To start off, two question-topics that this widely circulated and influential statement raises for me are:

1) What are the reasons for and implications (whether positive or negative) of framing "Nature" here as a "Mother" figure? And of framing the ecological struggle in terms of a duty to "protect" "her"?

and

2) What are the reasons for and implications (positive or negative) of framing the environmental struggle through the language of "rights"? Does the discourse of "rights" in need of protection provide a cogent or coherent framework for explicating and politicizing environmental struggles? How so or how not?

Also, to add one more: I would be interested to hear more about how so this statement is being invoked and deployed politically? In Bolivia? Elsewhere? And also to hear more about the process by which this text was conceived, revised, produced, etc?

I appreciate the sentiment of trying to encode environmental protection in the constitution, not that such legal niceties shall matter if the capitalists manage to do away with the MAS government.

My problem is with using the language of rights. By doing so, it argues that rights are something that exist outside humanity. Rights are nothing more than agreements. Humans can only make agreements with other humans, not with other species, and certainly not with plants, fungi, unicellular organism, or minerals.

If people want to consider the Earth or the environment a good in itself, ignoring the point that value judgments are made by human beings, and not intrinsic to nature, fine. It is a far better argument, to me, to argue that science shows that human beings need a healthy environment to be healthy. Material interest, not morality.

Chegitz, what do you mean by "Material interest, not morality."?

Radical-Eyes, I'll take a stab at your questions -- which I take to be rhetorical, rather than seeking concrete answers.

1) I see the "mother" aspect of nature as part of an ancient duality, held by many cultures throughout the world, from the yin-yang of the orient, to the heaven and hell of contemporary Christianity.

I think that "Mother Earth" and "Father Sun," representing matter and energy, respectively, have gone out of balance, with energy dominating for some 5,000 years or so, since the time when matriarchal tribes gave way to patriarchal cities. Riane Eisler does a great job of explaining this in <a href="/http://www.rianeeisler.com/chalice.htm" rel="nofollow"><i>The Chalice and The Blade.</i></a>

The discovery and exploitation of fossil sunlight accelerated the dominance of energy over matter, until today, the people in North America are using 50% more energy than is harvested by all the plants in North America. We are living beyond our budget, and clearly, this cannot continue!

So, "We've got to get ourselves back to the garden," as Joni Mitchell once implored.

As for "protecting nature," I don't think that's our job. Nature will do quite well once she gets over the fever that will rid her of this parasite. Not that I think humans <i>necessarily</i> are a parasite -- we're supposed to be the "wise hominid," right? Let us then <a href="/http://simplicityinstitute.org/" rel="nofollow">voluntarily change our behaviour</a> in enlightened self-interest in order to not invoke the immune system of Gaia!

2) Hmm... "rights." I don't necessarily believe in "rights." An asteroid could wipe us off the planet in the next instant. Humans have no "right" to survive, let alone thrive. So I think I agree with Chegitz Guevara that "rights" are simply "agreements" -- which are still very important!

But unlike Guevara, I <i>do</i> think nature has intrinsic value beyond our use of it. Nature will remain long after humans are gone. I hope the sentient felines, canids, bonobos, cetaceans, or whatever that succeed us develops archaeology early in their development, so they can learn from our mistakes. And perhaps <i>we</i> will be their fossil sunlight to fuel their hopefully careful development!

Jan illustrates my point nicely. Rights don't exist outside humanity. We cannot reach an agreement with an asteroid. It is completely incapable of caring about our want and cares.

Jan thinks nature has intrinsic value. Note she says she thinks, i.e., she's placing the value. She claims it's intrinsic, but if it were intrinsic, it would be self-evident, and she wouldn't have to say she thinks. In any event, value is a property humans assign to things. If intelligent life didn't exist on Earth, no one would care about Earth. If no one cared, it would have no value. A think can only have value if someone cares about it.

@Roxane, I mean, the vast majority will not be won over by moral arguments. If moral arguments were sufficient, we'd already be living in the utopia preached by Rabi Yeshu 2000 years ago, or from any of the subsequent reformers. What moves people is when they see their material interests in jeopardy.

