The Rainforest Information Centre Council of All Beings Back to Deep Ecology Index Council of All Beings Brief Description Workshop Manual Council of All Beings for Youth Joanna Macy article 8/02 and essay from "Coming Back to Life" August 2012 Great story by Gerry Coates February 2013 "My Name is Quartz" by Sven Helland NEW - Excerpt from “Playing Around” by Richard Neville, Hutchinson 1991 Milo Clark article 1/03 Some testimonials More Links
What is Deep Ecology? Stephan Harding “Through deep experience, deep questioning and deep commitment emerges deep ecology.” In the 1960s, having read Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring, Arne Naess was moved to apply his formidable philosophical skills to understanding the ecological crisis and its resolution. Since becoming the youngest ever professor of philosophy at the University of Oslo whilst still in his twenties, Arne Naess revealed his brilliance by studying and writing extensively in many fields, including semantics, philosophy of science, and the works of Spinoza and Gandhi. But he was much more than an academic. To understand what Arne Naess meant by deep ecology it helps to imagine this place: high up, totally isolated, with commanding views of landscape down below. The word ‘ecology’ originates from the science of biology, where it is used to refer to the ways in which living things interact with each other and with their surroundings. The Deep Ecology Platform 1.
Why is Deep Ecology Deep? There is no Planet B. Progress was the great myth of the industrial era, but that myth has now turned into a nightmare. Half of the world’s forests are gone, 40% of topsoils degraded, half the world’s sources of fresh water used exclusively by humans. With a current world population of 6.8 billion, the idea that each one us could enjoy the benefits of ‘development’ is not only an impossible dream, but also propaganda from the industrial world, especially the big corporations, the World Bank, the IMF, the UN, development and conservation NGOs. These organizations warn us to be ‘realistic’, but the reality they never talk about is that to offer all those billions of people a USA-standard lifestyle would require five – yes five – planets the size of the Earth. Predicting the Future Even for the affluent, it isn’t going to last. Quick fixes won’t work It isn’t that these actions may not be useful in themselves: it’s the ‘business as usual’ concept that is flawed. Deep Ecology: A Few Questions
Work That Reconnects Network — Take part in the healing of our world! Indigenous Elders - 'Mankind has gone too far' - Earth Tribe First Nations anti-fracking protest in New Brunswick, Canada Maybe Facebook has provided a helping hand. All around the world, indigenous groups are finding voice, through Facebook and other non-mainstream media, with a message common to all – Save Mother Earth. Brenda Norrell, in her useful news service, writes that indigenous Elders and Medicine People said there is no time left to defend the Earth. (See full story by Brenda Norrell here – Indigenous Elders: No time left to defend the Earth – ) Chief Arvol Looking Horse, Lakota, with a Council of Indigenous Elders and Medicine Peoples, issued a statement saying mankind can no longer ignore the teachings to protect the Earth. The First Nations anti-fracking protest in New Brunswick, Canada, is a prominent example of those who feel their roots in the land trying to protect it from invasive fossil fuel companies.
The One-Straw Revolution Masanobu Fukuoka (1913-2008) was a farmer and philosopher who was born and raised on the Japanese island of Shikoku. He studied plant pathology and spent several years working as a customs inspector in Yokohama. While working there, at the age of 25, he had an inspiration that changed his life. He decided to quit his job, return to his home village and put his ideas into practice by applying them to agriculture. Over the next 65 years he worked to develop a system of natural farming that demonstrated the insight he was given as a young man, believing that it could be of great benefit to the world. He did not plow his fields, used no agricultural chemicals or prepared fertilizers, did not flood his rice fields as farmers have done in Asia for centuries, and yet his yields equaled or surpassed the most productive farms in Japan. In 1975 he wrote The One-Straw Revolution, a best-selling book that described his life’s journey, his philosophy, and farming techniques.