Earth thought 201 of 365 : One of the favorite pot-shots of anti-environmentalists and environmental romantics alike is to point out how some aspect of our lives does not conform to environmentalism. Then, each says, don't fool yourself in thinking that you try to protect the environment, because -e.g.- you took a flight to California this year. Or, you drank imported wine. There is a grain of truth in. these views, as well as a pound of misdirection. The truth is this: if we don't consume or pollute, we simply don't burden the environment. And doing each less is less burdensome. Check. But also, we are embroiled in an unsustainable system and ethical life is complex -there are many goods we have reason to acknowledge and respect, not just environmental ones. Thus, the sound person will be involved in some burdensome behavior until we completely transform our society. And this is where both the anti-environmentalists and the romantics are blind. They avoid the political, non-individual nature of the problem. The former think the status quo is just fine, and the latter search for purists and hermits. But even the purist will only be helpful in the way she signifies a social message, spurring us all to change the nature of our institutions.
Earth thought 202 of 365 : The further problem with environmental romanticism is its misapprehension of the hero. It thinks the lone individual or the commune are the purely good. But, ironically, the car-driving engineer who designs a more efficient car has done more good than the pure hermit. Millions of cars now produce less. This is like the case of Temple Grandin. She decided to work with the fast food industry, and as a result millions of cattle live in less fear and die a painless death. The people who know the changes are societal and can work them, finding the working benefit, not the denial -these are the heroines.
Earth thought 203 of 365 : And now a comment about environmental scholarship (rather than about Bastille Day -and why should we celebrate the beginning of a reign of beheadings?). Due to the organizational structure of academia, scholarship should be specialized, current and engaged with the known people in the field. Shouldn't I say, "due to the demands of scholarship"? After all, scholarship advances by focusing on divided labor, being specific, and moving as a dialogue among the positions on a question where it currently is. Maybe. This is a scientific model. But philosophy is not science. Philosophy, which cultivates wonder and educates the next generation's character, often calls for other things -for instance, for imagination, the ability to form character, and for historical depth. The best papers needn't always be the most trendy, and many debates grind nothing but dust -stepping back would help more. But there is this in philosophy, too -the important thing is the question, the problem, the idea. And these take clearing, and art. The great philosophers quite often write in ways that reflect it -think of Plato's dialogues, or Nietzsche's aphorisms, or Wittgenstein's remarks. And, interestingly, these outlive scholarship. Are more educational, more useful. Don't we need this now -as we engage with a problem unformulated for much of Western thought, the problem of the environment? But the organizational demands of peer review scholarship pressure us to the specialized, the current, the known. Such environmental scholarship, ironically, can put at risk environmental philosophy. And what environmentalist would want that?
Earth thought 204 of 365 : Now imagine ecotopia -what does it look like? When Plato conceived of the ideal city as an analogy for the ideally harmonious soul, he did not situate the soul it the outside, or the city in the country that surrounds it and keeps it situated. He didn't imagine the circulating air and running water, the seasons bearable for food and life. Then what city was it, what soul, there without breath, water, food or cool for sleep?
Earth thought 205 of 365 : The problem with Marxist analysis of private property is that it is not true enough to Marx's actual words. It generalizes easily to the claim "property is bad". But Marx was clear that property is not in-itself bad -rather, he objected to the effects of a form of property. He noticed -correctly- that private property in our world has no strings attached for the owner. There is no ethical tethering of the ownership in the community. If you own something, you can do with it what you will as long as you don't hurt others or their property. This is a shameless view of property. For what if what you wanted to do is to destroy your beautiful woodland for fun? Now, I do think liberty is crucial. And yet I do miss a community where how responsibly you own something in nature is tied to your status in the community.
Earth thought 206 of 365 : With some things we own, we feel that they are entrusted to us. Contemporary capitalist property rights can't explain how that could be part of ownership. After all, if something we own is entrusted to us, then we have responsibilities towards it -we can't just do with it what we will. At least not shamelessly. I am saying that how we own parts of the Earth ought often to be seen this way.
Earth thought 207 of 365 : The real ecological people act like this -it's natural, they express, to co-inhabit the Earth with other forms of life. You think that's ideological? The farmer plows around the Killdeer nest.
