Hey tweets, thanks to all who replied to my question about whether
nature has morals. As I promised, I will summarize your answers. But
before I do, I must relate a story about Art Kruckeberg, the famous
Seattle botanist and recent winner of Seattle Audubon's science award.

My middle school writing students were working on an oral history book
about civil rights in Seattle, and four of them were about to
interview Art on the topic of environmental rights. When he agreed to
be interviewed, Art stipulated that the kids read Aldo Leopold's book,
"Sand County Almanac."

"Art," I objected, "my kids are sixth-graders."

There was a pause. "How old is that?" Art asked.

"They're eleven!"

"Hmm. Okay, then have them read the last chapter."

The last chapter is about the return of Odysseus after his sojourn to
Troy. When Odysseus returns, writes Leopold, he suspected his female
slaves had been impure, so he killed them. No one in Greek society
objected to this because the slaves were property, and Odysseus was
free to be as stupid with his property as he wanted. That kind of
thing could not happen today without consequence, says Leopold,
because we no longer condone thinking of people as property. Wouldn't
it be great if we started thinking about nature as not property, too?
Wouldn't it be great if we had a land ethic?

Came the day of the interview, and Art showed up rarin' to go. My
students were ready, having read Leopold. "Can a tree be bad?" asked
one boy.

Art reacted like someone had just given him an electric shock. "Well,"
he said after some thought, "I suppose you could say that an invasive
tree from another country that came here and took over was bad."

Without missing a beat, the next student asked, "Should you punish
that tree?"

I laugh now, but these are deep questions. Your answers to my related
question broke down into three categories:
1. Strict environmentalists said nature has no morals. There is only
survival of the fittest, natural selection, evolution. Even people
don't really have morals - they have ways of behaving that maximize
survival.
2. Religious environmentalists said there is intelligent design and
the creator is good. We ourselves have been given stewardship of
nature, but also free will, so sometimes we behave badly toward
nature, and nature reacts with imbalance.
3. In-betweeners said there is a separation between nature and
society. With a few exceptions (eg., Ravens; some social animals),
animals do not have morals. But we must in order to govern ourselves,
because we are social creatures who live together, invent much of our
environment, and affect almost all of it. - Connie, Seattle

constancesidles at gmail.com
www.constancypress.com





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