The Trumpeter - Journal of Ecosophy (Athabasca University)
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Spinoza, Deep Ecology, and Human Diversity -- Schizophrenics and Others Who Could Heal the Earth If Society Realized Eco-Literacy
Get PDFThe author, who is a diagnosed schizophrenic and a student of Philosophy, explores the notion of the active love, of Spinoza and Arne Naess, in association with Fritjof Capra's concept of Eco-Literacy and with Gregory Bateson's ecological theory of schizophrenia. Via personal anecdotes and synthesis, the claim is made that enriching respect and understanding of our human diversity, and especially seeking the social integration of abnormal psychologies, should be a key goal of Deep Ecology-related thought and action
Antidotes to Humanism
Get PDFHumanism, especially Christian humanism, has impeded environmental progress, a growing body of scholarship shows, but bioregionalism may offer an antidote. Often considered merely an economic and scientific sub-discipline of environmental studies, bioregionalism also contains an overlooked spiritual dimension that enhances it as a subject of scholarly study and as a personal pursuit. Juxtaposing poems by John Milton and Gerard Manley Hopkins, religious poets from England in the 17th and 19th centuries, I demonstrate first the historical humanist response to the nature-culture nexus and, second, the bioregional response to that same nexus. In addition I offer firsthand spiritual experiences vis-vis the environment, teaching experiences that demonstrate a bioregional ethos, and a survey of scholarship that demonstrates the primacy of place-based studies that are currently neglected in most college and university curricula
From Knowledge to Ontological Awakening: Thinking Nature as Relatedness
Get PDFIn this paper, I examine the ontological valuation of what-stands-on-its-own in relation to the problem of thinking Nature beyond empirical reductionism and conceptual solipsism. Exploring the roots of this ontological valuation in Hellenistic philosophy, and its subsequent repositioning within the Christian doctrine of Creation, I suggest that the emergence of an externalist ontology has facilitated the rise of a paradigm of knowledge gradually discarding ontological or metaphysical objects of knowledge (such as Nature) because non-amenable to the criteria of functionalism and empirical fallibilism. I conclude this paper by suggesting that a relational ontology may offer an alternative to formulate an expression of Nature that can better resonate with our ecological findings in terms of ontological interdependency and interrelatedness, while avoiding the peril of both essentialism, reductionism and solipsism when it comes to thinking Nature
Wild Foresters: Practicing Nature’s Wisdom
Get PDFIn 1997 New Society Books published our anthology Ecoforestry: The Art and Science of Sustainable Forest Use.1 Since then, the paradigms of responsible forest use have continued to evolve. The Ecoforestry Movement found common ground in general principles of responsible forest use aiming to keep full functioning forests intact, while selectively removing trees and other material from them. It is now time for a wider and wilder effort to bring wild and tame forests within a more comprehensive vision to save and care for all forests, to restore them where removed, and to sustain cultural and biological diversity to support wild forests.
Wild forests are critical to ecological resilience, flourishing cultures, and thriving communities. Wild forest places are unique and of great variety, thus the Wild Forest Movement encourages, respects, honors and supports diversity of cultures with place based wisdom and technologies, instead of a single development model. It supports moving from fossil fuel dependence into the solar age. People everywhere can contribute to solving the three global economic, warming and biodiversity crises. Wild Forests support diverse practices, cultures, worldviews, personal philosophies and lifestyles. Wild Foresters seek perennial knowledge and wisdom to be found in unique forests, places and cultures. Wild Foresting practices involve a wide range of activities and also not acting where silence and contemplation are wise
Book Review: Trail of Story: Traveler's Path (Johnson)
No full textLeslie Main Johnson’s detailed study of the ethnoecology of Gitksan, Witsuwit’en and Gwich’in indigenous groups of northern Canada explores native people’s intimate and narrative understanding of land, landscape and community.
Thoroughly exploring the nuances of indigenous language and “trail of story” about their environs, Johnson does not neglect the nuances of western colonialist language about ecology, mapping and land. Her carefulness results in articulate academic and philosophical conclusions about the often damaging, always challenging adaptations required of native communities today
Chaos or Relationalism? A Pragmatist Metaphysical Foundation for Human-Nature Relationships
Get PDFPragmatist philosophy is often rooted in a chaotic notion of the nature of the universe. Given that many have argued for pragmatism’s application to environmental ethics, it remains to be seen whether such a chaotic metaphysics a) best describes the nature of observable experience and b) is the best metaphysical basis for attempts to improve the human-nature relationship. I contend that what is taken to be chaos is actually just the observed complexity of a fundamentally relational universe. In this essay, I’ll explore the difference between these two metaphysical positions and examine their respective effects on concepts of human-nature relationships
Gregory Bateson’s Contribution to Understanding the Linguistic Roots of the Ecological Crisis
Get PDFThe five core ideas of Gregory Bateson discussed here challenge a widely held orthodoxy taken for granted by many academics, including western philosophers. Namely, that language functions as a neutral conduit in a sender receiver process of communication. This assumption sustains the idea of a culture-free rational process, and objective information and data. It also hides the linguistic colonization of the present by the past, which is critical to understanding why we continue to rely upon the same mind-set that is contributing to the ecological crisis to fix it. Bateson’s five key ideas––the recursive nature of our guiding epistemologies, the disconnect between our conceptual maps (metaphorical interpretative frameworks constituted in the distant past) and today’s cultural/ecological realities, how the difference which make difference is the most basic source of information circulating through both cultural and natural ecologies, the nature of double bind thinking, and the need to move to Level III learning––provide a conceptual framework for understanding the difference between ecological and individual intelligence, and why so little attention is given by environmentalists and philosophers to the linguistic roots of the ecological crisis