The Trumpeter - Journal of Ecosophy (Athabasca University)

Drengson, Alan

The Life and Work of Arne Naess: An Appreciative Overview

Naess, Arne

 
 
The Trumpeter  
ISSN: 0832-6193 
Volume 21, Number 1 (2005) 
 
 
Articulation of Normative Interrelations:  
An Information Theoretical Approach 
1999J 
Arne Naess 
 
The units of normative and descriptive formal logic of truth and falsity 
are propositions. These are expressed by sentences assumed to be 
unambiguous, that is, they have one single meaning, namely the 
proposition at hand. The formal logic of propositions has nothing to do 
with communication. A central concern is logical derivation. From the 
two propositions (expressed by) “All whales are fish” and “All fish are 
warm-blooded,” one may logically and correctly derive the conclusion 
“All whales are warm-blooded.” One theorem says that if, from true 
propositions, we derive correctly a new proposition, it will be a true 
proposition. In the above derivation the logical correctness is assured by 
study of the terms of the sentences expressing the propositions. The 
terms are assumed to be unambiguous, expressing definite concepts.1 
The two first propositions are generally assumed to be false, the third 
true. The logical correctness of the derivation happens to be such that a 
true conclusion is derived from two false premises. The example is 
chosen to remind us of the difference between derivational correctness 
and (assumed) truth or falsity. 
 
Heuristics is the art of finding out what is relevant when we try to 
verbally articulate our attitudes, or try to find out how we stand (or 
ought to stand) in difficult matters: our standpoints. It is largely 
admitted that it is sometimes difficult to find adequate words for what 
we mean. Less frequently, it is admitted that it is sometimes difficult to 
find out what we actually mean by what we said, or what we might, 
should, or must have meant by what we said, assuming we meant 
something at all. 
 
The process of articulating attitudes cannot be completely separated 
from that of forming attitudes, creating new attitudes or modifying old 
ones. When articulations are supposed to fit into a context of 
considerable complexity, an article, a book, a systematic exposition of 
Volume 21, Number 1 103
parts of a total view, the test of adequateness is a formidable 
undertaking. The adequateness has both an internal dimension, 
consistency and clarity within the systematizations, and an external, the 
genuineness and depth of personal acceptance of the articulation. The 
units of articulation may have the linguistic character of a term or a 
sentence. The sentence may express a norm or description, and its mode 
may be of various kinds. As an example of a mode (way of speaking), 
that of Sextus Empiricus may be mentioned; that is, non-dogmatically. 
It is still a debated issue whether the non-dogmatic way intended by 
Sextus and some other Pyrrhonic skeptics may itself be tentative and we 
get modes of the second order. I mention this only to emphasize that the 
articulation of parts of a total view is an indefinitely complex affair 
seen from a comprehensive philosophical view. What follows is, of 
course, a simplification of a fragment of the process. 
 
Suppose an articulation takes the form “It would be better for mankind 
to be fewer!” Considering that the terms man and mankind may offend, 
the articulation is changed by using humans instead. The change reveals 
a purpose to communicate with others. The term better is an 
indispensable term, however vague. But the question naturally follows: 
Better in what respect? Perhaps an articulation presents itself: “Better 
for the realization of human fundamental goals in life.” This phrase is 
rather complicated. Its relation to the first articulation is that of a 
specification (not precization). It leads naturally to a question: Which 
are the fundamental goals and what does their fundamentality consist 
in? Here, both precizations and specifications may be felt to be needed. 
There is no definite limit to the series of questions that may be asked. 
On the whole, the answers may be successively more tentative, and 
have a less obvious character of being an articulation of (non verbal) 
attitudes and well established, firm opinions. The area of relevant 
further questions increases indefinitely. There is no obvious limit that 
stops the process. But there are practical limits: the human capacity for 
articulation, thinking, energy, and stubbornness. 
 
An example may illustrate the genuineness and depth of personal 
acceptance dimension. Consider the articulation “Every living being has 
a value in itself.” One interpretation that makes the sentence 
unacceptable to me is that it follows that it is ethically wrong for 
humans to kill a living being. The intuition which makes some of us 
unhesitatingly accept the sentence as expressing a normative truth does 
not suggest, proclaim, or imply this. But exactly what does it proclaim? 
The question is not well formulated. Exactness is not relevant or even 
possible. Each of us has only met a small number of kinds of living 
beings. Of the one-celled creatures which are more or less arbitrarily 
The Trumpeter 104
 
 
classed either as an animal or a plant I have only met one which elicited 
joyful identification and acceptance as a kind of benevolent fellow-
being: Eutreptiella gymnastica. She wriggled and danced with grace in 
a drop of water. Most others I have met did not elicit any positive 
feelings and some are even repulsive. It seems that the sentence about 
value in itself generalizes a kind of attitude that has been actualized 
only in a small set of experience. If we say “It is life as such, a trait 
belonging to every living being, that has value in itself,” the question 
arises whether we have any genuine attitudinal relation to such an 
abstraction. Furthermore, if we are completely indifferent towards a 
certain kind of living being, do we really attribute intrinsic value to it? 
The reflections have no definite end. What I am driving at is the 
limitless manifold of theoretically relevant questions. In practice the 
situation is different: We leave one sequence of questions and enter 
others or quit the struggle of articulations until further notice. 
 
If we say about something A, that it is dark, green, heavy, and beautiful, 
in short, that it is dagahaba, we may be wrong on 15 counts. We may 
find that A is light of weight, of colour, blue, and not beautiful, or we 
may be mistaken. Speaking in terms of information theory we say 
something is potentially carrying much more information than just 
saying that A is dark. In terms of simple calculus of propositions “A is 
dagahaba” may be analyzed into a conjunction of four independent 
sentences, p - A is dark, q - A is green, etc., A being equivalent to 
p&q&r&s. There are 16 true/false possibilities, of which only one 
makes A true. We may say that information to assert p gives only half 
of the information compared to saying p&q, 1/4 compared to p&q&r, 
1/8 to p&q&r&s. 
 
In terms of entropy, the structuralization from just asserting p to that of 
p&q&r&s, is a decrease, whereas the opposite event presents an 
increase. 
 
It is natural to believe that the quest for knowledge and insight may be 
pictured as a one-directional march towards more informatory 
assertions, longer one-directional sequences of hows and whys, and a 
resulting steady gain in information and decrease of entropy. In what 
follows I shall try to show why this is a misleading belief and I shall 
illustrate it with an account of the dynamics of normative 
systematizations. 
 
The life of a human being in all its dimensions is vastly complex and 
cannot be verbalized. There are no sets of linguistic symbols, and 
especially no set of terms and sentences mirroring or verbally copying 
Volume 21, Number 1 105
life. But verbalizations of fairly definite attitudes, sentiments, 
experiences, insights, presuppositions, behaviour patterns, and 
procedures are themselves integral parts of life. The sources of 
verbalizations are rarely or never exhausted through any definite set of 
terms and sentences. “The human will is free” relates to experiences not 
entirely verbalized through that sentence. One may distinguish different 
aspects and parts of those experiences and those related to the sentence 
“The human will is not free.”2  
 
There are traditions of mysticism in the East and the West. If we ask 
what is meant when we use the term “traditions of mysticism,” the 
answer can only have a very modest function. It may lead the people 
asking the question to some literature, some people to be considered 
mystics, or to some experiences being considered mystical. The field of 
relevant investigations is colossal and there are no authoritative 
verbalizations. These are of undisputed value as expressions of 
mysticism or as formulations within the research on mysticism, but no 
definite set of fairly precise character can make all the less precise 
obsolete. 
 
