- Deep
ecology, that branch
of environmental
philosophy that most
radically challenges
the assumptions of
anthropocentric humanism,
has recently become
something of a bête-noir
within mainstream
ecological thought.
Following Luc Ferry's
influential linking
of deep ecology with
fascism in The
New Ecological Order,
many environmental
thinkers have published
work criticizing the
movement's anti-modernism
and potentially totalitarian
holism. For example,
in "Ecofascism:
An Enduring Temptation," Michael
Zimmerman identifies
instances of such holism
in the politics of noted
European environmentalist
Dr. Walter Schoenichen
and in American environmentalist
J. Baird Collicott's
early approval of deep
ecology's "biocentric" philosophy.
Citing Aldus Leopold's
collectivist land ethic
as a major influence
upon American biocentrists,
Zimmerman sums up the
threat of organic holism
at work in certain
branches of deep ecological
thought:
According
to Leopold, 'the land'
refers to the internally
related complex of organic
and inorganic elements
. . . that constitute
a particular biome or
bioregion. Leopold sometimes
described these elements
as being analogous to
the organs of an organism.
To survive, an organism's
organs must cooperatively
limit their behavior
in ways that serve the
higher good of the whole
organism. Individual
organisms lack ethical
importance, for they
are temporary instantiations
of enduring species
whose interlocking relationships
constitute 'the land.'
(400)
If
taken as a biological
foundation for political
policy, it is not difficult
to see how Leopold's
land ethic can lead
to a form of holistic
totalitarianism wherein
the rights of individuals
are automatically subordinated
to the collective good.
Similarly, in Imagining
Nature: Blake's Environmental
Poetics,
literary critic
Kevin Hutchings analyzes
the Polypus in Blake's Jerusalem as
a "travesty
or parody of the
holistic relationality
which is a definitive
yet ultimately irreducible
or undefinable
trait of Blakean
'Life'" (194).
Hutchings analyzes
the Polypus as a
figure whereby Blake
explores the horrific
implications of
a human society
that has been "overwhelmed
by the 'Outside'
or objective universe" (196)
to such an extent
that it behaves
like an assimilating "organism" in
which "the
individual human
loses all autonomous
identity." He
goes on to link
such a totalitarian
vision with Arne
Naess's philosophy:
One
of the founders of
the 'deep ecology' movement,
Naess advocates an
ethic of human 'identification'
with all life, a mode
of relationship entailing
[according to critic
Ralph Pite] 'an extension
of sympathy that reaches
so far and becomes
so constant that the
self loses any desire
to differentiate between
itself and the world.'
(quoted in Hutchings
197)
Far
from offering a desirable
alternative to modernity's
dualistic alienation
of human beings from
nature as a domain to
be dominated in the
name of civilization,
Hutchings's deep ecological
Polypus embodies an
inverse, pathological
form of identification
which "entails
a holistic totalitarianism
that actually forecloses
ethical possibilities" (197).
-
Such
critiques are important
insofar as they identify
regressive elements
within the deep ecology
movement that, in the
name of holism, seek
to efface différance
and to deny political
contingency via recourse
to specious biological
determinism. The historical
consequences of such
ideology in Nazi "blood
and soil" totalitarianism
should serve as a powerful
reminder of the risks
entailed in reactionary
dismissals of modernity
and of humanism's ethical
legacy for our species.
However, as Cary Wolfe
and other scholars have
pointed out, traditional
liberal humanism is—in
and of itself—theoretically "impoverished" when
it comes to providing
non-anthropocentric
models for how to conceive
the rights of non-human species.
Indeed, changes currently
underway in global ecology
and in technology indicate
that non-human nature
is rapidly being altered
by human culture to
such an extent that
any distinguishable
difference between what
is "natural" and
what is artificial may
soon be rendered meaningless.
Although the cultural
dimension of nature's
meaning has always been
a product of human artifice,
the scope of physical
changes underway in
today's global weather
systems, increasingly
ubiquitous genetically
modified organisms, and
in continually shrinking
habitat for endangered
species all suggest
that nature's material "différance" is
being effaced by humanity
on an unprecedented
scale. Indeed,
it is the latter erasure
that has led contemporary
ecologists such as Bill
McKibben to conclude
that our era marks the "end
of nature" and
philosophers such as
Michel Serres to argue
that global culture
has itself become a
force of nature, the
human equivalent of
plate tectonics (16).
In other words, if we
continue to apply powerful
technology under the
influence of a traditionally
humanist mindset that
remains blind to the
pitfalls of anthropocentrism,
nature as an "outside" will
cease to function as
a useful counterbalance
to human activity or
as a domain which provides
a window onto other
modes of being. In essence,
the risk of humanity
being reduced to a subset
of biological nature
feared by opponents
of totalitarian holism
seems far less likely
today than an opposite
(equally problematic)
monism wherein nature
is completely subsumed
by the category of the
human.
-
Insofar
as it attempts to inaugurate
a means of thinking
alternatives to the
latter dilemma, deep
ecology remains a significant
facet of environmental
philosophy. Of all the
major schools of ecological
thinking currently available,
deep ecology addresses
most directly the problem
of anthropocentrism
and the need to re-consider
the status of non-human
entities as co-inhabitants
of planet earth. It
does so primarily via
the Deep Ecology Platform
(DEP)'s recognition
of "intrinsic
value" in
all life forms and its
assertion that human
beings have no essential "right" to
reduce the richness
of biodiversity "except
to satisfy vital needs" (Naess
and Sessions quoted
in Deep
Ecology 70).
Although the concepts
of "inherent
worth" and
humanity's "vital
needs" are
subject to deconstruction,
the platform nonetheless
raises the question
of why non-human life
has traditionally been
excluded from "subject" status
in western thought,
and (therefore) from
inclusion within the
sphere of "intrinsic
value" and/or
unalienable rights.
