Developing a Worldview

Here’s another essay I had to write for a class; it was for a take-home final. I haven’t posted a lot recently because of finals week, but after this, I’ll hopefully have a lot more time to dedicate to coming up with new stuff to write about.

Also, unless anyone specifically asks, I’m not going to include my Works Cited, just because I’m tired and don’t feel like doing it. Heh, so if you want them, ask, and you shall receive.

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Is there any one worldview that can completely ease the pains of our ecological crisis? I’m not sure. However, I do think that there is a source of this pain, and any attempt to solve ecological problems should at least implicitly address it. That pain is simply the result of the great divide between humans and the rest of nature. There came a point in our relationship with nature that we ultimately decided to reject our relationship with every other species, and forge ahead on our own. Neil Evernden writes that “…the central problem of human ecology is the relationship of mind to nature” (Evernden 36). We need a worldview that will bring us back into the fold. That’s a large task, and I think that the first thing that needs to be addressed is our view of nature, and then recreate a myth of creation in order to place ourselves in the proper cosmic context.

The scientific worldview is currently the dominant perspective that guides most of the developed world’s perception of nature. In this paradigm, nature is mechanical. Made up of atomized and disconnected blocks, science suggests that there is no limit to our knowledge of nature, and thus, our dominance over the world is confined only to the extent of our knowledge. As Francis Bacon, one of the fathers of modern science, “Knowledge is power.” Science has taught us to view nature as a resource to be used, not an entity worthy of respect on its own. This view has led us to the point in ecological history that we are right now.

So, what to do? I think that we have to begin by taking another look at our creation stories. Our current creation story goes something like this: about fourteen billion years ago, matter was created in the Big Bang. Earth was formed in a solar system around an average star that moves slowly around the fringes of a typical galaxy (one of about 125 billion). We evolved from crude competition between species; nature repeatedly culled the weak and favored the stronger. That story is the story we hear: a story of domination, of loneliness. But is that the story that we should hear? Is that the story we should teach to our children?

Brian Swimme writes, “To be human is to be a story. To forget one’s story is to go insane” (Swimme 250). The first steps towards regaining our connection with the planet is to rewrite our story, our history, and make it so that we understand ourselves as integral parts of nature, not atomistic blocks cut off from reality. If we cannot do this, than any attempt to restructure our patterns of thought will ultimately fail. Humans naturally look to their origins to find out who they are, how they ought to treat others, and what their place in the world is. If we can create a story that is ecological, or rather, one that is integral, we will enable ourselves to act in the world as participants and not as objects (a word that etymologically means “thrown out”).

Treating other beings with respect is the first step in the reunification of humanity with nature. If we learn to love nature, we will ultimately choose to treat it well. The Kogi are an excellent example of this, as are many pre-modern cultures. Instead of choosing to expand, grow, and eclipse the natural environment, these societies have learned to embrace the delicate balance of living healthy lives and letting other beings live healthy lives, as well. David Kinsley quotes a First People’s hunter, who says, “A hunter cannot just go and demand of a tree that it give him something, help him, aid him, cure him from sickness. You have to give something back for what it gives you” (Kinsley 14). Non-humans are thus treated with the same respect given to other human beings. This sort of reciprocity encourages living a life of respect for nature.

But the reconnection of humans to nature does not simply stop at ethical boundaries. Our creation stories will do more than just teach us about how to interact with other beings; it will even teach us more about who we are. This is the end goal of such stories. When we restructure our creation stories, we will ultimately have to rethink our own ontological status in the universe. If our creation stories tell of a universe that is ultimately shared, we will reach a point where we realize that we share not only physical resources, but perhaps even our own being. Joanna Macy writes,“As open, self-organizing systems, our very breathing, acting, and thinking arise in interaction with our shared world through the currents of matter, energy, and information that flow through us” (Macy 262). No longer will humanity act simply on a object to subject basis, but instead, will act on a subject-subject basis.

Many thinkers have discussed this process and evolution of consciousness extensively. However, one particularly interesting dialogue about the unification of human being with other being comes from the Himes brothers in their essay, “The Sacrament of Creation: Toward an Environmental Theology.” Though the Himes brothers do not go so far as to suggest that all being is intermeshed, they do provide some interesting insights into a Christian approach to such an understanding of ontology. In their essay, they outline a challenge to the modern Christian view of stewardship. This view suggests that humans are above or are at least more favored than the rest of nature. Instead, the Himes brothers advocate a deeper shift towards something they call companionship. “The theme of companionship, the relationship which exists not only between human persons but between humans and nonhumans, has been largely submerged in the stewardship theme. We need to recover it. Companionship implies mutuality. It excludes the reduction of either side of the relationship to a tool of the other’s purposes” (Himes 274). Thus, nature and human beings are unified together in Creation.

It all begins with the beginning: readjusting our creation stories to show our connection to the earth, reevaluating our place in nature ethically, and ultimately, stepping back into the being of the universe peacefully, no longer struggling to dominate everything we touch. If we have the courage to change the way we teach our children the origins of the universe, we may be able to change the dangerous path humanity now treads, and alter our course to one that is beneficial, peaceful, and harmonious.