At this point, the question of sources of creative discovery and 
invention enters. These are sometimes related to the more precise, 
sometimes to the less precise, verbalizations in the form of assertive 
sentences. Consider the sentence “All living beings are ultimately one.” 
Because of the use of the term one here the sentence may be considered 
to be an expression of mysticism of some sort. The sentence may be 
said vaguely to stress the unifying or universal features of the different 
kinds of life at the expense of those differences, or to proclaim that 
there is a trait common to all life that is of outstanding importance. The 
term ultimate may limit the kind of importance to what is in the end, or 
after all, important. One avenue toward a higher level of preciseness is 
suggested by the term identification. It does not stress an actual state of 
ultimate identity but a process. 
 
The precization of the sentence, “Ultimately all life forms are one” (T0) 
in the direction of “A mature person identifies with all life forms” (Tx) 
has arbitrary features. That is, there are often directions of precization, 
some of which will develop what might be meant by ultimately. Or, the 
tentative, more precise formulations reveal weaknesses as expressions 
of an attitude, judged laudable (as a metanorm), and the original 
expression T0 (the ‘point of departure formulation’ is given up). 
 
The development of systematic thinking may in this, as in other cases, 
be thus illustrated: 
The Trumpeter 106
 
 
    T1            
a) T0       
 
T T  2 21          
T22   
         
 
b) T0      T3    T31   
         
T32 
 
c)  T0 
 
  T0 
 
Personally I do not make use of T0, but 
formulations like all life forms seek self
preservation on analogy with Spinoza’s
preservare in se). Whereas T9 admitted 
life and living beings, as in “Every livin
must be interpreted more narrowly in te
leaving out landscapes.  
 
In terms of information and extended en
movement of the systematic thinking ar
and-forth movement, first increasing inf
then decreasing them. The progress can
humanity may, I hope, be said to increa
is an increase of available results of exp
cultures. The collectivity is most marke
but science comprises only a small part 
 
The above discussed back and forth mo
formulate fragments of a total view seen
derivational, point of view. A great dive
arranged in sequences of premises and c
permits of various interpretations which
Consequences are drawn along the stem
derivations. (Or down along the pyrami
is used.) 
 
In everyday life, the situation arises wit
How should I express this? and the prob
make others understand rather than wha
Volume 21, Number 1  
 
Tentative precization in two 
directions, the second is 
preferred. The same kind of 
step once more, but recourse 
to the first formulation and 
tentative precization in a 
slightly different direction 
and so on. In the end T0 is 
given up.use formulations like T2 and 
-realization, U0, interpreting self 
 term perseverare in se (not 
very broad interpretations of 
g being has intrinsic value,” U0 
rms of biology, for instance, 
tropy theory, the total 
ticulating total views is a back-
ormation and negative entropy 
not be conceptualized easily, but 
se collective experience. There 
erience within and across 
d in the scientific development, 
of human endeavour. 
vement influences the attempt to 
 from a logical, specifically 
rsity of terms and sentences are 
onclusions. Each of them 
 are continuously explored. 
 and branches of the tree of 
d of derivation, if that metaphor 
h high frequency where we ask: 
lematic feature is rather how to 
t would be an adequate 
107
expression of how I feel and think. In articulation of a total view, when 
pressing for articulation of basic views and attitude as well as for 
consequences for those processes in practical daily life situations, it is 
the other way around: at least when ‘burdened’ with a high formal 
education there are in the air words and sentences enough. There is a 
flow of verbalizations available. The greater problem is rather: What do 
I mean? What is the relation of my socially adequate flow of words to 
the deeper layer of my self? A sentence is offered, but exactly of what 
is it expressive when occurring in a definite situation of reflection? 
 
A hypothesis is here of great practical service: “The definiteness of 
intention is always limited.” Asking oneself or others: How did I (or 
you) interpret T0 in S, a definite datable situation of sending T0. The 
answers tend to be like this: ‘T1 or T2?,’ ‘T1,’ ‘T11 or T12?’ ‘T11,’ . . . 
‘T11 . . . 1 or T11 . . . 2?,’ ‘I don’t know.’ That is, sooner or later, sometimes 
already at the start of the question sequence, the sender or receiver 
honestly answers “I don’t know.” And this is done even when the 
relevance, appropriateness, and clarity of the alternative interpretations 
offered in the question are fully recognized by the answerer. The “I 
don’t know” type of answer has been called nescio-answers from Latin 
nescio, “I don’t know.” They testify to the limit of the definitions 
intention or interpretation of the sender of a sentence or term. When a 
receiver is asked “When you heard T0 uttered did you interpret it as 
synonymous with T1 or T2?” and so on. The same kind of limit of 
interpretation or intentionality is found.  
 
Reaching the limit of one’s intention, the task at hand may demand an 
answer. The kind of answer “I don’t know whether I have meant so or 
so” is not satisfactory. If the difference, the discrimination is relevant 
and important, one must decide what to mean. This implies a search 
centering on both one’s own attitudes, sentiments, and articulate views, 
and on features of the situation imperfectly investigated. The decision 
has a character of creativity or activeness. It is not less creative than an 
experiment in chemistry or any other cognitive activity in search of new 
insights. 
 
But so is also the work back to the crudest conceptual level, that of T0.  
If the term concept is preserved for fairly well delimited, verbalized, 
cognitive contents, then the typical T0, as found in articulations of basic 
layers of total views, is not intended to be expressive of a concept; its 
individual terms are not expressions of concepts. 
 
The back and forth movement along the axis of preciseness is of little 
theoretical and practical interest if it does not also constitute a 
The Trumpeter 108
 
 
movement along the axis of definiteness of intention. The ideals of a 
maximum or a constant level of definiteness of intention are stumbling 
blocks in research. Not even in creative research within the exact 
sciences is there room for the realization of those ideals. 
 
Endnotes 
                                                 
1 The statements about formal logic of propositions and terms are (of course) 
somewhat vague and ambiguous but serve their function in the context.  
2 An excellent example of distinction related to a common source is furnished by H. 
Ofstad’s thorough analysis of main interpretation of the sentence ‘x decided freely in 
the situation S’, x being a person. 
Volume 21, Number 1 109


Articulation of Normative Interrelations: An Information Theoretical Approach

 
 
The Trumpeter  
ISSN: 0832-6193 
Volume 21, Number 2 (2005) 
 
 
The Conquest of Mountains: A Contradiction? 
1970 
Arne Naess 
 
 
 
 
This article was originally published in Mountains, September 1970, ed. K. K. 
Wilson, pp. 28–29. 
The urge to climb has many sources, and no two climbers ever have the 
same motivation. Success as a climber, however, is measured in a fairly 
specific fashion, reflecting perhaps some of the most objectionable 
traits of contemporary society. 
  
There is stress on competition. Achievement is measured by means of 
such superficialities as the number and difficulty of a climber’s ascents, 
or the number, difficulty, and height of the summits he has reached. The 
superficiality stems from the conventional approach to the assessment 
of “difficulty.” Every well-integrated individual has his or her own way 
of “measuring” achievement and success, namely in relation not only to 
personal goals but also to his or her state of training and so on: factors 
which naturally have to be ignored in the world of competitive sport. 
  