Indeed, the notion of
intrinsic value, I will
argue, necessarily compliments
the principle of "wide
identification" that
also underwrites deep
ecological thought as
an "ultimate
premise" (Glasser
219). As is illustrated
in Zimmerman's and Hutchings's
analysis, the charge
that deep ecology promotes
totalitarian holism
hinges largely upon
exclusive attention
to the "identification" principle
without an acknowledgement
of the tension that
is produced by deep
ecology's concurrent
inclusion of the "intrinsic
value" principle.
At a fundamental level,
the latter represents
an attempt to acknowledge
the value of both "human
and nonhuman" diversity,
as reflected in the
platform's second basic
principle: "richness
and diversity of life
forms contribute to
the realization of [intrinsic]
values" (Naess
and Sessions quoted
in Deep
Ecology 70).
It is difficult to see
how a commitment to
human diversity as a "value
in [itself]" gels
with the charge of totalitarian
holism leveled by critics
of deep ecology. Moreover,
diverse traditions have informed the philosophical
premises of the DEP
(including Spinozan
Christianity, feminism,
pre-industrial or "primal" cultures,
ecological science,
contemporary physics
and—particularly
significant for the
present study—Romanticism
and Eastern religion).
-
The
humanist tradition in
Western thought enables
us to contemplate human
life's "intrinsic
value," arguably
one of the most important
ethical achievements
of this philosophy.
Although subject to
the charge of logical
fallacy (it might be
argued that nothing
has inherent value but
that all value derives
from human attribution),
the principle nonetheless
possesses a certain
wisdom insofar as it
guards against the reduction
of value to utility.
This is why Kant's "categorical
imperative" asserts
that it is wrong to
see a human being as
a "means" to
some end rather than
as an "end
in his/herself"—i.e.
to see subjects in terms
of their functional
utility rather than
as entities with a value
that transcends all
notions of use. Following
in this tradition, Naess
attempts to extend the
concept of what constitutes
an "end
in itself" to
non-human entities.
Thus, following Tom
Regan, he defines "intrinsic
value" as "the
presence of inherent
value in a natural object
. . . independent
of any awareness, interest,
or appreciation of it
by any conscious being" (Regan
quoted in Naess 197).
The humanist tradition,
however, maintains that
differences in kind
which exist between
humans and animals (language
use, rationality, capacity
for ethical behavior)
justifies their exclusion
from the domain of "intrinsic
rights." For
example, Kant maintained
that because animals
lacked consciousness,
they could not be ends
in themselves but were
mere means to human
ends. Given recent discoveries
regarding animal consciousness
in the field of cognitive
ethology and regarding
humanity's close genetic
kinship with other animals,
many of the discriminatory
markers invoked by earlier
humanist thinkers have
proven to be problematic
and/or not nearly as
clearly defined as was
once believed. Deep
ecology challenges us
to reconsider why we
continue to deny that
non-human life can also
be perceived as possessing
inherent worth and why,
for purposes of expediency,
human beings should
automatically have the
right to determine a
natural entity's value,
or, conversely, to deny
it. In order to consider
the possibility that
non-human life forms
might possess intrinsic
value, deep ecologists
have had to seek philosophical
models beyond those
afforded in humanism,
insights derived from
non-dominant traditions
within Western thought
and in Eastern traditions
such as Buddhism.
-
Humanity's
ability to identify
with certain non-human
life forms may at first
seem to be a sufficient
basis for attributing
intrinsic value to an
entity, yet in actuality
identification alone
in no way ensures that
an organism's right
to life will be acknowledged.
For example, human beings
might identify with
a tiger's strength and
beauty or a wolf's intelligence,
yet this very identification
contributes to the slaughter
of tigers for aphrodisiac
products in the Far
East and has contributed
to our competitive drive
to exterminate the wolf
in the West. Likewise,
the popularity of bird
feathers and furs as
objects of aesthetic
admiration (human identification
with the beauty of these
things) has contributed
to extinction and/or
drastic reduction in
the populations of other
animals. This is why "wide
identification" alone
is an insufficient principle
upon which to ground
an ecological philosophy
that goes beyond the
limitations of traditional
humanism. Conversely,
if we cannot identify
with non-human life
at all (seeing human
interests as being entirely
distinct from the interests
of other organisms and
denying the latter a
capacity for thought
or feeling) then we
also run the risk of
objectifying and exploiting
natural entities as
wholly alien "others." In
an effort to avoid either
scenario, deep ecology
attempts to counterbalance "wide
identification" with
an acknowledgement of
all life's "intrinsic
value." The
great risk of this strategy
is that, from a conventionally
rational perspective,
it may appear to be
incoherent. Operating
from within such a perspective,
one might critique the
logic of asking human
beings to identify with
natural entities while
simultaneously asserting
that life's value is
ultimately "independent" of
any human "awareness,
interest, or appreciation" of
it. From such a standpoint,
a philosophy must choose
whether it bases its
ethical claims upon
principles of sameness
(identification) or
différance
(attribution of value
to things because they
resist the homogenizing
effects of identification).
-
This
paper will make a case
for the necessity of
deep ecology's inclusion
of these apparently
contradictory (but actually
complementary) principles
within its philosophical
framework. Three key
sources of deep ecological
thought—Romanticism,
Martin Heidegger's philosophy,
and Buddhism— collectively
illustrate the importance
of combining both "wide
identification" and "intrinsic
value" in
one's environmental
ethos. William Blake's
monistic art demonstrates
the vital importance
of human identification
with nature; Martin
Heidegger's late philosophy
outlines the limitations
of identification and
the need to acknowledge "intrinsic
value" in
non-human entities; and
Buddhist thought parallels
both approaches, providing
a means for recognizing
their complementarity.