Once a mass movement comes into being, another material aspect comes into play, our social being. When we see the pain and joy on the faces of other people, we are moved, because we have been programed my millions of years of evolution to be moved (which is why our masters don't let us see what they do to "our" "enemies"). The more people fight to be free, the more people will join the fight to be free, even if it doesn't directly impact them.

Humanity is he most magnificent thing we've yet discovered. We are self-aware. We are the means by which the Earth and the universe comes to know itself. There <i>may</i> be other intelligent life in the galaxy, but I think it unlikely. There is definitely intelligent life in other galaxies, but we'll probably never know. So far as we know, we're it. In all 4 billions years of life on this planet, intelligent life has only arisen once. There's no guarantee it will happen again. We are infinitely precious. That is why we must restore the environment, to save us. With out us, no one gives a fuck.

Chegitz, thanks for elaborating on what you think about how the way the world works. I see you're thoughtful, and critical in your thinking. I would like to suggest that assigning an assumed gender to Jan without knowing more betrays a possible presumptuousness about how the world works....

The reason that would be important in this case is because in the larger picture of what you have said is the presumption that, as you say, "Humanity is he most magnificent thing we’ve yet discovered." And "When we see the pain and joy on the faces of other people, we are moved"... And "If intelligent life didn’t exist on Earth, no one would care about Earth."...The presumption that your definition of "humanity", "people" and "intelligent life" is the only one that exists....

And yet, when you write, "we have been programed my millions of years of evolution to be moved", what is missing is a recognition that your definition of how the world works denies the thousands of years of evolved humans who live and perceive and experience the world quite a bit differently than you, who resist occupation, colonization, slavery and destruction, and who have a depth of comprehension about joy and pain on the faces of others that surpasses anything we in our culture can imagine.

The reason this is important is because these people who see, experience, perceive and live in the world this differently are allies, and we need to find ways to learn from them, and to work together to stop the destruction done (by the domination of capitalism, as I know you know) to the earth on which we need to live before it's too late. All this other stuff, about who perceives the earth as mother or father or otherwise thinks in the properly "scientific manner" takes time away from stopping the enemies of life on the planet, for all of us.

Chegitz Guevara wrote:<blockquote>If intelligent life didn’t exist on Earth, no one would care about Earth. If no one cared, it would have no value. A think can only have value if someone cares about it.</blockquote>

The more time I spend with non-human animals, the less impressed I am with humans.

You've made some fairly large assumptions here! Why do you think <i>Homo sapiens</i> (despite the misnomer) is the only "intelligent life?" I might even agree that humans are the "most intelligent" -- by our own measure! But this is sorta like ghetto kids scoring poorly on intelligence tests designed by college graduates. Our goats can't find the hypotenuse of a right triangle, but they can go out in the woods and selectively eat things that are good for them and avoid ones that make them sick -- humans aren't <i>this</i> smart in their own environment of a grocery store!

I've seen crows using cars to crack nuts. The pick a nut off a tree, drop it on the road, wait for a car to run over it, and go retrieve the nutmeat. We're all taught in school that humans are the only tool users -- and yet a simple corvid has learned to harness petroleum <i>and unwitting "wise apes"</i> to harvest food!

I've seen an orca tow a boat with engine troubles and a broken anchor rope away from a rocky shore. It grabbed the rope and towed it to open water, where the coast guard then assisted. This required the orca to 1) realize that the boat was in trouble, 2) understand that there were fellow sentient beings in danger, 3) formulate a plan to save them, and 4) carry it out. This violates so many things that we "know" about "non-intelligent" animals that I don't know where to start: symbolic thought, future planning, abstract reasoning -- if only we cared as much for the orcas!