Furthermore, detailed route descriptions and publicity are stressed in 
order to facilitate stupid comparisons. In consequence, how and where 
to climb on a mountain are determined more by one’s reaction to 
reports and superficial ratings than by desires arising spontaneously 
during the climb. Generally, the most beautiful or otherwise remarkable 
places on a mountain are to be found along the edges of phenomenal 
precipices, not at the (geographical) summit which is often a dull place. 
Nevertheless, climbers often walk or scramble to the summit in fog, 
merely to complete the climb, as if the latter, as an experience or 
achievement, could be defined by a machine without reference to 
qualities specific to human beings. 
  
In the Himalayas, the inhuman aspect of climbing is more pronounced 
than it is elsewhere. When chauvinist impulses dominated the picture 
after the Second World War, expeditions degenerated into sieges of a 
Volume 21, Number 2 55
quasi-military sort. The mountains were “conquered,” a fatal 
expression, and “success” was often insured by sending great numbers 
of climbers who made a series of “assaults.” 
  
A salutary reaction has set in against the desecration of mountains by 
garbage (pitons, equipment, etc.), but there is still little protest against 
this worthless form of “summitry.” Such a negative attitude towards the 
dominant trend may seem fanatical, and I think only a minority of 
climbers will experience mountains as I do, but there are more of us 
than is generally assumed. Our numbers are magnified by the pressure 
towards conformity, and the need for young climbers to secure 
reputations, in order to be voted onto expeditions by their fiercely 
competitive and status-seeking elders. 
  
“The mountain was considered impossible to climb . . .” This is one of 
the venerable stereotypes in climbing literature. It may be a mistake to 
translate it literally. The lure of the mountains is largely symbolic; in 
the mythology and poetry of various cultures, mountains are in an 
important sense “unclimbable.” They symbolize elevation, perfection, 
and grandeur to be striven for. The general public’s awe of mountains 
as “challenges” is no doubt associated with this symbolism. Thus, 
identification of success in climbing the holy mountains of the 
Himalayas with “conquest” of their summits can be seen as nothing but 
infantile profanation; in this way, modern man convinces himself that 
he can do the impossible. But he forgets both his dependence upon 
administration and machinery, and also his debt to the old symbols. If 
his “modern way of life” becomes universal, mountains will one day be 
regarded as heaps of mineral, and to climb them pointless. 
  
This is not written with the intention of activating climbers who 
basically share my attitudes, but are too shy or modest to try to change 
things. Let diversity of motive and method flourish by all means. But 
let us also agree that no single concept of climbing should so dominate 
as to spoil the pleasure or experience of others, of this generation or of 
those to come. To ensure this may, perhaps, entail a broad shift of 
attitude in our direction, as the “achievement attitude” is massively 
destructive in nature, and seriously threatens all other positions. Such a 
shift might today be possible, in the new atmosphere of ecological 
awareness brought about by technology’s overstepping of vital limits. 
 
The Trumpeter 56 


The Conquest of Mountains: A Contradiction?

The Trumpeter  
ISSN: 0832-6193 
Volume 21, Number 2 (2005) 
 
 
Access to Free Nature 
1998 Unpublished 
Arne Naess 
 
The greatest slogan of Agenda 211 is perfectly anthropocentric in the 
sense that it calls for development which leaves the life conditions for 
future generations of humans as good as they are today. It is generally 
recognized that safe access to patches of free nature (a piece of land not 
dominated by human adult activities) is a component of satisfactory life 
conditions for small children. 
  
In the cities a generation ago, at least in Scandinavia, small children had 
areas where they were permitted to do everything they wanted (except 
make random fires). The free areas were big enough so that the children 
did not ruin the vegetation. In winter they made small ski jumps. There 
were no artificial structures whatsoever, but the children occasionally 
would build things. Very gradually these areas of free nature were 
ruined. The pieces of the land, by an evil misconception of a fatal sort 
called “the value of the property,” were considered too valuable to 
remain “undeveloped.”  
  
In the absence of such areas, and considering the increasing population 
pressures, we may have to limit space available for all children of the 
next generation. Therefore, I propose safe access to patches of free 
nature rather than to “areas.” Based on what older people recount about 
their happy days as small children in the areas of free nature, it is a 
duty, at least in the rich countries, to protect every such existing patch 
of free nature. As the areas of asphalt and other forms of complete 
human domination widen, high priority must be given to patches of free 
nature. Parents should be responsible for the behaviour of their children 
to avoid wanton destructions (a behaviour not endangering free areas a 
generation ago). The situation is grave: if there are rules of behaviour 
laid down by neighbourhoods or parents, the feeling of freedom may be 
reduced. If there are no rules introduced today, some children may 
destroy for the sheer joy of destruction. 
  
The Trumpeter 48 
 
 
The ready access to large areas of non-human dominated nature is 
yearly diminished at a catastrophic rate through the thoughtless 
concentric widening of cities, suburbs, and towns. A birthday cake, for 
example, is traditionally cut into moderate pieces with a core 
remaining. If every other piece is eaten, there remains the core and 
“free” space between each piece. If “development” may be symbolized 
by the pieces eaten, there still remains wide access to the core, the 
markets, and the institutions. The wide access guarantees that if you 
live or work in the core area of human domination, the distance to large 
free areas is relatively short. How short? Here there is room for visions 
and utopias. The extremes of decentralization, the vision of global 
anarchy, picture the cores as mere local community centres.  
 
According to the Gandhian vision of panchayats,2 the greatest units of 
administration and other institutions are community centres of five 
villages. There have been attempts to realize this on a small scale in 
India. The Sami people made up the only (non-violent) anarchy of great 
expansion I know of, covering large areas of northern Norway, Sweden, 
Finland, and Russia. A strong feeling of solidarity bound them together. 
They were completely helpless facing the expanding nation states based 
on violent “defence” institutions. 
  
The easy access to free nature has been a cornerstone of decentralized 
societies, that is, regional aggregates of communities. To lose this 
access may have a deep influence on human character and, as I see it, 
the continued destruction of such access, especially in the formative 
years of human personality, should be looked upon as a calamity. 
 
There is a difference between countries where symbols of unity mainly 
deal with documents and countries where the symbols deal mainly with 
the land. The Norwegian national anthem starts with “Yes, we love this 
country . . .” and the annual Christmas address of King Olav to his 
people for 50 years was accompanied by a series of pictures showing 
landscapes, very few with human habitation whatsoever. (This did not 
stop the continued destruction of easy access to free nature, however!) 
In the North, people were induced to so-called “Centres of 
Development,” and in many ways they came to prefer life in towns and 
cities. But to the astonishment of most people, the criminality, the use 
of narcotics, the dominance of fashions, started very soon. 
  
Easy access to free nature is only one factor that can, in the early 
formative years, moderate the asocial tendencies and the quest for ever 
higher levels of consumption. This quest is naturally of great value for 
producers and makes corporations very powerful. 
Volume 21, Number 2 49
  
It is by now fairly clear not only that the terms “wilderness” and 
“biodiversity” do not elicit the unreservedly positive reaction they did 
in the early 1970s, but that many groups who work in the areas of 
environmental problems, like that of climate, downscale the issue of 
continued decrease of diversity, pointing to the continuing large number 
of species on the Earth. They instead point to major human problems of 
clean water, erosion, and so on.   
 