Conceptually, this essay
will revolve around
the insight suggested
in Zen master Ch'ing-Yüan's
famous sermon on mountains
and waters (Sheng-yu
Lai 358-359). Ch'ing-Yüan
states that when he
first began to study
Zen, mountains were
mountains and waters
were waters, when he
thought he understood
Zen, mountains were not mountains
and waters were not waters,
and when he actually
experienced Zen awakening
mountains were again
mountains and waters
were again waters. One
way to interpret this
sermon is to note that
we in the West are inheritors
of a dominant mode of
dualistic thinking wherein
mountains and waters
appear to be objects
existing "outside" the
human subject, which
could be likened to
the first phases of
understanding in Ch'ing-Yüan's
sermon. However, we
also inherit a less
dominant tradition (Romanticism)
that seeks to foster
a mode of consciousness
that transforms mountains
and waters into phenomena
the subject identifies
with on a deeper level.
In this second phase
of awareness, mountains
no longer appear to
be the objects they
once were, but take
on an altered phenomenological
status within the mind
of the perceiver. Yet,
such identification
must go a step further
in order for the human
subject to achieve a
truly enlightened relationship
with mountains and waters.
A third phase must be
achieved wherein mountains
and waters again are
acknowledged as being
separable from humanity,
although this insight
is now accompanied by
a greater sense of compassion
than was available at
the outset. Inspired
by Ch'ing-Yüan's
sermon, this paper will
consider whether deep
identification is a
necessary prerequisite
to "letting
things be," by
acknowledging that such
identification does
not require a one way
projection of human
identity onto nature,
nor an insistence that
nature be absolutely
revealed to us. True
identification humbly
acknowledges the limits
of human understanding
and values the mystery
of nature's "suchness"—its
irreducible otherness—by
creating a space for
acknowledging its "intrinsic
value."
-
In "Blake's
Deep Ecology, or the
Ethos of Otherness," critic
Mark Lussier usefully
revises the traditional
characterization of
Blake as an archetypal
champion of art and
reviler of nature as
something hostile to
the imagination. As
he convincingly illustrates,
what Blake objected
to was the Cartesian
construct of nature
as an object domain
separable from human
consciousness, a world
of dead matter that
could be exploited ad
infinitum to benefit
humanity's estate. In
such a view, nature's
unpredictability is
effaced within a mechanistic
framework that characterizes
it as a machine-like
system composed of discreet
parts, whose power can
be harnessed by human
beings. Nature remains
a material other, but
one that can be controlled
by humanity. Blake's
texts—perhaps
more than those of any
other Romantic poet—consistently
subvert this construction
of nature and the anthropocentric
subjectivity that underwrites
it. This is because
of his conviction (expressed
in a 1799 letter to
Rev. Dr. Trusler) that "to
the Eyes of the Man
of Imagination Nature
is Imagination itself" (Complete
Poetry 702).
For Blake, nature and
humanity are in fact
one, originally unified
in Albion, the Eternal
Man. Albion's fragmentation
gave rise to the dualistic
illusion that humanity
is separate from nature,
but Imaginative perception—particularly
that enacted in poetic
reflection—reveals
the true interconnection
of all things. In order
to experience what a
deep ecologist might
term "wide
identification" with
nature, however, Blake
asserted that we must
revise our atomistic
understanding of subjectivity
in order to comprehend
all existence as reflecting
the Human Form Divine.
Within this monistic
schema, all entities
share humanity's capacity
for intellect, feeling,
and "speech" because,
on a deep level, they
are synonymous with
the human mind or imagination.
-
Blake
realized that human
identification with
nature requires an acknowledgment
of how non-human entities "signify" even
though they don't literally
possess human language.
This is why, in poems
such as "The
Book of Thel" natural
entities "speak" to
Thel in the sense that
they are capable of
educating her if she
is receptive to their
lessons. As Lussier
points out, this poem
anticipates what we
would today describe
as an ecological awareness
that "every
thing that lives, /
Lives not alone, nor
for itself" (II:
26-27)—that
although lilies, clouds,
worms and human beings
are (as individuals)
impermanent, they sustain
wider networks of life
that do not pass away.
This is why the Lilly
(Blake's spelling) of
the field explains she
doesn't lament death
because her life nourishes
other animals like the
lamb and the bee. Likewise,
a little cloud explains
that when it appears
to vanish, it in fact
remains part of the
water cycle that gives "tenfold
life" (II:
11) to other beings.
Thel's existential dilemma
(a uniquely human dilemma)
is that she cannot accept
either her mortality
or her integration within
the web of life. This
is why Thel fears that
she "live[s]
only to be at death
the food of worms," to
which the cloud replies "Then
if thou art the food
of worms. O virgin of
the skies, / How great
thy use, how great thy
blessing" (II:
23-26). Here,
the text playfully subverts
Thel's speciesist revulsion
at the prospect of becoming
worm food by reversing
the anthropocentric
assumption that human
beings use nature (but
not vice versa) to celebrate
Thel's inescapable "purposiveness" within
ongoing natural cycles.
Yet, due to a dualistic
philosophy that locates
subjectivity exclusively
in the individual's
disembodied mind, Thel
is incapable of consciously
accepting her own impermanence,
an understanding that
would provide insight
into what Lussier terms "the
splendors of a complementary,
undifferentiated existence" (55).
As many commentators
have pointed out, an
acceptance of impermanence
as an existential condition
common to all things
is also a major facet
of Buddhist thought,
one that implies a need
for the individual ego
to free itself from
a grasping mentality
that would seek to escape
or avoid such a realization.
D. T. Suzuki sums up
this stance succinctly: "we
are all finite, we cannot
live out of time and
space . . . salvation
must be sought in the
finite itself . . .
if you seek the transcendental,
that will cut you off
from this world of relativity,
which is the same thing
as annihilation of yourself" (14).
