Filozofia ochrony dziedzictwa przyrodniczo--kulturowego

• Authors: MIREK ZBIGNIEW

Title variants

EN

Philosophy of the protection of the natural and cultural heritage

• Languages of publication: PL EN

Abstracts

EN

Philosophy, which is an expression of the love of wisdom, seeks truths which protect life; asks about its most profound sense, and thus also about the meaning of human actions and endeavours. In its search for the truth about life, philosophy has at its disposal two multi-volume books: the Book of Nature and the Book of Culture. The former first one is read by the scientific mind “with the sage’s glass and eye”; the latter one, the centre of which, in our Western civilisation, is the Bible, is read by the heart through the eyes of faith. The former provides empirical knowledge about the surrounding world; the latter introduces us into the realm of spiritual life, reveals values, far–reaching meaning and purpose, and gives us wisdom which goes beyond what is tangible and temporal. As a result of this cooperation between faith and reason, we arrive at the symphonic truth about biological and spiritual life, and we acquire knowledge about their mutual relations, as well as about their links with the broadly defined environment. As noted by pope John Paul II, in order to function properly and ascend reliably and safely towards development, any civilisation needs both of these wings – reason and faith. Any attempt to fly with one wing only will always end badly. Central and crucial for every culture is the question about man, and first of all, about whether his life transcends mortal life, whether his conscious personality continues to last after death. Since the beginnings of human history, not a single culture or civilisation known to man has ever answered this question negatively. The answer has significantly contributed to the relationship between man and the earthly world since the form of these relationships determines whether or not man finds perspectives for himself in the everlasting spiritual space. As early as the mid-twentieth century, the British writer C.P. Snow, in his lecture The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution, characterised in a powerful way the drama of our civilisation which results from the complete divergence of these two ways of cognition, two avenues that need to be followed for love to take appropriate form. What is even worse is that it has not just ended in schizophrenia; since the scientific and technical revolution, not only has West-European, post-Enlightenment, secular civilisation become the first civilisation in the history of humanity to strive to answer the above fundamental question negatively, but it also seeks to impose its point of view on the modern world. Its proponents have come to the conclusion that man of the scientistic and secular civilisation (the Darwinistic and behavioural Homo sapiens), a flightless bird locked up in the earthly life, needs no wings at all, but merely legs planted firmly on the ground. Twentieth-century science, in particular ecology, has forcefully revealed the dependence of life on the environment; it has also made us aware of the powerful and complex link between human life and the remaining elements of the global ecosystem of our planet. Ever since the link was discovered, any serious threat to the quality of the environment has been seen – and rightly so – as a threat to life itself, especially to human life. Eco-ethics, eco-aesthetics and eco-theology have brought to light the existence of similar relations and threats in the world of the spirit. The complex interrelationships between the spheres of nature and spirit have also been noticed. The International Convention on Biodiversity The International Convention on Biodiversity may be a good, but insufficient, basis and starting point for a reflection on the philosophy of the protection of natural heritage. Even though it addresses problems of biological life, it also allows one to touch the sphere of culture, and thus also the domain of spiritual life as such. The global environmental crisis caused by the exploitative human economy has brought about the mass extinction of plants and animals on our planet. Of necessity it triggered a correspondingly strong reaction, namely the Earth Summit in Rio (1992), where almost all the states of our globe signed the International Convention on Biodiversity. Biodiversity – in the context of the wealth of environments and the dynamism of life The Convention specifically highlights the fact that life – the central value of each authentic culture – has expressed itself with enormous diversity (so far-reaching that the world of highly developed beings knows mechanisms whereby even monozygotic twins become different from each other). The diversity of life – which is the second important observation of the Convention – is closely linked to the great variety of habitats, which is critical for the dynamic stability of the global ecosystem of Earth. If this is the case, then nature conservation must be understood primarily as the protection of life with all its richness, i.e. its biodiversity, at all levels of its organisation (genetic, species, biocenotic and landscape) and at all stages of its ontogenetic development (from conception till natural death). At the same time, respect must be shown for the full diversity of environments without which all the richness of life cannot exist. No less important, in this context, is the protection of the entire natural dynamism of life and dynamism of its environment, as well as all the factors determining this creative dynamism. Without the dynamism, life cannot develop, diversify and improve in a manner consistent with its nature. Sustainable development Sustainable development is the third key word, in addition to the biodiversity and the environment. The Convention says, in an indirect way, that the state of biodiversity – with all its underlying conditions – must become a metric of the quality of every culture and the central