Notes 
                                                 
1 Agenda 21, the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, United Nations 
Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) Rio de Janerio, Brazil, June 
3–14, 1992. 
2 Panchayats are institutions of local self-government with popularly elected village 
councils (gram panchayat ) as the basic unit. 
The Trumpeter 50 


Access to Free Nature

 
 
The Trumpeter  
ISSN: 0832-6193 
Volume 21, Number 2 (2005) 
 
 
Architecture and Deep Ecology 
1992 Unpublished 
Arne Naess 
 
Two areas of problems today require unusually long time perspectives: 
architecture and population. A slow but steady decrease of human 
population may perhaps start already in the twenty-second century, but 
an ethically and socially acceptable decrease to a significantly lower 
level must take many centuries. There must be action today, but 
desirable results may be in a distant future.  
  
Architecture is today conceived as a sort of modification of Earth 
ecosystems and the good of both human and non-human living beings is 
taken seriously. Landscape architecture is already an old discipline, but 
has not often been studied within an ecological framework: seeing 
towns and cities as parts of landscapes, and landscapes as parts of 
ecosystems. Architecture, adapted to a population of 10 thousand 
million, or more, requires a lot of new ideas and procedures.  
  
Supporters of the deep ecology movement insist that ecological 
sustainability is only realized globally or regionally when full richness 
and diversity of life forms (in a wide sense) is protected. Humans and 
human cultures are life forms, and their protection includes what is vital 
for them. But the present human domination is intolerable. Areas of 
tree-plantations, tree farms, gardens, parks (in cities), are areas of 
greatly diminished biodiversity. Tree plantations now occupy areas that 
are too vast.  
  
Cities cannot, of course, contain areas of wilderness, but future cities, 
like many cities centuries ago, can contain areas of ”free nature.” Such 
an area is one without domination by humans but with scattered human 
population. They do not interfere with its flora and fauna and other life 
forms. One important difference from areas of wilderness is the size: an 
area of free nature may be very much smaller. In the Norwegian capital, 
Oslo, there were in the last century many areas of free nature, some less 
than 50 by 50 metres (2500m2). A difference from parks is of great 
Volume 21, Number 2 29
educational importance: children were free to do what they liked in 
those areas (lökker) and access was not dangerous. If the ground was 
hilly, children made ski jumps. Small children could make use of any 
natural object in their play. Real estate prices in this century gradually 
made the free areas ”much too valuable” (in dollars) to avoid 
“development.” 
  
From the point of view of ecological education, the spots of free nature 
are crucial because small children in cities and towns get intimately 
acquainted with the chaotic and infinitely diverse character of nature 
without being transported out of town or city. Growing up, children are 
gradually better equipped to reach larger areas of free nature, and many 
eventually are able to spend part of their time in wilderness.  
 
Many of the most devoted supporters of the deep ecology movement 
have grown up either in cities or towns with small areas of free nature, 
or have, as children, enjoyed a home close to larger free areas. It is a 
long range problem of city planning to provide children with easy 
access to small areas of free nature. 
 
The ecologically and technically cheap accessibility of the city 
population to large areas of free nature has steadily diminished in most 
places in Europe. 
  
Before talking more about cities, I shall once more mention wilderness. 
For obvious reasons, it is common to see an antagonism between 
wilderness and human habitation. But Alaska was through many 
centuries a vast wilderness, but practically everywhere people, the 
Indians, were present. The places have names that attest to their 
presence. It is likely that the land could have retained the status of 
wilderness for more centuries. The white man made that impossible. 
Sami people (Lapplanders) inhabited Finnmarken, the northern-most 
part of Norway, for centuries and did not interfere seriously with the 
full richness and diversity of life forms. Now the excessive number of 
tame reindeer, and also other factors, has terminated the wilderness 
status of Finnmarken. 
  
In short, the planet may be divided into three types of areas: wilderness, 
patches of free nature, and human dominated areas. Just as an idea to be 
mentioned in connection with a number of competing ones, consider the 
tripartition of the total habitable area of the planet, one-third wilderness, 
one-third free nature, and one-third human-dominated. The term 
habitable is inserted because the Antarctic and the extreme Arctic areas 
are kept out of the present discussion. (If part of the vast Soviet 
The Trumpeter 30 
 
 
radioactive material stored in the extreme Arctic is not kept isolated 
from the ecosystems, the areas may have to be classified as man-
dominated.) 
  
But back to the cities! 
  
Homes are increasingly built with close attention to minimize energy 
consumption and to other ecologically essential aspects. I shall not talk 
about building but rather about city planning. 
  
It is a fairly common hypothesis that people brought up in cities without 
access to free nature will either be indifferent towards further 
elimination of wilderness and decrease of free nature or will have a low 
priority need and only spend a short vacation now and then in such 
areas. This means that, in the present intense conflicts of interest that 
are determining the rate and persistence of destruction, the indifference 
of inveterate city people will be on the “wrong side,” that is, among the 
passive or the “developers.” 
  
It is difficult to assess the tenability of the above mentioned hypothesis. 
In any case, I think it of great importance that in the next century small 
children in the cities have easy, safe access to patches of free nature. 
Most of the very active supporters of protection of wilderness and free 
nature have enjoyed early experience in such areas. But there is still a 
too small minority of dedicated people to change present policies 
radically. At elections in Western democracies too few people support 
politicians who show courage in ecologically relevant conflicts. How 
can they propose responsible policies when it does not pay in elections, 
but presumably causes staggering losses? 
  
In short, one of the important reasons for establishing access to free 
nature in cities, and not just parks, is that of maintaining and increasing 
the number of people who very early in life acquire respect and love for 
nature. 
  
The 1990s seemed to be a time for environmental ethics to be taken 
seriously in schools and universities here in the West. In Norway, 
considerable sums have been earmarked for ethical research and 
teaching. This should be greeted with joy and appreciation, but I think 
that a major change of attitude towards nature and ecological systems as 
wholes largely depends on deep experience in nature, not so much on 
teaching that tells us to behave better. Presumably, our government 
agrees. But it costs so much more to prepare conditions such that 
everybody, or a substantial minority, can fairly easily change habits in 
Volume 21, Number 2 31
the direction of a ecologically sustainable lifestyle. It still takes 
considerable personal initiative to do so. It costs so much less for 
governments to hand out money to science and ethics. 
  
As it is, most cities grow concentrically and increase the average 
distance to big areas of free nature. Oslo is a tragic example. When I 
was a child, broad areas of free nature made it enjoyable to ski all the 
way to the front door, or at least within easy walking distance from 
home. Then, gradually, the distance increased. Public transportation 
helped, but eventually people tended to go by car. So, after  cross-
country skiing one has to sit in a car driving through traffic instead of 
taking a shower and relaxing. A lot of problems arise every time people 
feel they need free nature.  
  
As to transportation, Sweden may be the leader in making it possible to 
use bicycles, both in cities and outside, without risk of being hit by cars. 
In Canberra, Australia, and perhaps other cities, there was recently 
(1992) a stagnation in the development of bicycle paths. The argument 
used is the increasing rate of accidents. These are due mostly to bad 
construction: It was until recently assumed that people bicycled very 
slowly and that sharp 90 degrees turns were safe. But people often 
bicycle at 20kph or more and such turns are intolerable. 
  