-
Blake
consistently presents "self-annihilation" an
ethical imperative that
permits a fundamental
re-visioning of nature. However,
as Kevin Hutchings points
out, such "annihilation" is not synonymous
with the human subject's
complete loss of identity
due to its absorption
into nature as an "outside," as
may be erroneously inferred
from Lussier's notion
of "undifferentiated
existence." On
the contrary, in Blake's
schema, the atomistic
Cartesian subject is "annihilated" not
by being absorbed into
nature, but instead
is transformed via a
radical expansion outward
so that it comes to
be perceived as encompassing
both humanity and nature
within a higher "Human" identity.
I would argue that what
could be termed Blake's
monistic "higher
humanism" is
something that distinguishes
his art from both Zen
Buddhist thought and
from deep ecology. However,
Blake's emphasis on
phenomenological experience
as a gateway to realizing
this higher state of
unity is something that
also connects his thought
with these approaches,
as scholars such as
John G. Rudy have noted.
In poems such as Milton, self-annihilation
is not merely arrived
at via abstract contemplation,
but is experienced as
an ecstatic, embodied
expansion of the self
outward in moments of
intense inspiration.
What critic Michel Haar
says of Rilke's attempt
to explore the "'unheard
of center' or 'pure
space' of the heart
of the world that is
no longer subject or
object" (130)
seems equally descriptive
of Blake's project.
Haar asserts that when
Rilke says "The
birds fly through us" he "does
not mean our consciousness
represents the flight
of the birds; not only
do we experience their
very flight in our body,
but it happens through
our body in a sense
that is not simply a
matter of perception
but a fit of passion,
of an ecstatic outburst
, of 'sympathy,' of
a fluttering of wings
that quivers through
and beyond us in a space
that gathers and envelops
us" (Haar
126). Such
ecstatic "sympathy" enables
Blake to experience
(via his imagination)
the being of other animals
and to assert that they
have the ability to "signify" through
and beyond the scope
of language. A vivid
instance of this occurs
in Milton's
famous lark song passage:
The
Lark sitting upon his
earthly bed: just as
the morn
Appears; listens
silent; then springing from
the waving Corn-field! loud
He
leads the Choir of Day! trill,
trill, trill, trill,
Mounting
upon the wings of light into
the Great Expanse:
Reechoing
against the lovely blue & shining
heavenly Shell.
His
little throat labours with inspiration;
everyfeather
On
throat & breast & wings
vibrates with the effluence
Divine
All
Nature listens silent to him & the
awful Sun
Stands
still upon the Mountain looking
on this little Bird
With
eyes of soft humility, & wonder
love & awe
(II, 31:29-38)
Inspired,
the lark's song moves
its whole being, makes
it quake with "Divine
effluence";
its whole body "vibrates" with
inspiration, just as
the poem resonates with
a sound but half its
own. The poet, like
the bird, "labours" to
give voice to this "ecstatic
outburst" whereby
the reader may experience
something of the bird's
vibrant trace: "the
bird flies through us" when
our bodies resonate
with the text, or when
we experience the lark's
song first hand. The
lark signifies as an
emergent phenomenon
at the juncture of bird,
text, song and consciousness,
so that its voice becomes
indistinguishable from
the poet's. Such identification,
whereby the bird is
no longer just a bird,
nor the text just a
vehicle for representation,
would be quite impossible
from a dualistic perspective.
Similarly, Rudy interprets
the lines "How
do you know but ev'ry
Bird that cuts the airy
way,/ Is an immense
world of delight, clos'd
by your senses five" in
Blake's "Marriage
of Heaven and Hell" as "draw[ing]
the reader meditatively
into the prior oneness
of text and bird, of
text and world, as the
emergent base of all
reading" (102).
Rudy notes that the
question "How
do you arrive at the
knowledge of immensity
suggested in the phrase
'immense world of delight'" meditatively
leads the reader towards
the insight that "the
bird is not simply a
representation of delight.
It is the
realm of delight itself,
requiring not simply
knowledge about but
knowledge as that
which is under the pen" (104).
What we see in Blake's
poetics that is common
to both Zen and deep
ecology is, therefore,
an emphasis on action
as a form of knowledge
that compliments discourse, "a
shift from saying to
doing" (100).
-
And
yet, is Blake's romantic
identification enough
to provide us with a
blueprint for subjectivity
that moves beyond anthropocentrism
to cultivate an ethos
of alterity? Given
Blake's monistic position,
his belief that all
things are part of a
higher Human (with a
capital H) identity,
one might question in
what sense his poetry
permits the thinking
nature's alterity as
true "otherness." It
seems to me that Blake's
thought is incompatible
with deep ecology's
desire to recognize
nature's "inherent
value" if
by this we mean the
ability to acknowledge
nature's worth beyond
any human "awareness,
interest or appreciation" of
it. Indeed, Blake's
thinking does not break
with humanism's tendency
to see in man "the
measure of all things"—why
else would his figure
of ultimate unification
(Albion) bear a human
form? From
an ecological perspective,
Blake's monistic equation
of nature with Human
imagination poses potential
difficulties. For example,
what about the need
to protect species or
landscapes with which
we humans have difficulty
identifying (perhaps
why there aren't more "save
the leech or swamp" campaigns)? Likewise,
as aforementioned, too
much human identification
with a species can also
lead to destructive
ecological practices.
Still more problematic
is the potential to
justify continuing radical
alteration of the environment
based on the principle
of identity. In The
Machine in the Garden,
Leo Marx explores how
the pastoral ideal guiding
western cultivation
of so-called "barren" wilderness
is underwritten by the
notion that all human
arts (including technology)
are a product of nature,
that nature evolved
our tool wielding species
to permit its own transformation.