The wolves of Isle Royal National Park in Lake Superior control their birth rate to avoid consuming all the moose on the island. They somehow avoid the "boom and bust" chaotic population swings predicted by the <a href="/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_function#In_ecology:_modeling_population_growth" rel="nofollow">logistics equation.</a> They keep their numbers at about 50 moose for each wolf, without enduring famine, which is the usual way predator-prey relationships stabilize. Wolves in other situations do not exhibit this behaviour. Do they realize that they're on an island with limited resources? Are they "smarter" than humans in that regard, who seem to have no idea that we, as well, are on an "island" called "Earth?"

<blockquote>Humanity is he most magnificent thing we’ve yet discovered. We are self-aware.</blockquote>

Says the human!

Koko the gorilla understand about 2,000 spoken English words -- including personal pronouns, a a sure sign of self-awareness -- and communicates with humans using American Sign Language. She demonstrated abstract reasoning and symbolic thought by creating new words, such as "finger-bracelet" for the concept (new to her) of "ring." Koko actually asked for a pet kitten, and when it curled up in her arms, she named it "ball!" Talk about symbolic thought!

But perhaps most "magnificent" of all, was that other gorillas, exposed only to videos of Koko, have picked up ASL, and taught it to other gorillas.

Yea, humans are pretty cool. I'm glad to be one. But we are different <i>in a matter of degree, rather than some absolute!</i>

Once you accept "different by degree" as an essential truth of the human relationship with non-human animals, it becomes very difficult to maintain an anthropocentric attitude. It was not so very long ago that humans enslaved other humans, using the very excuses Guevara uses to justify human domination of non-human animals.

<i>"There may be other intelligent life in the galaxy, but I think it unlikely. There is definitely intelligent life in other galaxies, but we’ll probably never know."</i>

Okay, here's a little "thought experiment" for you: what if intelligent life from other galaxies were to arrive here? And what if they treated humans as we treat non-human animals? Oh yea, that movie's been made already...

<i>"In all 4 billions years of life on this planet, intelligent life has only arisen once. There’s no guarantee it will happen again. We are infinitely precious. That is why we must restore the environment, to save us. With out us, no one gives a fuck."</i>

You forgot to put "as we define it" in back of "intelligent life."

The problem with the "enlightened self-interest" argument for the environment is that it can always be trumped. "Well, yea, the environment must be restored to 'save us,' and we'll start just as soon as we finish digging up all the coal," or "Yea, we're going to need the environment someday, but we need nuclear power right now." If your only interest in the environment is what it can do for you, it's always easy to rationalize that something you do to the environment can do even more for you -- that's how we got in this mess!

So, it's absolutely essential that we provide "the environment" with "rights" of some sort -- recognizing that "rights" are a uniquely human construct. I'm not thinking I'm going to convert anyone -- after all, you have anthropocentrism in common with fundamentalist religions -- any argument you make for the supremacy of humans has likely already appeared on a right-wing website against teaching evolution!

I submit that we use something more important than intelligence to take our measure as a species -- how about compassion? Isn't that supposed to be what communism is all about? "From each species according to its abilities, to each species according to its needs."

On the question of Jan's gender, English doesn't give us a gender neutral pronoun (somewhere along the line, making sure I write proper English has started to matter to me--it takes a lot of effort not to correct other people's mistakes).

Yes, it's an assumption, and pithy statements about "U &amp; me being an ass" aside, humans are designed to operate on assumptions, since we cannot obtain nor process all of the information needed to get by. We take partial information and go from there, which is why some people see Jesus in a grilled cheese sandwich, others think they recognize a friend and its someone else, and I assumed Jan is a woman. It's how humans work, and there's nothing inherently wrong with it. In fact, it's necessary from a natural standpoint, because the amount of time you have between <i>thinking</i> you see a lion and <i>knowing</i> you see a lion could be the difference between a disappointed lion and a satisfied lion.

The problem comes in the basis of assumptions. If I were sexist, I might think, well that's a very rational argument, must be made by a man. That's an irrational argument, must be made by a woman. Etc. I do try and examine my assumptions, to make sure I don't fall for such thinking. Being raised in a sexist and racist society does cause problems even for those of us opposed to such things. Obviously, one doesn't always succeed.