On a global scale, a major problem in the twenty-first century will be 
how to make cities liveable: how to make it possible to live a healthy 
and decent life in Mexico City and dozens of other great cities in the 
less industrialized world. There is no space outside cities for the 
additional thousand million people. Somehow they must be contained 
in cities. Reforestation is necessary and the continual deforestation for 
the sake of subsistence agriculture must be stopped. The area of good 
soil for agriculture is decreasing. Even if it should be practical to 
change direction and get more square kilometres, there will not be soil 
for a thousand million more farmers. Clearly, the architects of the rich 
nations should co-operate with those of the less rich to work out plans 
as to how to solve the significant city problems ahead. 
  
Helena Norberg-Hodge has won international fame for influencing 
architecture in Ladakh, but the power of irresponsible developers is 
staggering. It is an astonishing thought that she got to be world famous 
for doing something that so obviously must be done, and should already 
have been done in thousands of areas, not only in Ladakh and 
practically nowhere else. She has introduced solar energy in small 
homes and has otherwise been able to help the people of Ladakh 
proceed from premodern to postmodern, ecologically sane conditions. 
The Trumpeter 32 
 
 
Or, to be more honest, she has gone a long way on that road, but is 
increasingly hampered by Indian “developers” of the conventional kind. 
It is lamentable how few architects are available in the less industrial 
societies. Not to improve the style anywhere, but to co-operate with the 
tiny minorities who are fully aware of the catastrophic developments in 
cities and even in the villages. The upper classes, including the 
politicians, are on the whole imitating the West, and the few who are in 
opposition for ecological or other reasons are not properly supported. 
  
I shall end with a few words about what is called the deep ecology 
movement. It is distinguished from the reform or shallow movement, 
headed by people who trust that better technology, better scientific 
understanding of particular phenomena, such as ozone layer and 
climatic changes, and stricter rules for combating pollution will do the 
job. The supporters of the deep ecology movement think that changes 
of value priorities are necessary. They consider life on this planet to 
have a value in itself. The deep ecology economists are studying how to 
have ecologically sustainable economic progress during ages of slow 
population decrease, that is, progress in the satisfaction of vital needs of 
the populations. But there are two most essential points. The first is the 
grounding of ecological policies on philosophical or religious attitudes. 
In the last five years, the Christians, for instance, have with increasing 
strength announced that we have sinned against God's creation, and that 
everything directly created by God has inherent value, therefore all 
living beings and the untrampled landscapes have such value. But most 
supporters have such a life philosophy, including value priorities, 
independent of any religious foundation. The second is that the 
supporters stress the need to be active politically in order to change 
society, especially the consumerism of industrial societies. Below is a 
useful condensed characterization of tenets fairly generally accepted by 
supporters of the deep ecology movement. Of course, they co-operate 
with the activists of the reform movement, and also with people active 
in the peace movement and the movements to fight desperate poverty 
and brutal tyranny. 
 
The eight points of the deep ecology movement 
 
1. The welfare and flourishing of human and non-human 
living beings has value in itself. The value of the non-
humans is independent of their usefulness to humans. 
2. Richness and diversity of living beings has value  in 
itself. 
Volume 21, Number 2 33
3. Humans have no right to reduce this richness and 
diversity except to satisfy vital human needs. 
4. The flourishing of human life and cultures is compatible 
with a substantial decrease of the human population. The 
flourishing of non-human life requires such a decrease. 
5. Present human interference with the non-human world is 
excessive and the situation is rapidly worsening. 
6. Policies must therefore be changed. These policies affect 
basic economic, technological, and ideological 
structures. The resulting state of affairs will be deeply 
different from the present. 
7. The appreciation of a high quality of life will supersede 
that of a high standard of living. 
8. Those who accept the foregoing points have an 
obligation to try to contribute directly or indirectly to the 
implementation of necessary changes. 
 
Since the start of the international ecology movement in the 1960s, 
architects have been in the forefront, explaining hundreds of small and 
great ideas about how to make architecture ecologically responsible and 
progressive. But we need their voice increasingly clear and strong in the 
realm of local and global planning, solving the vast problems of 
responsible use and non-use of planetary space, never forgetting that we 
are small parts of the Earth. If we ever get in contact with living beings 
in comparable paradisic planets, they may be so far away that it will 
take a hundred thousand years for a Christmas or New year telegram to 
reach them. 
 
 
The Trumpeter 34 


Architecture and Deep Ecology

 
 
The Trumpeter  
ISSN: 0832-6193 
Volume 21, Number 2 (2005) 
 
 
Introductory Biology and Life  
Appreciation Courses 
1990H 
Arne Naess 
 
 
 
 
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VThis slightly revised paper was originally published in The Trumpeter: Journal 
of Ecosophy 9, 3, (Summer) 1992, page 126. The ”Note on Biology Education” 
was added in 1996. iology is the fifth and the second last of the six sciences covering all 
hat is, according to the influential philosopher of science Auguste 
omte. He listed them in the order of increasing complexity: 
athematics, astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, and sociology. 
iology was conceived as a science of organisms. A main problem for 
omte was whether, like chemistry, biology’s “laws” could be derived 
rom those of physics. In any case, Comte had the influential idea that 
here is no place for metaphysics, and especially no place for a study of 
nderstanding of value (other than the purely instrumental values) in his 
lassification of science. 
 
oday, biology is more often defined as the study of living beings than 
s the study of organisms, but courses in biology, and the range of 
iology as conceived as part of an encyclopedia, is still centred around 
he anatomy and physiology of kinds of organisms with a sprinkling of 
volutionary terms. These areas are often thought to furnish the hard 
ore and conceptual basis of the life sciences, the science of living 
eings. The study of ecology, the study of the various contemporary 
onceptions of life, and the conditions of life on Earth, are not 
onceived to be basic studies of life. There is much that can be said for 
uch a conception of what is the most basic. But it should be 
emembered that the conception is itself derived from valuation, not 
rom facts alone. 
 
hen students are introduced to biology as the study of living beings or 
f the organisms, they are today often deeply dissatisfied with the 
olume 21, Number 2 21
narrowness of perspective of most courses in most countries. When 
they complain, the answers they get tend to be unsatisfactory. If they 
say that basics must be learned first, the students may justly feel that 
most of what they learn in the introductory courses is not basic. What 
factual basis have conclusions about basicness? Which valuations are 
tacitly assumed to be valid, or at least uncontroversial? 
  
Until recently, chemistry was primarily a study of chemicals. Now it 
astonishes old chemists how few chemicals are studied. Students must 
know a lot about chemicals, as astronomers about stars, but 
introductory courses do not take the study of a set of chemicals or of 
stars as basic. An analogous change of biology may be warranted today, 
but only analogous, not similar. 
  
Considering the crisis of life conditions on Earth, and the influx of 
biology students motivated by their awareness (however fragmentary or 
misguided) of a crisis, basic courses must relate to this phenomenon. 
Factual knowledge must get a priority in part in relation to the 
motivation of the student. This is mostly not realized, and we have here 
one of the roots of dissatisfaction. 
  
Earlier, the terms analogous and not similar were used because the 
richness and diversity of species of chemical compositions have only a 
remote relation to that of living beings. As experienced by a now, old-
fashioned “stuff-chemist” chemicals certainly have or had a sort of life-
quality, at least a sort of identity and independent (fascinating) 
character similar to that of species of animals or plants to a naturalist. 
So there have been and still are chemist-naturalists. 
  