In the humanities, the
equivalent of this thinking
is reflected in assertions
that without art, nature
would not signify—in
Heideggerian terms,
that nature requires
the "clearings" of
human language so that
the "truth" of
its being may shine
forth. The common theme
here is, to quote Blake, "where
man is not, nature is
barren." Yet
deep ecology seeks to
balance "wide
identification" with
an ability to recognize
that nature (even without
humans) constitutes
a richly diverse panorama
of life, much of which
evolved long before
humans arrived on the
scene. Is there a way
to balance identification
with an acknowledgment
that this domain has
inherent value, a right
to exist apart from
us?
-
In
order to create room
for thinking the truth
of inherent value, deep
ecology draws upon both
post-Romantic Western
thought and insights
from Eastern philosophy,
most notably from the
late work of philosopher
Martin Heidegger and
from Zen Buddhism. As
Bill Devall and George
Sessions note in Deep
Ecology: Living as if
Nature Mattered,
Heidegger "made
three contributions
to the deep, long-range
ecology literature," namely:
his critique of Western
philosophy's development
after Plato (which "paved
the way for the technocratic
mentality that espouses
domination over Nature"),
his characterization
of Thinking as something "closer
to the Taoist process
of contemplation than
to Western analytical
thinking," and
finally, an ethos that
urges modern culture
to develop ways of "dwell[ing]
authentically on this
Earth" via
increased alertness
to one's bioregion and
to natural processes
(98). Despite these
potentially useful ideas,
however, it must be
acknowledged that Heidegger
not only remains a controversial
figure due to his allegiances
with Nazi politics,
but also a problematic
thinker even from an
ecological perspective.
For example, in Of
Spirit: Heidegger and
the Question,
Jacques Derrida notes
that Heidegger's characterization
of animals as "world
poor" in
comparison to human
beings constitutes a "discourse
on privation [that]
cannot avoid a certain
anthropocentric or even
humanist teleology" (55).
In "Eating
Well," Derrida
even claims that Heidegger's
theory of animal privation
belies a "sacrificial
structure" (113)
that underwrites western
culture's putting to
death (in a non-criminal
manner) of not only
animals but also groups
of de-humanized people.
While I do not endorse
Derrida's conclusion
that Heidegger's desire
to deny humanity's kinship
with animals implies
that human beings do
not "have
a responsibility to
the living in general" (112),
it is important to acknowledge
potentially destructive
components in Heidegger's
thinking which tend
to essentialize both
human and animal identity
alike. Philosophers
sympathetic to deep
ecology would do well
to interrogate such
flaws in Heidegger's
critique of humanism,
as Michael Zimmerman
has in recent years.
-
Nevertheless,
in spite of the many
shortcomings in Heidegger's
work (and life), his
thought does inaugurate,
in a unique manner,
a way towards thinking
the underlying complimentarity
of "wide
identification" and "inherent
value" which
is critical to the deep
ecological platform.
For the sake of brevity,
I will focus on the
evolving relationship
of "poiesis" to
physis in Heidegger's
work as an indication
that nature's "presence" or
truth may not ultimately
require human artifice
to be revealed. I
will focus on "The
Origin of the Work of
Art" (1935)
and "The
Thing" (1950)
as texts that reflect,
in Zimmerman's words,
a turning away from
an earlier anthropocentrism
in Heidegger's thought
when the philosopher
concluded that "he
could no longer conceive
of being in terms of
human understanding,
but instead had to conceive
of human understanding
as an aspect of being
itself" ("Heidegger" 247).
That is, Heidegger's
late philosophy regarding
the mutually "appropriating
mirror-play" ("The
Thing" 179)
of the fourfold (earth,
sky, mortals and the
divine) suggests that
the "physis" (self-revealing
event) of natural entities
constitutes a form of
value ("intrinsic
value")
that cannot be reduced
to the clearings afforded
by western poiesis (human
facilitated modes of
revealing), such as
art and technology.
Heidegger's eventual
turn away from formal
philosophy is sometimes
attributed to his interest
in poets writing in
the Romantic tradition,
such as Hölderlin
and Rilke. Certainly
in essays like "As
When On a Holiday…" (1939)
we can see the influence
of romantic identification
with nature at work.
Here, Heidegger develops
his hermeneutics of
resonance, whereby the
poet responds to the "call" of
nature by creating linguistic "clearings" through
which the truth of its "holy
chaos" (82)
can be simultaneously
revealed and concealed,
or perhaps more to the
point, revealed
in its concealment.
But beyond the identification
that permits the poet
to respond to nature's
sublimity, there is
also a play in this
essay between nature's
presence and absence,
a revealing and concealing
flux that is not evident
(or possible) in Blake's
monistic ethos. Is there
another tradition that
Heidegger brings into
play that enables insight
into an irreducible
nothingness that is
ever at work in nature's
revealing? Many
scholars have pointed
to the influence of
Eastern thought—and
particularly Buddhism
and Taoism—on
the development of Heidegger's
late work. The philosopher
was already referencing
Eastern thought in his
lectures during the
1930's, worked with
a Chinese scholar to
translate Lao-tzu in
1946, and, upon reading
D.T. Suzuki's Zen
Buddhism in
the 1950's, remarked "[i]f
I understand this man
correctly, this is what
I have been trying to
say in all my writings" (quoted
in Suzuki xi).
As Zimmerman asserts
in "Heidegger,
Buddhism and deep ecology," there
is much to suggest that
Zen thinking enabled
Heidegger's late philosophy
of dwelling to go beyond
anthropocentric identification
in order to explore
how all things (man-made and natural entities)
are at once absent and
present, gathering the
world into presence
by virtue of their emptiness.
-
This
shift is perhaps most
evident in the different
treatment of the relationship
between art and nature
in "The
Origin of the Work of
Art"(1935)
and in "The
Thing"(1950).
