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Deep & Shallow Ecology

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Mohd. Kaif
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15 views5 pages

Deep & Shallow Ecology

Uploaded by

Mohd. Kaif
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Deep Ecology and Shallow Ecology

Deep Ecology is a school within environmental ethics


that was founded by the Norwegian philosopher Arne
Naess.

According to him, to adequately deal with


environmental problems, a shift is required in both
ethical and metaphysical understanding of the world.
Ethically, he advocated ‘biocentric egalitarianism’, the
view that all living beings have the equal right to live and
flourish.
Metaphysically, he advocated a relational concept of self
that includes aspects of the natural world and is not a
discrete separate entity.
 Compliance to such a principle requires a kind of self-
realization, ultimately leading to a radical revision of the
present modes of life and consumption, including economic
activities, political institutions, population growth etc.

 The main teaching of deep ecology:


Humans or any other species are what they are only in connection
to the natural world.
One life is related to another life in various ways and various other
lives in one way or another, in a web of lives that constitute
ecology.
Humans are not isolated, discrete and disconnected from other
beings but are their true self only in relation to other individuals
and beings of the natural world.
No individual being can be totally understood from only what they
are inside, their true being arises from their relation with every
other being they have the potential to affect or be affected by.
It is just like personal identity which would be
incomplete without the many human relationships and
cultural associations.
A person is, for instance, a father, a son, a professional,
member of a religion, perhaps an ardent music lover, a
soccer player, a friend, a citizen of a state and nation, and
many other things. He has interiorized these over years
as a part of his identity, without which his identity would
not be complete.
Similarly, nature is also as much entwined with personal
identity, be it the air we breathe, the water we drink, the
food we eat, and also the interactions with the
innumerable other living beings with whom we share the
planet.
Deep ecology has developed as a revolution against
shallow humanistic ethics which distinguishes
between humans and nature and then tries to bridge the
illusionary gap by prescribing an ethics to be followed
by humans in their interactions with nature.

They fall short of a deep understanding of the natural


world which would confirm that there is actually no
such gap and there is no difference between humans
and the rest of the biotic world.

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