The reality of chemicals for chemist-naturalists is in part a realm of 
chemicals as gestalts: the gestalt-ontology approach. 
  
The specimens of species, genera, and families of living organisms 
make up a reality with intrinsic value, subjects of care for their own 
sake, subjects of respect, subjects of identification in a pronounced way 
mostly absent in the case of chemicals. 
  
There is, however, a strong reason for not having to learn much about 
the individual species, genera, families, and so on, but rather to 
understand, especially in the sense of Spinoza's amor intellectualis. 
This implies excursions of very special kinds, living at least for some 
time in mixed communities. It implies the ability to verbalize 
experiences so that the student can communicate to others what “nature 
tells them.” Through proper selection of places, the student gets in 
The Trumpeter 22 
 
 
touch with living beings of highly different genera, families, and so on. 
It will be the responsibility of the teacher to estimate what the student 
has gained of experience, ability to articulate, and proper conception of 
the limitedness of his or her knowledge. 
 
Note on Biology Education 
 
In 1939 the University of California campus at Berkeley included a 
music building. It was a delight to pass that building since music came 
out of the windows and made us feel well. The courses there centred 
around music appreciation: the endeavour to deepen and intensify the 
musical experience. There were many technical things to learn on the 
way to the exams, but it was my great joy to see how highly the musical 
imagination and creative listening was estimated as a genuine part of 
the education. “How do you feel and conceive this? What do you 
experience?” The teachers, perhaps not all, had the courage to deeply 
influence the students, their personalities, from the very start of their 
studies.  
  
Musicology is the science of MUSIC, Biology the science of LIFE. 
Why is there such a fundamental difference between introductory 
courses in musicology and introductory courses in biology? I do not see 
why biology education, starting with introductory courses, could not to 
a large extent resemble those of musicological courses. Life 
appreciation, for example, appreciation of the evolutionary miracles. 
Acquaintance, and understanding (amor intellectualis) of living beings, 
like acquaintance and understanding of forms of music. Musicology 
courses furnish the student with examples. Music is played, 
appreciated. “What did you experience when you listened to this?”    
“Listen to this, how it seems to announce a new style?” and so on. Why 
should the education of biology teachers be so different from teachers 
of music? There are innumerable facts in musicology, and a confusing 
wealth of theories. The notation and classification show variation. 
Introductions to musicology could be without any trace of appeal to 
spontaneous experience, emotion, quest for a life with music. There 
must be some difference of style, but why so much, and in such a 
wrong direction? 
 
 
Volume 21, Number 2 23


Introductory Biology and Life Appreciation Courses

 
 
The Trumpeter  
ISSN: 0832-6193 
Volume 21, Number 1 (2005) 
 
 
Culture and Environment 
1993AD 
Arne Naess 
 
I will discuss certain relations between culture and the global process of 
increasing ecological unsustainability. One of the many factors which 
make it difficult to change the process into one of decreasing 
unsustainability is the shift in ways of thinking from that of ecology to 
that of environment. The latter term suggests that we have to do with 
something outside humanity, something we regrettably are dependent 
upon. It is easier to mobilize people and money if we acknowledge the 
human tendency to self-destruction through policies that not only spoil 
our nests, but lead away from our basic goal in life, whether it is called 
happiness or not. The increasing ecological unsustainability is 
something much nearer to our souls and selves than we have 
traditionally assumed in the West.  
  
It is today often acknowledged that overcoming the increasing 
ecological crisis, the still increasing level of ecological unsustainability, 
leads invariably to problems in the humanities, in sociology, and 
political sciences. It even fosters new branches like environmental 
diplomacy. The Canadian government decided to stop complaining 
harshly about air pollution in Canada due to US pollutants provided the 
government of the US agreed to a trade treaty favourable to Canada. It 
is today accepted that every major ecological problem has a social and 
political aspect. Furthermore, it is clear that technological invention, 
even of a revolutionary kind since the ’60s, such as solar energy, had 
practically no influence on the curve of increasing unsustainability. 
Whether the use of an ecologically salutary invention is adopted on an 
appropriate scale depends upon social and political factors. 
Unfortunately these factors are neglected in research and development 
programs. Natural science has a higher cultural standing, and 
governments now gladly spend money on studies of climate, the ozone 
layer, and similar unpolitical issues.  
  
Volume 21, Number 1 53
Turning the attention to the situation in the Third and Fourth Worlds, 
old stable cultural traditions still play a decisive role. Among such 
traditions we very often find ecological, sophisticated, and beneficial 
technologies and ways of life. The influence of industrial societies, 
including that of mass tourism, has increased in strength in this century 
and has with few exceptions been negative. 
  
An example: The traditional Sherpa culture in Nepal has strict rules 
regarding how to make use of trees and bushes for heating. Living 
between 2000 and 4000 metres in the Himalayas with long cold 
winters, the vital need was clear. But only dead trees were used. With 
tourism the Sherpas got jobs, especially as mountain guides and porters. 
Their mobility increased immensely. There was, to use an expression 
about the development in European Community, an avalanche of 
transport across traditional borders.  
  
The ethics and practice in relation to forests and vegetation in general 
had been local in the sense of protection of natural resources locally, 
not in general. So, as soon as the Sherpas were far from home, they 
would cut and burn everything, for instance, in order to secure hot 
showers for tourists every morning. 
  
In short, wonderful ecological ethics and practice in many non-
industrial countries had often or mostly local areas of validity and 
dominance. It turned out that the tourists' way of life generally was 
conceived by the Sherpas as one with very little ethical and other 
constraints, and nevertheless capable of securing a fabulously high 
material standard of living. Large scale corruption has been a regular 
consequence, with few notable exceptions. 
  
A very important development since the ’60s has been the emergence of 
a drive among people in the Western industrial nations to join the 
minorities in the Third and Fourth Worlds to re-establish ecologically 
sane technologies and ways of life in general. One group, called social 
ecologists, comprises a subgroup, for instance in Uruguay, living and 
working among the “poor” to support the few, mostly very old people, 
who still remember and make use of those technologies. 
  
The introduction of Western, mostly unecological, technology has 
mostly a devastating influence on culture and upon the state of the 
economy, for instance requiring imports and help, and increasing the 
distance between rich and poor. (For example, the influence of the so-
called green revolution based on Western agricultural technology.) 
  
The Trumpeter 54 
 
 
Unfortunately the co-operation of Westerners who are competent to 
work in the spirit of the above-mentioned subgroup of social ecologists, 
is not favoured by Western colleges and universities. Effective co-
operation with “poor” people requires not only knowledge of cultural 
anthropology and ability to live a life in a foreign country that is not 
provocative and strange, but also requires willingness to stay there for 
years. And Westerners should be fairly sure that when they come back 
to their own countries they are either able to find a job, or are helped to 
be trained in available kinds of jobs. 
  
If the devastating ecological trend in the Third and Fourth Worlds is 
going to be changed, it is necessary that the institutions in the West 
understand their responsibility either to decrease Western pernicious 
influence or to change it into a beneficial one.  
  
