the whole of the Earth's biosystem. Deep ecology concentrates on the interconnections of all things with the substance of the wave structure of matter being the ultimate connector of everything. In Naess view, there is a dynamic unity, or singular commonality that exists to connect all of reality.
Naess' philosophy placed him squarely in opposition to western civilization's ideal of the importance and centrality accorded to the individualized self. It is this western cultural belief that the self is engaged in a constant struggle or competition against nature that opposed everything that Naess believed. For Naess saw the accepted belief of western culture that elevated the self above all else as being highly destructive to the planet, and consequently would lead to the destruction of what constitutes the greater whole of which we are but a minuscule part of. In opposition to the belief in the supremacy of the self; Naess' philosophy of deep ecology locates humanity as part of a greater whole often referred to as the universe.
For Naess, the study of ecology allowed humanity to achieve a "realisation of the Self" as a part of the Earth's ecosphere. His deep ecology provided green movements around the world with the fundamental encouragement to "not only protect the planet for the sake of humans, but also, for the sake of the planet itself, to keep ecosystems healthy for their own sake," as reported by the Guardian.
Naess promoted the idea that human population needed to be reduced to promote the Earth's sustenance. He also called for humanity to turn it's attention to the benefits that 'soft technology' which promotes a closer and noninvasive human relationship to the natural environment. All of Naess' beliefs grew out of his regard for the necessary union of a biosphere of planetary equilibrium as a means to insuring earthly ecological harmony.
When Naess was faced with an ecological movement that had grown significantly during his lifetime and developed many schisms that resulted in the creation and influence of splinter groups such as Earth First, who gained infamy for their use of tactics that often crossed the line from peaceful activism to outright violence, Naess suffered a great deal of embarrassment. He countered the abandonment of peaceful activism by emphasizing that: "We don't say that every living being has the same value as a human, but that it has an intrinsic value which is not quantifiable. It is not equal or unequal. It has a right to live and blossom. I may kill a mosquito if it is on the face of my baby but I will never say I have a higher right to life than a mosquito."
Arne Naess has left humanity to consider his philosophy of deep ecology as a call to rethink the values that underlie western society. Our dependence on current forms of economic development define humanity's niche in Earth's biosystem and considering Naess' philosophy may have reached a time for a significant reevaluation. Human beings view the world as a storehouse of natural resources that we treat as commodities waiting to be extracted and exploited for human needs. Such thinking has caused the Earth to sustain, in many cases, irreparable damage. As a species, we have overlooked, for too long, that our relationship with planet Earth must become a more equal partnership existent upon the concept of developing practices that lead to the sustainability of the biosphere. The threats posed by rapid and uncontrolled deforestation which has completely destroyed valuable ecosystems and the unchecked emissions of CO2 and other toxins that have contributed to global climate change are but two of the areas that humanity must confront regarding the overall health and well-being of the Earth. We live in precarious times. All species of life, not just humanity, face enormously complex threats to the continued existence of life on the Earth. Arne Naess proved himself a visionary who made us aware of the many menaces that our way of life has created over time. It is up to us, the human race, as the most intellectually capable species that the Earth has produced, to first, acknowledge on a world-wide scale, the scope of the problems that face us and then to take action to salvage, as best we can a livable Earth that promotes and maintains an ecologically sustainable planet
thought-provoking article
ReplyDelete