====

You're disputing the value judgements I make (which is fine, they need to be tested). I think that proves my point about relying on morality. To me, my value judgements are sound. You don't seem to like my value judgements, and you argue against them, but from your standpoint. But I reject what I perceive as your standpoint, and so your objections aren't valid in my view. In order to show the incorrectness my values, you have to do so within my value system (show me that my: facts, axioms, logic, etc., is wrong). The same is true in reverse. (Although, there is evidence to suggest that no argument is valid to undermine a core belief, and that it takes something traumatic to alter those.)

This is why it is impossible to change the world on moral arguments, which are, after all, nothing more than value judgements. I think one set of things are right and wrong, you another (which isn't to suggest there is no intersection). If we are to unite based on morality, it might not happen. We need to unite on what we can demonstrate we have in common, such as our material interest in not seeing the basis of life being destroyed, as we are both life forms.

Cheers, Comrade.

Two points:

1) One needn't attribute rights to non-human organisms or inanimate objects in order to develop a respectful, appreciative, ethical perspective towards them, one that transcends narrowly-defined "interests". That is, one can speak of what IS RIGHT and what is WRONG in terms of how we treat or exploit other species and other parts of nature, can't we? Ethics need not take a rights-based form.

In fact, one could even argue that perhaps humanity (or at least most of humanity) has an interest in developing a certain kind of enlightened "ethical" relationship towards nature, no?

2)Roxanne, does it necessarily diminish someone's beliefs to simply acknowledge that they *are* in fact beliefs, and not merely self-evident propositions? If so, how so? Isn't it possible to acknowledge that they are beliefs--not just "the way it is"--and yet still treat the people who hold them with respect, and as allies in certain key struggles?

3) @Jan: As to the Orca that saved the ship: I am continually fascinated by stories like this one. There are wonders in the natural world, and we should be open to them. And also open to studying them critically. Along these lines, I think we humans need to be cautious about attributing human-type traits onto other species. I'm not saying that other animals don't have all sorts of wonderful abilities of their own. Just that we shoud be aware of a pronounced tendency among humans project onto other species (and other humans too!) some version of themselves.

For example, I don't have the source handy, but I once read of a study done of dolphins and human dummies. The goal was to test the hypothesis, based on anecdotal experiences, that doplhins that find people stranded in the ocean will tend to help them out and to push them towards land. The study, which used dummies that were supposedly hard to tell from human beings, as I recall, found that the dolphins were basically just playing with the humans. That is, half the time the dolphins pushed the human dummy towards shore, and half the time further out to sea...

Radical-Eyes wrote: <blockquote><i> once read of a study done of dolphins and human dummies. The goal was to test the hypothesis, based on anecdotal experiences, that doplhins that find people stranded in the ocean will tend to help them out and to push them towards land. The study, which used dummies that were supposedly hard to tell from human beings, as I recall, found that the dolphins were basically just playing with the humans. That is, half the time the dolphins pushed the human dummy towards shore, and half the time further out to sea…</i></blockquote>

Just for argument's sake, why do you think we call them "dummies?"

I'd be surprised if dolphins really can't tell the difference between a dummy and a living being. Were the dummies warm to the touch? Were they programmed to move on their own, the very definition of "animal?" Even the local jays (another smart corvid!) quickly learn the difference between scarecrows and humans!

Perhaps the dolphins were "training" with the dummies, in preparation for the "real thing!"

I can just see an alien experiment, observing a Red Cross CPR class: <i>"Zandor, we used to think humans actually tried to help each other, but when we did a controlled experiment with dummies, they would chat and laugh and stop for a coffee break in the middle of 'saving' the fellow human. It is our conclusion that they were just 'playing' with these humans, rather than trying to 'save' them. This is Xrudu, signing out -- there is no intelligent life here."</i>

Of course, this is all just rhetorical in lack of more details about the actual dolphin study, but I feel (as opposed to "think") that anthropomorphism is a much more reasonable way to approach non-human animals than anthropocentrism. Our 200,000 years is a speck in time, and our DNA is about 99% the same as some of these "inferior" creatures.