Every year counts. To teach environmental ethics, as it is now accepted 
at many Western colleges and universities, is a very indirect help, 
especially because it is mostly meta-ethics, that is, academic discussion 
about various theories about ethics. Even in academic institutions, 
ethics was what is now called 'normative ethics' prescribing (and 
discussing) duties, obligations in various sorts of life situations, and 
wise guidelines. Also, of course, discussing consequences and 
evaluating guidelines in the light of consequences. One of the reasons 
governments in many industrial countries now finance environmental, 
academic ethics may be that it costs so much less than studies centering 
on social and political means to fight the ecological crisis, and much 
less than doing, on a proper scale, anything about the crisis. One may 
compare the 50 years from 1830 to 1880 when there was much talk 
about the misery of labour, and women of the aristocracy weaved and 
sewed clothing for the poor; there were constantly fund-raisings to help 
the poor, but on a scale that was completely insufficient. As now, 
economics was used as an explanation: more wealth among the wealthy 
must be accumulated in order to change conditions in a decisive way. 
  
There are today two different basic attitudes towards non-human 
beings. According to the so-called anthropocentric, no non-human 
being can have value in itself, it can only have instrumental value, that 
is, value as a means for humans. Among contemporary philosophers, 
Habermas has such a view. The other basic attitude holds that non-
humans may have value in themselves independent of what they can be 
for humans. 
  
As long as there were a moderate number of humans with moderate 
means to interfere with the richness and diversity of life on Earth, it did 
Volume 21, Number 1 55
not matter much for the planet how they conceived their relation to the 
Earth. But now, with an enormous number of people, and a practically 
infinite capacity for destruction, how they feel about nature is of great 
importance. The simplest reason for this is the ignorance of the long-
range effects of their interferences. A so-called green society is 
expected to be ecologically sustainable. The term is mostly also used in 
such a way that a society deserves the name only if the peace and 
distribution problems are also largely solved. 
  
There is unfortunately a tendency to talk about the environmental crisis 
rather than the ecological crisis. Environment is conceived as 
something outside of humanity. Humans are clearly inside the 
ecological systems of the Earth, and the societies of humans have the 
same kind of need and right to be protected as societies of other living 
beings. The rapid extinction of non-industrialist societies is an 
ecosystem degradation and destruction. The threat of the extinction of 
cultures has an ethical aspect, and belongs to the proper problematics of 
general ecology. Protection of human cultural diversity is a genuine part 
of the protection of biodiversity. 
  
Writers who characterize a (future) green society sometimes make it 
clear that they describe a utopia, others intend to describe a future 
society that will be a reality if the ecological crisis is overcome. 
  
There is in my view a regrettable tendency to talk and write about green 
societies as if they will be realizations of only one culture. In my 
opinion, the absence of deeply different future cultures would be a 
calamity. Richness and diversity of future cultures is for me a great 
ideal, perhaps the only way towards further developments of the human 
species. Diversity of subcultures, as we see them today in, for instance, 
big cities, cannot replace diversity of cultures. In at least a couple of 
decades there were thousands of new musicians in a certain part of New 
York City, thousands who lived in and for music. As long as the 
children were exposed to very different lifestyles and value systems, no 
specific culture was created. No traditions, no completeness. 
  
Most pictures of conditions in a green society suggest a rather uniform 
way of life. I reckon that some people will relish conspicuous 
consumption. Some will be victims of unsatisfied greed, some will 
delight in ecologically expensive gadgets. But in the latter case the 
owners of these gadgets will have to live ecologically inexpensive in 
other ways. The laws or mores should tolerate great differences of 
lifestyles. Today we know how some people may spend 90 per cent of 
The Trumpeter 56 
 
 
their income for purposes for which others would not even spend 5 per 
cent. 
  
The protection of richness and diversity of life forms is compatible with 
a variety of political systems. But national socialist and fascist systems 
are intolerant of deep cultural diversity and therefore cannot furnish a 
basis for a green society. There is a great literature comparing 
communism, socialism, and capitalism. Also vertical versus horizontal 
societies are compared, and tightness versus looseness. As long as only 
vague descriptions of countries are offered for comparison, next to 
nothing can be concluded about relative merits on the way to ecological 
sustainability. The presumption among most writers is that democracies 
are best. The argumentation is weak because it mostly relies on 
historical and contemporary evidence, that is, on actual ecological state 
of affairs. Authoritarian, hierarchical, Buddhist countries have often 
been used as examples of countries with great chances of remaining 
ecologically responsible in spite of not being democracies, but they are 
not industrial societies. If the democracies of the West do not within 50 
years change their ecological policies in the direction of decreasing 
unsustainability, the catastrophic situation may be reached when 
“strongmen” are able to acquire power and change policies by decrees. 
My guess is that ecological dictatorship has no better chance to be 
realized than ecological democracy. 
  
One may ask what is the relation between the various existing forms of 
systems of economy, technology, family relations, reproduction habits, 
religion, and so on, and the relative prospects of leading to ecological 
sustainability? The answers are in many ways hypothetical, because it is 
difficult to say to what degree a deplorable or less deplorable situation 
of a country is due to the system. The so-called systems are changing 
all the time, even in the cultures called traditional. One cannot easily 
predict how a worsening ecological crisis will be met. People read that 
we, because of our irresponsible behaviour, might cause a new ice age, 
or a meter high rise of the water level of the ocean, even within a 
hundred years, and many get concerned. They approve appropriate 
measures to be taken. But when they read what might be the effect of 
continued population explosion, they often are reluctant to approve 
ethically acceptable, appropriate measures. There are or have recently 
been cultures with norms favourable to the stability of the size of the 
population. Among animals, biological processes that limit 
reproduction are fairly common when resources are small or dwindling. 
For example, there are insects which every autumn, anticipating winter 
and spring time scarcity, produce fewer females. Resources on remote 
islands are in an obvious way limited and this has motivated appropriate 
Volume 21, Number 1 57
customs. Malthus thought that Norway's agricultural population had 
customs that counteracted the blind drive of procreation. On the whole, 
cultures today do not have institutions favourable for early stabilization 
and reduction of population. 
  
The small minority of 500 million who are responsible for most of the 
degradation of life conditions on Earth tolerate cultural patterns today 
that favour irresponsible reproduction. A 10 per cent decrease of the 
birth of unwanted children would make richer European countries enter 
the process of population decrease before long. The increase of 
criminality among children from age 10 to 15 testifies to the presence 
of devastating cultural trends that incapacitate adequate education.  
  
Many people active in the fight against the ecological crisis look 
forward to green societies where children, from the time they are able to 
walk, have access to patches of free nature without having to go across 
dangerous streets. But this requires architectural revolutions. As it is 
now, the street is often a cultural centre. 
  
There is, in short, much to be learned from the study of cultures in the 
past and the present, but the global state of affairs is so complex that 
any fairly simple general conclusion about relative merits of different 
cultures is highly speculative. What we know as members of Western 
democracies, whatever their cultures, is that we are heavily responsible 
for the increasing unsustainability. 
  
The above reflections have the modest aim to emphasize the importance 
of increasing efforts in every country under every sort of conditions, 
political, cultural, and so on, to turn the tide from increasing to 
decreasing unsustainability. 
  
This conclusion is compatible with a certain mobility of area of 
concentration: some groups may concentrate on overcoming definite 
dominant ideological or spiritual aspects of their culture (in a wide 
sense of the word), others may concentrate on reforms of the economic 
systems, still others may concentrate on the fight against the 
implementation of an ecologically horrendous concrete plan or a source 
of horrible pollution. The frontier of kinds of work is long, and 
discussion about what is most needed to do should not degrade into 
polemics. 
  
