Overcoming The Energy Of Old Evil And Old
Gods We Will Arrive For The First Time Upon The Sacred Enigmatic Earth
As The Single Home Of All Humanity And All That Lives. [A.B.E.]
The ecological environmental
crisis is by now obvious to anyone who thinks about the fate of the Earth. It is
equally obvious that the ecological crisis is a crisis in consciousness. Never
before has there been so much knowledge shared by so many people throughout the
world about the impending ecological disaster to come. Yet at the same time so
little is actually being done to avert the destructive collision between global
consumer capitalism and the dying Earth....
Only a worldwide ecological environmental revolution is going to save what is
left of the living Earth. Many ecologists believe that it is already too late
and that all we can now do is slow the rate of our inevitable decline. In the
long run perhaps all that will be possible is to save enough of the living
biosphere to redevelop places upon the Earth to rebuild and save humanity and
the remaining species from ultimate extinction.
We
remain obsessed with shorter range issues such as national debt, unemployment,
war and crime, which in themselves increasingly look like symptoms of the larger
disease of ecological collapse.
The perversity of maintaining a conflict between ecological environmentalism and
economy continues as if they were separate issues. The World’s leaders seem
obsessed with free trade areas, the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs (G.A.T.T.)
(M.A.I.) and something called “free market democracy” and “technology and
competitiveness”, all of this to be conducted through the “information super
highway”.
Yet, the reality of the destruction of the rainforests, disappearing ocean life,
multiple species extinction, uncountable forms of chemical and nuclear pollution
and the daily drama of the holes in the ozone layer roars out at us from the
media everyday. There is transgender mutation going on in every species
including man due to active estrogens coming from many of the plastics and
chemicals being used in the home and in industry. And so the disastrous
environmental litany goes on. Everyday we discover that we have been criminally
breaking the laws of life and that the punishment is extinction. Insanely,
suicidal, we continue to argue about the economics involved.
All of this is forcing us to rethink what the Earth actually is and in the
process to rethink the nature of ourselves and our relationship with it. It is
obvious that our image of ourselves, which, after all, determines why and how we
act at every level, is in deep and perilous conflict with the reality of the
Earth. Through the “Gaia Hypothesis” we have begun, to some extent, to rethink
the Earth, but it is ourselves that we are in need of rethinking.
In spite of all the rhetoric at a socio-economic, political level and all the
talk going on in the media and in people’s kitchens, there is still no
widespread, organized active ecological awareness here yet. If this strikes you
as extreme, consider how and why the ecological crisis is being discussed.
Everybody knows that there is something wrong. Many people in every country have
a clear picture of what is wrong because they spend most of their time
diagnosing environmental symptoms. Yet, collectively, there is no consensus as
to what should be done. Even where there are pockets of consensus, we are
beleaguered by the fact that, at a political level, nationally and
internationally, the political will does not exist to the point where real
action can be taken to deal with the causes of the ecological environmental
crisis.
There is a rapidly growing literature exploring the different perspectives and
schools within Ecophilosophy. Many people are aware of terms used by
ecophilosophers. such as Deep Ecology, Shallow Ecology, Resource Ecology,
Anthrocentric Ecology, Ecocentric Ecology, Biosphere, and so on. It is not my
intention here to enter a discussion of the variously held views of all those
who are engaged in forms of ecological thinking. The Spiritual Realist under of
ecology will I hope become somewhat clear in what follows. Young and growing
though this spiritual realist understanding, still be. Suffice to say that to be
self awake to the fate of the Earth is to think ecologically. ( footnote: in a
coming book called Presence Ecology the meaning of existence. I explore all of
the issues inherent in Ecophilosophy in the light of spiritual realism. )
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