In the "Origin" essay,
Heidegger discusses
the way a Greek temple "accomplishes" (175)
the strife between earth
and world necessary
for the revealing of
truth, and in doing
so "acquire[s]
the shape of destiny
for human being" (167).
That is, the temple
both embodies occidental
culture's pitting of
human history (world)
against an earth that
is conceived of as being "ahistorical," and
brings these domains
into an antagonistic "belonging
to one another"(174).
Natural entities require
the temple's work for
their "truth" to
come into presence,
and historical world
requires the earth as
a foundation that grounds
its unfolding destiny.
Through a series of
violent cuts, the temple's
différance
permits an otherwise
invisible earth to become
visible:
Standing
there, the building
holds its ground against
the storm raging
above
it and so first makes the storm
itself manifest in its violence
. . .
The
temple's firm towering makes
visible the invisible space
of air . . .
Tree,
grass, eagle and bull, snake
and cricket first enter into
their
distinctive
shapes and thus appear as what
they are. The Greeks early called
this
emerging and rising in itself
and in all things physis.
(167-68)
What
is curious about the
description of the temple's
poiesis—its
bringing into presence
of nature—is
the way in which the
temple's "world" has
usurped the original
meaning of physis, which
is an "emerging
and rising in
itself" [my
emphasis]. That is,
natural phenomena only
become "visible" via
the temple's enframing;
by implication, earthly
things cannot manifest
themselves as what they
truly are without the
presence of human poiesis
(which originally included
both art and technology
as forms of technē).
The earth's reliance
upon human enframing
for its truth to appear
is even more pronounced
in the world of modern
(as opposed to ancient)
art. In his famous discussion
of Van Gogh's painting
of peasant shoes, Heidegger
analyzes the way in
which the painting reveals
the truth of the shoes
as equipment, which
in turn reflects the
truth of the peasant's "world" and,
only indirectly, the
earth's truth as part
of the peasant's world.
Indeed, the earth's
status in the world
revealed through this
relatively modern, representational
work of art is arguably
even more removed than
what we see in the Greek
temple. This is because "earth" in
the painting is subject
to many layers of mediation:
its traces are only
indirectly apparent
by considering signs
of wear upon the shoes,
the earth's significance
for the (hypothetical)
peasant woman who owns
the shoes, the artist
Van Gogh's interpretation
of the peasant's world,
the viewer's interpretation
of Van Gogh's interpretations.
On the one hand, Heidegger
tells us that "in
the shoes vibrates the
silent call of the earth,
its quiet gift of the
ripening grain and its
unexplained self-refusal
in the fallow desolation
of the wintry field" (159).
On the other hand, we
are told that the shoes
are a completely de-contextualized
aesthetic object: "there
is nothing surrounding
this pair of peasant
shoes in or to which
they might belong—only
an undefined space. There
are not even clods of
soil from the field
or the field-path sticking
to them, which would
at least hint at their
use." The
question therefore arises
as to how the earth
can be at once present and absent
in modern representational
art; a paradox that
can only be resolved
by seeing the earth's "presence" as
being entirely contingent
upon the viewer's apprehension
of its role in the peasant's
experience of world: "on
the leather lie the
dampness and richness
of the soil. Under the
soles stretches the
loneliness of the field-path
as evening falls." The
earth's physis as a
mode of self-revealing
is, therefore, particularly
inaccessible within
the alethias (clearings)
afforded by Van Gogh's
painting. Although a
trace of the earth's
materiality is evident
in the ancient temple's
marble and in the natural
environment which surrounds
it, nature's physis
is completely subsumed
in the painting by the
shoes' utility, the
peasant woman's world,
and the decontextualized
nature of the art object
itself.
-
By
1954, however, physis
makes a remarkable comeback
in "The
Question Concerning
Technology." There,
Heidegger claims that
not only art, but physis
itself is a form of
poiesis ("bringing
forth"): "physis
is indeed poiēsis
in the highest sense," as
evident in the "bursting
of a blossom into bloom,
in itself"(10).
Rather than pitting
technology's poiesis
against earth's physis
in an effort to alter
the latter, Heidegger
suggests that technology
should ideally allow
the earth's own presence
to "be" instead
of transforming nature
into a gigantic "standing
reserve"(17)
of energy. What can
account for the dramatic
shift in physis's status
in this late work? I
believe a careful study
of "The
Thing," a
text written four years
before "The
Question Concerning
Technology," suggests
that concepts derived
from Eastern traditions
may well have influenced
this change in Heidegger's
thought. In this text,
there is an attempt
to re-think the value
of physis, of learning
to respect what is inherent
in nature—what
Zen philosophy might
refer to as nature's "suchness." Such
thinking would see humanity's
identification with
nature as a first (not
final) step towards
granting natural entities
the right to "just
be" (inherent
value). Paradoxically,
deep identification
entails granting non-human
things a certain distance from
humanity's modes of
being, while also acknowledging
that all things are "appropriated" within
the fourfold "thinging" of
earth, sky, mortals, and
the divine. The former
creates a space for
thinking how the physis
of natural entities
constitutes a mode of
poiesis, while the latter
(in a suggestive parallel
with Buddhist thought)
implies that all things have "presence" by
virtue of an underlying
absence (emptiness).
-
As
in "The
Question Concerning
Technology" essay, "The
Thing" begins
with a discussion of
the many ways in which
contemporary technology
appears to have virtually
eliminated "distances
in time and space" (165).
That is, circa 1950,
air travel, telecommunications,
film, and other technologies
seem to have "abolish[ed]
every possibility" of
temporal or spatial "remoteness" as
great distances can
be overcome with a speed
that is historically
unprecedented (an abolition
that is even more pronounced
in the 21st Century
internet era). Yet,
Heidegger argues that
in spite of this "conquest
of distances" there
is a "terrifying" sense
in which we remain remote
from the nature of things: "the
nearness of things remains
absent" (166).