 
 
The Trumpeter 58 


Culture and Environment

Devall, Bill

Bill Devall and Alan Drengson, guest editors for this Naess series

A Plea for Pluralism in Philosophy and Physics

 
 
The Trumpeter  
ISSN: 0832-6193 
Volume 21, Number 2 (2005) 
 
 
In Praise of Books of the Big Outside 
1993Q 
Arne Naess 
 
 
 
 
 
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VThis review of Books of the Big Outside by Dave Foreman was originally
published in Wild Earth 3, Winter 1993/1994, pages 88–89.   here has been nothing quite like Dave Foreman's Spring 1993 Books 
f the Big Outside1 published anywhere on this Earth for this planet: a 
atalogue of books “available to wilderness defenders.” But the 
embers of the group in charge of the undertaking are walking a 
inancial tightrope: “unless our sales volume increases, we may not be 
n business in 1994.” We cannot permit this to happen, and we are all 
esponsible if it happens. I promise that if it happens, I shall as a 
unishment eat caramel pudding every day for a whole week. It is a 
ish I have hated since early childhood. I expect others will inflict 
imilar pain if the enterprise falters.  
 
hy books? Surely, one may be a firm deep ecology supporter without 
eading any books whatsoever. But to many of us, it helps and most of 
s live among people who do not yet actively support the defence of the 
lanet, but who would do so if we were able to articulate what we 
xperience and what we have read, sometimes in books. 
 
he catalogue has now got the breadth of scope essential to convey the 
ength of the frontier along which activists struggle. The books are 
rganized by category and now include psychological, social, political, 
nd philosophical issues. Dave writes a little about each book, and I am 
lad that he successfully focuses on what he thinks is good and uses 
ery little space in suggesting what is bad. 
 
here is a section with the heading Eco-philosophy, a term I rarely use. 
n the West, the term philosophy has largely lost its old meaning, friend 
f wisdom. Wisdom is not a theory, but a link between fundamental 
iews and decisions in concrete situations all of us encounter. 
cosophy, household or home-hold wisdom, is a good word, but that 
olume 21, Number 2 61
does not mean that I recommend it. Take it or leave it. But my point is 
to support those who are suspicious about a philosophical view not 
clearly related to practice. A professor of philosophy at a Western 
university need not have written anything he or she would consider 
important for our decisions, except discussion regarding what to read, 
in order to qualify as a professor of philosophy. 
  
Dave uses at least twice the expression “personal gut feeling for wild 
things and sunsets.” Not to reveal such a gut feeling or to ignore “all 
non-academic conservationists in their philosophical analysis” Dave 
considers bad. “In fairness, I can make these . . . criticisms against most 
of the books in this cubby-hole.”2  
  
One may perhaps be a supporter of the deep ecology movement and 
even partake in direct actions without strong gut feelings of the kind 
Dave seems to refer to. But the special driving force of the movement 
depends heavily, perhaps decisively, on them. Spontaneous, wild, 
enthusiastic feelings. They alone should not, of course, determine 
decisions. We need reason to help us decide among alternative actions: 
priorities, co-operation, and organization. In the ecological movement, 
important work is done by enthusiasts as well as by the lukewarm, or 
people with a style that is taken to indicate lukewarmness.  
  
As a professional philosopher, I insist that there is nothing 
unphilosophical about the gut feelings Dave refers to. On the contrary, 
the more strong the “positive” emotions, the better the prospect for gain 
in human freedom, individual and collective (Spinoza). And if strong 
gut feelings are decisive in philosophy, there can be no argument 
against their frank articulation in an appropriate context. But beware, if 
you look for tenure as a philosophy professor, such contexts are very 
rare. My book Ecology, Community and Lifestyle3 was intended to be 
difficult and academic enough to be used as a text at universities. My 
hope to conquer a place in the sun (or shade) at philosophy departments 
was crushed. Their main objection: not enough careful argumentation 
for and against definite, well-defined positions. Subordinate objection: 
too much hidden propaganda! Now, 20 years later, “applied” 
philosophy has a place in universities and colleges, but a very modest 
one compared to, say, chemistry, or even climatology. 
  
Economics and politics with reference to radical environmentalism are 
now of growing importance. In Norway, we have been fortunate to have 
had two Nobel Prize winners in economics. The first fought against 
economists who accepted pay to lead government and big business 
economic projects without criticizing the premises and assumptions of 
The Trumpeter 62 
 
 
the economic thinking of the institutions paying them the dollars. A 
very important point in research ethics! Of course, you risk never again 
being asked about anything by government and business. But if you are 
already an established expert you must take that risk. The other Nobel 
Prize winner is a firm supporter of deep ecology and, of course, 
together with some other leading economists, against joining the 
European Common Market, a gigantic organization that will intensify 
economic growth and competition, and try to compete with both Japan 
and the United States in their ecologically disastrous struggle to 
maintain or even increase the ecologically and philosophically insane 
level of unsustainable consumption. 
  
Perhaps, perhaps not, future issues of the Book of the Big Inside and 
Outside, the process of identification reaches far, may contain 
references to books or articles talking about the million dollar “eco-
eco” (economy-ecology) projects, for instance, the attempts to put the 
price of ecological damage into the prices of cars, sofas, and millions of 
other things. 
  
Dave criticizes an ecophilosophical book for virtually ignoring “all non-
academic conservationists.” Philosophy and ecosophy overlap, but to 
help practical decisions in concrete situations is part of the function of 
ecosophies. That their fundaments are philosophical or religious does 
not imply that their articulations are academic. Ecological folk wisdom 
in the West as well as in the East includes tentative solutions to 
philosophical and religious questions, but articulated artistically or in 
the language of everyday life. 
  
This belongs to the view most or all supporters of the deep ecology 
movement agree about: it would be good for humans if there were 
fewer humans, and very good for non-humans. In the section on 
overpopulation, this view is of course taken for granted. A future 
edition may contain reference to books in favour of the substantial part 
of the population which suffers most from the irresponsible 
reproduction: the small children. Even a two per cent yearly decrease in 
the birth rate in the industrial societies would soon result in a 
satisfactory rate of decrease of the present gigantic population. Policies 
in favour of population decrease should be intimately connected with 
policies in favour of children and their safe access to patches of free 
nature. By “wanting” children here I mean to seriously want to live a 
life that includes treating them as beings with intrinsic value and 
protecting them as far as practically possible against physical and 
mental injury. 
  
Volume 21, Number 2 63
The analogy of human population growth and parasitism and cancer 
may be useful when talking about the past, but scarcely functional in 
talking about the potentialities of the human species in the future. Here 
I support the optimistic view that it may not even take many hundred 
years before the (sadly reduced) richness and diversity of life on Earth 
is eagerly cared for and increased through human action and inaction. 
But views may and should differ on this point. 
 
Notes 
                                                 
1 Dave Foreman's Books of the Big Outside is published in Bernalillo, NM by Ned Ludd 
Books.  
2 Foreman, 35. 
3 Arne Naess, Ecology, Community, and Lifestyle: Outline of an Ecosophy, translated 
by David Rothenberg. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989. 
The Trumpeter 64 


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