Let the "precautionary principle" apply. Animals have intrinsic value in their environment. In our arrogance and unquestioned belief in our superiority, we mess with that to our peril. So far, we seem to have as much in common with single-celled yeast, who consume all their resources and die in their own excrement.

Radical Eyes, you wrote:

"2)Roxanne, does it necessarily diminish someone’s beliefs to simply acknowledge that they *are* in fact beliefs, and not merely self-evident propositions?"

That's your framing of what is happening. That is not what I see happening here. You think it's a worthwhile past time to critically evaluate *what you call* "beliefs". Yet, there are thousands of years of human evolution, as Chegitz says, and those yrs of human evolution are *still* expressed in cultures other than the one to which you and I belong, which contain multitudes of *experience* you want to call beliefs. You are reading a statement from a culture with a history richly checkered with the blood of indigenous cultures who resisted the Spanish Conquest, who remain there, STILL fighting to preserve their way of life which is threatened by not merely capitalism, but a cultural paradigm--A way of thinking imposed upon them for the purpose of domination. To look at this statement and dissect it's language and "belief system", is to move in the direction of perpetuating that practice of domination. Rather, it would be wiser to recognize it as a declaration around which we can unite and work in solidarity WITH those who LIVE, not merely believe, but LIVE a relationship with the natural world, a way of life from which we will need to learn, while there is time.

Radical Eyes wrote:
"If so, how so? Isn’t it possible to acknowledge that they are beliefs–not just “the way it is”–and yet still treat the people who hold them with respect, and as allies in certain key struggles?"

That is not what I see happening in this exchange. I think this declaration can be useful by asking what is the experience of those whose lives are so utterly destroyed that they would need to say this? I approach history as narrative. Whose story will be told about this? The story of those who looked at it and wondered about the language? About the "belief" systems? Or the story of a people divided by the destruction of colonialism, who came together to whatever degree they could, doing so in the face of rapidly rising habitat loss for the living beings upon which their lives depend, and against the odds of climate change a la capitalism's madness destroying life on the planet at all, to say, "No More. We cannot let this go on. The story we will tell is one that will include the voices of ALL, rising up against the few who would rather we die for their profits."

From there, we need to come together and act, too, while there is time, and refrain from diminishing (by calling it "critical evaluation") the perceptions and experience of others who live differently than you and Chegitz and anyone else in the culture to which *we* belong. (a culture with a merely 200 yr history if you look at industrialism, which is driving the habitat loss and climate change, or 500 yrs, if you look at the colonization and destruction of indigenous cultures in north and south america, or....Well, we could look at a huge scope of human history... Let's start with the history of the Bolivians, since that is where this statement came from...)

You started out, Radical Eyes, by saying, "1) What are the reasons for and implications (whether positive or negative) of framing “Nature” here as a “Mother” figure? And of framing the ecological struggle in terms of a duty to “protect” “her”?"

Your question was answered by Jan early on: Because it is a cultural way of perceiving and experiencing the world. Now you take it to another "level" of "critical evaluation", calling it "beliefs". I know native peoples who would feel deeply insulted by calling their experiential relationship to the earth "beliefs".

My point is, I think it's not relevant. What's relevant is that the planet we all need upon which to live has many threats right now, and this statement is a story from which we can learn, instead of objectify it into the oblivion we are all trying to avoid.

@Roxanne:

I agree with you that a radical left that devotes energies only to criticizing the documents and proposals put forth by others, and which does nothing to support and to unite with those anti-capitalist and eco-socialist tendencies that are in fact emerging as we speak, is engaged in a very one-sided project.

I certainly hope I haven't fallen into this myself...Indeed I was one of the people to propose posting this statement in the first place. I think it is an important development, in many ways. In particular I would like to learn more about what this document represents *practically*. That is: how is it being used and applied and rallied around in practice?

Along these lines, in my initial post (#1) above I wrote:

"I would be interested to hear more about how so this statement is being invoked and deployed politically? In Bolivia? Elsewhere? And also to hear more about the process by which this text was conceived, revised, produced, etc?"

