Do we have an environmental crisis?
Before I could get past the first page of Orr's book "Ecological Literacy" I wondered, again if we did indeed have an environmental crisis. And again I answered no. No, because, whatever problems the environment has do not result from a single cause. No, because the environment is something that changes always, and will change again. I answered no because I see nothing that might indicate that resolving the crisis of the environment would solve any real problems. The crisis is therefore somewhere else.
I often forget the multiplicity of impacts that are made upon the environment; human, animal, vegetable, geological. Natural events such as red tides in the Atlantic and purple Loosestrife on Ontario threaten the status quo of existing environmental conditions perennially. Plagues of locusts rape crops while plagues of human refugees invade neighbouring areas in search of the means of survival (Humans are animals and can be described as such when events reduce us to the level of mere existence.). As social beings, we humans have an obvious negative impact on the environment through our institutions, corporate identities, and our socially mandated actions. All these negative impacts on the environment belie the use of the term crisis ("turning point especially of disease; time of danger or suspense in politics, commerce, ect.") which implies that there is a decision to make (based on the Greek Krisis decision). We are incapable of making any decision with regards to the environment. We are neither qualified (morally or intellectually), capable in any physical sense, or interested in making such a decision as an institution, corporate identity or social structure. As individuals, such a decision may be noble, but ineffectual, and perhaps dangerously misguided.
An aspect of the environment that I often forget to keep at the front of my consciousness is its ever-changing face under the influence of the energy that drives this global machine. The environment changes under the influence the nuclear sources that provide its energy and the living organisms that use (not consume) it. The earth gets most of its energy from the sun. This sun powers the environment and provides energy for life to exist. As this energy waxes or wanes the environment follows suit. Though this change is epochal in terms of our existence, it is rapid in terms of the local environmental conditions upon which we are bending our attentions. The nuclear energy of the radiation deep within the planet drives the earth's magnetic field, manipulates the crust on which the environment exists, and provides the energy on which many submarine species exist. The living things that use this energy to live also make monumental changes to the environment, even though it is usually in balance with the actions of other living organisms. The unimaginable number of tonnes of carbon dioxide that are converted daily into oxygen and carbon compounds by photosynthesizing plants, renders our chemical productions minuscule by comparison. These forms of nuclear energy and the use of that energy are constantly and violently changing the environment on a scale that transcends the influence humans may have by factors of hundreds. Yet we in our state of hubris ignore them when we should be embracing them and learning from them.
The real crisis which we so egotistically ignore is not one caused by natural [read: non-human] agencies, but by humans and with in the sphere of human activity. But we are not acting in concert, nor in agreement, nor with an end in mind. The crisis is founded in the sum total of our ostensibly random acts of living. So how can one suggest that "humanity" as a single unit has anything to do with the ecological crisis. Surely, being able to "cure" the environment by means of a technological fix, divine intervention, or even by the concerted effort of all aspects of humanity, would solve nothing. This is because the mechanisms that cause our negative impact on the environment are based within ourselves as social and corporate beings.
Our attitudes toward these environmental symptoms are outward manifestations of our attitudes towards ourselves as individuals and as a species. That our environmental perspective is a symptom of a deeper social malaise is evidenced by our inability to effect positive environmental change within our existing social context. Our society, based as it is on consumerist principals, functions by taking something of perceived value from a source and giving little or nothing in return. We become rich by making them poor. We can be the western world, a capitalist, a farmer, a thief; while they are developing nations, a worker, nutrients in the soil, another who is weaker. This is the real dis-ease, the unbalance, the crux of the environmental biscuit. But it is also a fundamental aspect of us as a species. We are omnivores, we eat and take what we need. No philosophical reasoning is going to counter millions of years of evolution.
The question is not stopping our consumerism, for it is not a new diversion, but a fundamental part of our existence. The question is not of equal distribution of wealth, for this leveling of the playing field will merely increase the volume of consumption which cannot in itself be stopped. The question is of redirecting our consumerist nature away from the consumption of materials and the environment itself. This is the challenge of our species. It is a challenge that we have ignored but can ignore no longer.
Postscript: I feel that this position paper is a work in progress. That is, the progress of ideas. I no longer agree with what I have said, after finishing the readings for this week, though as time goes by, I will probably revisit some of these ideas. Some of the things that I have said bothered me as I said them, but in the context of the course, I thought that I should. So there ;-)