The placing of blind faith in the possibilities of scientific and technological knowledge of man, which results in the relativization of the Truth in the name of progress, denies the dependency that is underlying the concept of Creation. It is not the adoration of progress that will be able to preserve creation, but rather the search for Truth, which is the primary task and essential role of all those endowed with thought. Knowledge implies an act of Truth and at the same time of emotional participation, that is, of “love”. Above all, it is noted that Truth and Non-violence demonstrate the maximum concreteness and rationality of the principle, because ahimsa (sensu Gandhi) is the only way to approach the Truth, avoiding the possibility that any form of violence could impose the false: Gandhi extended this concept to all life forms and the environment, arguing that the destruction of natural resources was a form of violence. “The universe is not the product of darkness and unreason. It comes from Intelligence, Freedom, and from the Beauty that is identical with Love” says Albert Einstein. “Being is Supreme Wisdom. Everything that exists in the present arises from the interaction between Purusha and Prakriti, Spirit and Nature, which are the Parents of everything and every being” is affirmed in Chap. 4 of Bhagavad Gita. So, Man must obey the laws of nature, which govern biological systems capable of managing many aspects of their components (including man). Let us remember that already Saint Francis, in the Laudes Creaturarum, had recognized that Mother Earth had the ability to support but also govern living beings, including man. Bearing witness to the Truth and its consequences, and acting according to it, requires a sacrifice so closely linked to reality, that it constitutes the law placed at the foundations of civilization. Civilization, as Gandhi maintained, does not consist in the multiplication, but in the voluntary and deliberate restriction of needs. Following the words of last four Popes, the urgent need for humanity to take seriously into consideration the necessity of an ecological conversion becomes evident. Antropocene Vs Ecocene. Environmental ethics must be based on at least five assertions: (a) Life is a process of knowledge, able to perceive and process information, to learn, to reproduce itself, to have an history and to participate in the evolution, open, self-transcendent, self-organising, autopoietic, adaptive, dissipative, dynamic; (b) Life cannot exist without its environment; (c) Life on Earth is organized into hierarchical levels, each of which is a complex system; (d) Each level is unique because of its emergent properties; (e) Each level has its own characteristics but, through appropriate constraints, the processes of the higher scale explain the meaning of the level examined, while the processes of the lower scale explain its origin; (f) Man is part of this biological hierarchy and evolves with Nature. The need for the new figure of the Doctor of environmental systems and of their relations with human health (ecoiatrist) is reiterated once again: so, in analogy with Hippocrates, an “Ecoiatrist Oath”, to forcefully indicate the ethical commitment of the ecologist.

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Environmental Bioethics and Education

  • Vittorio Ingegnoli

摘要

The placing of blind faith in the possibilities of scientific and technological knowledge of man, which results in the relativization of the Truth in the name of progress, denies the dependency that is underlying the concept of Creation. It is not the adoration of progress that will be able to preserve creation, but rather the search for Truth, which is the primary task and essential role of all those endowed with thought. Knowledge implies an act of Truth and at the same time of emotional participation, that is, of “love”. Above all, it is noted that Truth and Non-violence demonstrate the maximum concreteness and rationality of the principle, because ahimsa (sensu Gandhi) is the only way to approach the Truth, avoiding the possibility that any form of violence could impose the false: Gandhi extended this concept to all life forms and the environment, arguing that the destruction of natural resources was a form of violence. “The universe is not the product of darkness and unreason. It comes from Intelligence, Freedom, and from the Beauty that is identical with Love” says Albert Einstein. “Being is Supreme Wisdom. Everything that exists in the present arises from the interaction between Purusha and Prakriti, Spirit and Nature, which are the Parents of everything and every being” is affirmed in Chap. 4 of Bhagavad Gita. So, Man must obey the laws of nature, which govern biological systems capable of managing many aspects of their components (including man). Let us remember that already Saint Francis, in the Laudes Creaturarum, had recognized that Mother Earth had the ability to support but also govern living beings, including man. Bearing witness to the Truth and its consequences, and acting according to it, requires a sacrifice so closely linked to reality, that it constitutes the law placed at the foundations of civilization. Civilization, as Gandhi maintained, does not consist in the multiplication, but in the voluntary and deliberate restriction of needs. Following the words of last four Popes, the urgent need for humanity to take seriously into consideration the necessity of an ecological conversion becomes evident. Antropocene Vs Ecocene. Environmental ethics must be based on at least five assertions: (a) Life is a process of knowledge, able to perceive and process information, to learn, to reproduce itself, to have an history and to participate in the evolution, open, self-transcendent, self-organising, autopoietic, adaptive, dissipative, dynamic; (b) Life cannot exist without its environment; (c) Life on Earth is organized into hierarchical levels, each of which is a complex system; (d) Each level is unique because of its emergent properties; (e) Each level has its own characteristics but, through appropriate constraints, the processes of the higher scale explain the meaning of the level examined, while the processes of the lower scale explain its origin; (f) Man is part of this biological hierarchy and evolves with Nature. The need for the new figure of the Doctor of environmental systems and of their relations with human health (ecoiatrist) is reiterated once again: so, in analogy with Hippocrates, an “Ecoiatrist Oath”, to forcefully indicate the ethical commitment of the ecologist.