Why the Bravest Position
Is Biocentrism

WE LEARN TO SEE THE WORLD THROUGH THE LENSES OF THE INDIVIDUAL beliefs and values that we have acquired from personal experience, family, and society. People often share a commonality of truths and values that are so widely accepted that they are seldom questioned.

We can’t help seeing our surroundings through the perceptual filters of our preconceptions, yet the media continue to hold out an ideal of journalism that is “objective” and “balanced.” But any journalist’s personal values are bound to influence the “facts” selected and the way they are juxtaposed and arranged to create a story. The best way to strive for balance is to have many journalists presenting a wide array of worldviews.

Understandably, people in the media are preoccupied with human affairs—wars, budget deficits, sports, and entertainment. Even environmental stories are usually built around the human costs and benefits for health, esthetics, jobs, or the economy.

When wilderness habitats are invaded and species threatened with extinction, their preservation is often justified by their potential utility for human beings. Thus, it is pointed out that perhaps a quarter of the active ingredients of all medicines are natural compounds extracted from living organisms. When species disappear, a vast repertoire of potentially useful materials is also lost. It is also argued that wilderness may generate revenues through ecotourism or provide spiritual solace.

Everything we use in our homes and workplaces—electricity, metal, wood, plastic, food—comes from the Earth. Our economic system is based on our need for them and their scarcity or abundance. Consequently, the future of old-growth forests, coral reefs, or watersheds often rests on the merits of economic returns from protection or exploitation.

An “anthropocentric” ecological ethic recognizes that environmental protection is ultimately in our self-interest because, as biological beings, we depend on the integrity of our surroundings for our survival.

There is an alternative perspective called biocentrism, which Bill Devall, coauthor of Deep Ecology, defines as “a worldview emphasizing that Nature has intrinsic value, that is, value for itself rather than only aesthetic, commodity or recreational value for humans; that humans have the capacity for broader identification with Nature as part of our ecological self; and that compassionate understanding is the basis for communication with Nature as well as with other human beings.” This is the central belief that underlies deep ecology.

Critics often accuse deep ecologists of being misanthropes, caring more for other species than for our own fellow human beings. I’ve heard it said derisively, “They want to protect trees and the spotted owl and don’t care if people are thrown out of work.” To such criticism, the U.S. poet Gary Snyder responds, “A properly radical environmentalist position is in no way anti-human. We grasp the pain of the human condition in its full complexity, and add the awareness of how desperately endangered certain key species and habitats have become.… The critical argument now within environmental circles is between those who operate from a human-centered resource management mentality and those whose values reflect an awareness of the integrity of the whole of nature. The latter position, that of deep ecology, is politically livelier, more courageous, more convivial, riskier, and more scientific.”

When we acknowledge our dependence on the same biophysical factors that support all other life-forms, the responsibility for “managing” all of it becomes a terrible burden. In fact, it’s an impossible task because, in spite of the impressive sophistication and progress in science and technology, we have nowhere near enough information to understand, let alone predict and control, the behavior of complex systems like watersheds, forests, oceans, or the atmosphere.

Amid the barrage of information from the print and electronic media, we must recognize the inherent biases that often flow from our anthropocentrism. For example, in all of the discussion about the catastrophic loss of northern cod or the fate of the old-growth forest of Clayoquot Sound, all of the “stakeholders” in the fishing, logging, tourism, and Native communities seem to accept that the underlying economic and political institutions are beyond question or change, even though they may well be the very cause of the crisis.

By looking at the world through biocentric lenses, we may recognize the roots of our destructive path. The landscape may be uncomfortable and strange, but we can’t afford to dismiss the problems viewed from this perspective as a lack of balance or simple bias