I would, in other words, be happy to learn more about the processes, the experiences, and the struggles out of which this important document emerged. So I am not just interested in nit-picking the language of this statement.

And yet I do happen to think that the language we use matters. And that Kasama can be a forum for critical analysis and for publicly thinking through (on a theoretical and a practical level) the language we use, the beliefs we--each of us-- base our words and our actions upon.

Radical Eyes wrote: "I agree with you that a radical left that devotes energies only to criticizing the documents and proposals put forth by others, and which does nothing to support and to unite with those anti-capitalist and eco-socialist tendencies that are in fact emerging as we speak, is engaged in a very one-sided project."

Thanks for saying that. To be clear, my understanding is that Kasama is full of people who are doing much well beyond mere criticizing the docs and proposals put forth by others. Because of that understanding, I genuinely consider the intentions and people of Kasama one of the best things going online and far-beyond the internet.

"I certainly hope I haven’t fallen into this myself…Indeed I was one of the people to propose posting this statement in the first place."

Yes, and I thank you for that. I hope this sort of discussion can be continued beyond the culturally prescribed one day a year (and I have a feeling that hope and intention is shared by others at Kasama)... I do think we are all capable of "falling into that" by degrees and in layers that, if we are receptive, different contexts show us, and show us how to climb out of what we can all fall into.

" I think it is an important development, in many ways. In particular I would like to learn more about what this document represents *practically*. That is: how is it being used and applied and rallied around in practice?"

Me too! I look forward to finding out more about that as this development unfolds!

"Along these lines, in my initial post (#1) above I wrote:...“I would be interested to hear more about how so this statement is being invoked and deployed politically? In Bolivia? Elsewhere? And also to hear more about the process by which this text was conceived, revised, produced, etc?”"...I would, in other words, be happy to learn more about the processes, the experiences, and the struggles out of which this important document emerged. So I am not just interested in nit-picking the language of this statement...."

Yes, you did, and yet...the gist of this exchange seemed to easily go into the direction that was more nit-picky and what I consider to be culturally anthrocentric and limited by the experience of our limited culture, than open to inquiry and new learnings; more intellectualized than identifying that, given the narrative the earth (*and* therefore we inhabitants) is (are) facing, the narrative of Bolivia's choice with this document is one we might want to seriously consider identifying with, to comprehend. As radicals, is it not one of our tasks to investigate and evaluate things as they are and base our actions on what we learn?

I think you know that we can go anywhere in the dominant culture and find a non-stop narrative that tells us all that all empathic identification with "others" (human or not) gets in the way of "rational" linear thinking and actions. Part of our work is to challenge *that*; to apply our critical thinking against that indoctrination.

....And *I* personally am a trigger-finger with that issue, so that's the reason for my sharp reaction when I perceive that is happening in an exchange.

"And yet I do happen to think that the language we use matters. And that Kasama can be a forum for critical analysis and for publicly thinking through (on a theoretical and a practical level) the language we use, the beliefs we–each of us– base our words and our actions upon."

I agree.

Thank you for clarifying all of this. I think that if Kasama continues to seriously look at what is being done to the planet and our people, in relation to one another, and in relation to what the capitalist system is indoctrinating us to do *and* think, it is possible to more deeply and seriously engage one another and build a stronger movement against that system. I hope that this declaration can be a guide for us to do that. Thank you again for posting it.

Comrade Chegitz, for some reason the notification for your comment, number 8, did not arrive in my inbox until this morning, so I didn't see it until just now! I wish I had seen it sooner...

You wrote: "...there is evidence to suggest that no argument is valid to undermine a core belief, and that it takes something traumatic to alter those.)...We need to unite on what we can demonstrate we have in common, such as our material interest in not seeing the basis of life being destroyed, as we are both life forms."

Yes. Thank you for saying this!

(and I am now craving a grilled cheese sandwich, sans Jesus, mind you!....)

Cheers