In the course of the
essay, it becomes clear
that "things" include
both man-made and natural
entities, the phenomena
that constitute "being" as
a whole. Heidegger suggests
that the "thingness
of things" (167)
remains remote from
us as long as we conceive
of things as objects: "the
thingly character of
the thing does not consist
in its being a represented
object, nor can it be
defined in any way in
terms of objectness,
the over-againstness,
of the object." That
is, the essence of thing-ness
does not appear in "objective" scientific
accounts of an entity's
physical composition,
or in modes of enframing
which equate things
merely with their utility
as man-made products.
Nor do we gain insight
into the nature of things
by dividing the world
between "objects" represented
within the subject's
consciousness versus
things-in-themselves
(Kant's account): "'Thing-in-itself,'
thought in a rigorously
Kantian way, means an
object that is no object
for us, because it is
supposed to stand, stay
put, without a possible
before: for the human
representational act
that encounters it" (177).
Instead of seeing things
as static objects that
are "represented" within
human consciousness,
Heidegger proposes that
we contemplate all things
as instances of "gathering"—as
clearings that enable
a bringing together
of four modes of being—earth,
sky, mortals (human
beings), and the divine—that
mutually appropriate
(179) each other. A
thing's thing-ness therefore
consists in its "bringing
near" (178)
the fourfold in a way
that "sets
each of the four free
into its own, [yet]
binds these free ones
into the simplicity
of their essential being
toward one another" (179).
For example, a jug "things" insofar
as it holds the "gift" of
wine, and thereby gathers
the sky's water, the
earth's grape, humanity's
production of wine,
and the presence of
gods when wine is used
in religious ceremonies
(libation). Such gatherings
constitute the thingness
of things, something
not only true of the
products of human poiesis,
but also of the physis
of natural entities:
Inconspicuously
compliant is the thing:
the jug and the bench,
the footbridge and the
plow. But tree and pond,
too, brook and hill,
are things, each in
its own way. Things,
each thinging from time
to time in its own way,
are heron and roe, deer
horse and bull. Things,
each thinging and each
staying in its own way,
are mirror and clasp,
book and picture, crown
and cross. (182)
Two
things are striking
regarding this penultimate
passage in "The
Thing." First,
there is an acknowledgement
here that poiesis is
not the only means whereby
things come into "presence";
rather, all things do
this insofar as they
gather the fourfold, "each
in [their] own way." A
tree, for example, can
also be said to "gather" the
fourfold insofar as
it is nourished by the
earth's soil, and the
sky's light can be
affected by human care
and perceived as a symbol
of divine creation.
Unlike what we see in
the "Origin
of Art" essay,
Heidegger insists here
that things do not appear
as things "by
means of human
making," but
neither, he insists,
do they appear "without
the vigilance of mortals" (181).
From a human perspective,
things do not appear
in their thing-ness
unless we reconsider
what it means to "dwell" more
responsively in a world
where we are always
already part of a larger "dance
of appropria[tion]" (180)
over which we cannot
exert ultimate control. In
acknowledging that all
things gather the world, "each
in [their] own way," Heidegger's
thought inaugurates
a way towards understanding
natural entities' "inherent
value" and
challenges human beings
to find ways to honor
this value in their
own poiesis (technological
or artistic clearings).
-
How
did Heidegger arrive
at such a different
perspective on the relationship
between physis and poeisis
in his later work? Scholars
such as Reinhard May
and Michael Zimmerman
have suggested that
Heidegger's encounters
with Eastern thought—particularly
his interest in Buddhism
and Taoism—may
well have influenced
this shift. A crucial
step toward acknowledging
humanity's appropriation
within the fourfold
lies in recognizing
a deeper relationship
between emptiness and
form than has traditionally
been available in post-Platonic
Western philosophy—a
relationship convincingly
elaborated within Eastern
traditions. As Zimmerman
argues, both Heidegger
and Mahayana Buddhism
acknowledge "humans
can learn to 'let things
be' only by gaining
insight into the nothingness
that pervades all things" ("Heidegger" 240).
In Mahayana Buddhism,
nothingness connotes
the "emptiness" and
impermanence of all
things, yet is not synonymous
with formless, chaotic
negativity. Rather,
the Sanksrit word for
nothingness, "sunyata," is
derived from a term
meaning "to
swell" (quoted
in "Heidegger" 252),
suggesting that emptiness
can be conceived of as
a "clearing" or
openness that constitutes
a generative space in
which things appear.
It is no accident that
Heidegger chooses a
jug as the focus of
his discussion in "The
Thing." A
jug is an ideal focus
for critiquing of our
understanding of things
as solid, discreet objects,
rather than "clearings" which
gather the world. The
jug's "thing-ness" is
not to be understood
as synonymous with its
material composition,
but is instead suggested
by its "holding" (or
gathering) nature:
When
we fill the jug, the
pouring that fills it
flows into the empty
jug. The emptiness,
the void, is what does
the vessel's holding.
The empty space, this
nothing of the jug,
is what the jug is as
the holding vessel .
. . [t]he vessel's thingness
does not lie at all
in the material of which
it consists, but in
the void that holds.
(169)
In
contrast to the Greek
temple in the "Origin" essay,
whose columns make the
air visible, it is the emptiness of
the jug, not its form,
that constitutes its
thingness. In Taoist
fashion, the jug is
a clearing through which
the fourfold comes to
presence, as it gathers
together the earth's
soil and the sky's rain
in wine that mortals
pour in libation to
the gods. Indeed, as
Reinhard May illustrates
in Heidegger's
Hidden Sources, "The
Thing's" discussion
of the jug remarkably
parallels Chapt. 11
of Lao Tzu's exploration
of how "[t]he
work of pitchers consists
in their nothingness" (30).
