To Paradise through Hell

Are you a ‘deep’ ecologist or a shallow one? That is an interesting thought after our last post.

Do you believe in non-interference in the natural world, or are you a ‘technology fixer’ who believes technology has all the answers, and that everything has to be measured in terms of its use to the human race? Let us hear your arguments either way.

In DotEarth, Revkin pays homage to Norwegian Arne Naess, mountaineer and philosopher who divided ecological thinking and action into deep and shallow. In what he coined as deep ecology, Naess believed all living beings have their value and have to be protected from destruction at the hands of humans.

Diversity of life forms on earth must be preserved and humans have no right to tamper with this, is a tenet of deep ecology. Life quality should be given more primacy than a high standard of living. Above all, if you believed in all this, you are obliged to work towards this goal.

A few months ago the Swiss Government's Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology concluded that plants have rights, and have to be treated appropriately. The Ecuadorian population has now voted to change their constitution to proclaim that nature has “the right to the maintenance and regeneration of its vital cycles, structure, functions and evolutionary processes.”

Ecuador drafted the changes with the help of the U.S. based Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund. Along with its work in Ecuador the Fund "has assisted more than a dozen local municipalities with drafting and adopting local laws recognizing Rights of Nature." The basis of these rights "change the status of ecosystems from being regarded as property under the law to being recognized as rights-bearing entities."

As revolutionary or impractical as they seem, these are small jerks that show there are people inclined towards ‘deep ecology’ and the connectedness of the world. The realization could well trigger a way of life which is in sync with nature.

Incidentally, Naess who was pessimistic about the 21st century saw hope in the 23rd by when, he predicted, population control would show results, technology would be noninvasive and children would grow up in a natural environment. “We are back in the direction of paradise.”