Similarly, Zimmerman
discusses suggestive
parallels between Heidegger's
characterization of
the fourfold's mutually
appropriating "mirror-play" and
insight regarding the
universe's luminosity
in Mahayana Buddhism.
In the most famous expression
of this insight, the
universe is conceived
as the jewel net of
the god Indra. All
things are analogous
to "perfect
gems" within
this net (or network),
and their reflective
light is simultaneously
produced by all the
gems collectively, "no
one of which stands
in a 'superior' or 'causal'
relation to the others" ("Heidegger" 253).
Zimmerman argues that "Heidegger's
account of the dance
of earth and sky, gods
and mortals, the dance
in which things manifest
themselves in the event
of mutual appropriation,
bears remarkable similarities
to the Buddhist account
of the moment-by-moment
coproduction of self-luminous
phenomena" (257).
-
Critics
steeped within a Western
tradition that posits
the human individual's
dignity and "inherent
value" might
find the suggestion
that all things (human
and otherwise) are "empty" has
troubling implications
if applied to political
subjectivity, fearing
that an emptying of
selves is often a prerequisite
of totalitarian political
regimes or can lead
to too intense an identification
with the "objective" domain.
For example, Brian Victoria's Zen
War Stories makes
a compelling case for
a link between the Zen
concept of "selflessness" and
Japanese militarism
during World War II,
and Karla Poewe's New
Religions and the Nazis similarly
links the German Faith
movement, militarism
and Indo-Aryan religious
doctrine, particularly
Jakob Hauer's interpretation
of Hindu texts such
as the Bhagavad
Gita. Poewe
claims that Hauer's
efforts to forge a new
Indo-Aryan religion
with a fatalistic warrior
code "anticipated
justification of the
deeds committed by the
Nazi regime" (79).
Such work, as with critiques
of radical elements
within the deep ecology
movement, usefully analyzes
potential effects of
state-sanctioned religious
ideology, instead of
maintaining that religious
discourse necessarily "transcends" politics.
As convincing as such
studies are as explorations
of how Eastern thought
has been appropriated
by totalitarian regimes,
it is problematic to
conclude that Buddhist
and/or Hindu thought
is essentially nationalistic
and/or totalitarian.
To draw such a conclusion
is to not only distort
what Hirata Seikō describes
as "the
absolute rejection of
war in ancient Indian
Buddhism" (4),
but also to deny that
any set of ideas is
subject to variable
interpretation or, more
rigorously, (re-) construction
over time. As
is well known, when
Chinese scholars translated
Indian Hinayanan and
Mahayanan texts, they
interpreted Buddhism
within the framework
of existing Taoist thought,
resulting in "Cha'an" Buddhism;
likewise, Japanese monks
reinterpreted these
texts to form Zen Buddhism.
Any western interpreter
of Buddhism brings to
the table certain cultural
and/or ideological lenses
through which he or
she constructs interpretations
of this thought. Concepts
such as "emptiness" are
therefore not only subject
to ideological appropriation
(in both a positive
and negative sense),
but also to unintended
distortion. As John
Rudy and other interpreters
of Zen Buddhism have
pointed out, a western,
dualistic tradition
that divides the world
between subjects and
objects can contribute
to misinterpretation
of the concept of emptiness.
In Romanticism
and Zen Buddhism,
Rudy points out that:
For
Zen Buddhists, engaging
[a] spiritual ground
[inclusive yet prior
to subject-object dualities]
follows patterns of
meditative emptying
by which individuals
relinquish the compulsion
either to assert independence
through radical emphases
on difference or to
establish unity through
variant modes of bridged
togetherness. The result
is neither subjective
nor objective. It is,
rather, an opening process
that reveals how each
thing in nature is both
an autonomous unit of
codependent activity
and a holistic manifestation
of ultimate reality.
(xiii)
Rather
than underwriting identification
with "objective" or
state-sanctioned structures
(totalitarian or otherwise),
emptiness as Rudy interprets
it suggests an alternative
to both subjective individualism
and objective obedience
to collectives. Indeed,
it is such alternatives
to dualistic accounts
of human subjectivity
vis-à-vis
the rest of the living
world that appealed
not only to Heidegger
in the later stages
of his philosophy, but
also continues to appeal
to deep ecologists.
As "The
Thing" makes
clear, insight into
the self's "appropriation" within
the world's mirror play
does not entail
a collapsing of any
one dimension of the
fourfold into the others. Human
beings still retain
a unique manner of "gathering" the
world in relation to
other beings: "men
alone, as mortals, by
dwelling attain to the
world as world" (182)—that
is, human beings alone
can self-consciously
choose the mode of their
dwelling and experience
the world as one of
many possible worlds.
Nonetheless, other non-human
beings also participate
in the fourfold, "each
in its own way," and
this diversity implies
the inherent value of
each unique mode of
gathering. The metaphor
of "mirror-play" enables
Heidegger to suggest
a deep identification
between human and non-human
actors in the "dance" of
creation, yet this mirroring
never stabilizes into
a form of monistic holism.
I would suggest that
this is because, unlike
his Romantic predecessors
such as William Blake,
Heidegger ultimately
resists equating "nature" with
a higher Human identity,
such as the Imagination.
Instead, the philosopher,
like deep ecologists
influenced by his thought,
challenges us to think
of identification and
inherent worth as a
productive "coincidence
of opposites" (in
Dennis McCort's parlance),
the kind of paradoxical
truth embraced by Buddhist
and Toaist traditions.
If we re-conceive the
identity of all things
as at once unique (having
inherent value) and
empty (inescapably appropriated
by other beings), a
truly non-anthropocentric
understanding of nature
becomes possible. Paradoxically,
only by learning to "identify" with
the emptiness of all
things while retaining
a sense of our distinctive
perspective may we eventually
find it in ourselves
to allow mountains to
be mountains and waters
to be waters.
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