value deserving special respect and protection in the course of planning civilizational development. The Convention refers to development which respects these values and wishes to protect and preserve them for future generations in a non-depleted state as sustainable development (after the Brundtland Report), and puts it before the current generation as a fundamental challenge to civilisation. In addition to solidarity with other life forms, the Convention also refers to intergenerational solidarity. It does not indicate, however, any detailed solutions, nor even their essential elements, except one – environmental education. Environmental education – important but insufficient Modern society is, as we often say, a knowledge-based society. Instrumental reason rich in knowledge is necessary to understand the world and take effective action but it is not a crucial factor in making a good use of knowledge. If the accumulation of knowledge were to be the determinant of welfare on Earth, the 20th century should be the happiest time in history in this respect. Meanwhile, it is quite the opposite – it has been called, not without reason, the era of the great extermination of any forms of life. What was missing then? Apparently, there was no training in ethics, especially no formation of the conscience. Environmental education, devoid of such training, is not enough. The ethical dimension – ecological conscience St. Augustine once wrote: “to know means to love.” Thus he was asserting that knowledge makes sense in so far as it is at the service of love. However, to serve life (after all, this is what love is about), knowledge needs conscience – an ecological conscience, as was pointed out in the late 1940s by Aldo Leopold; instrumental reason will not be enough here. What is meaningful in this context are the findings of the Montreal GAMMA Team, which was, as early as in the mid-1970s, searching, at the request of the Canadian government, for a model of civilizational development which would serve life. This would be an alternative to the liberal market economy based on continuous growth at the expense of the environment (and the life present in it). At the time, he proposed the so-called zero growth model. Reference was later made to it in the Brundtland Report (1987), which proposed the sustainable development model, which was also invoked by the Convention on Biodiversity. Most importantly, however, the Montreal Team, which proposed, at the time, alternative development scenarios, stated that neither, even the best models and associated economic mechanisms (targeted grants or compensation instruments), nor legal and organisational safeguards, will be effective, and no model will succeed unless man which is the subject and at the same time agent of the model, its integral and most essential part, is properly trained in ethics beforehand, unless people internalise in their hearts/conscience the scale of the value which guards life. This observation highlights the essence of things, which pope John Paul II later briefly phrased as follows: “the ecological crisis is a moral issue.” If so, then the correct answer on matters relating to the protection of life and its environment, and thus also the entire natural and cultural heritage, must function in the domain of morality and the spirit. As early as over 100 years ago, Jan Gwalbert Pawlikowski, who is considered the “spiritual father of nature conservation in Poland,” wrote that all the reasons for nature conservation which have appeared in history are secondary to the value of life itself (Pawlikowski was referring to nature in general): “The idea of nature conservation begins to be realised only when the conservationist does it neither for material reasons nor for the benefit of a historic or monumental value related to nature which is alien to him, but for nature itself, for the love of it.” For Pawlikowski “[...] there are a number of similarities between the idea of conservation and ethics [...]. It is neither a discipline of knowledge nor a profession, but a norm of conduct which should be a universal standard [...]” and as such “it should be added to every dish [meaning: every human activity]”; “[...] it takes the concept of duty and responsibility, as well as the sense of solidarity and love, beyond the realm of relationships with humans, to the entire »silent kingdom«, as Adam Mickiewicz [great Polish poet] put it.” Many years later, the eminent French ecologist and ornithologist Jean Dorst spoke in a similar vein, when he commented on the present-day hopes for saving nature by technical means or legal regulations: “Let no one think that in order to save humanity it is sufficient to fight pollution, to manage the resources of the Earth better and to prevent the harmful areas of human activity from multiplying! When the disease is in the patient’s heart, the doctor will not cure it by applying ointments to the wound, as these would merely be a placebo.” And he added: “The causes of our misfortunes lie in our souls. As do the reasons for our hope that we will finally become real humans [...].” “The humanisation process can proceed only if we feel full solidarity with the living world, with this Earth.” In addition to the values of goodness, love and responsibility, conservation of nature, seen in ethical terms, also puts conscience in the centre of its sphere of attention. It works towards awakening, sensitising and forming it. Conscience formation is indispensible here because conscience is a judge, and not a legislator. Therefore, irrespective of the moral intuitions it has, it must also be profoundly aware of the law on the basis of which it adjudicates. When “passing judgments” it relies primarily on the profound truth of life itself and is calibrated by this truth. In the centre of every culture for which life as a common good is the highest value lies caring for conscience. Apparently, this is why the word conscience is often being understood as common sense – this means that conscience is a spiritual sense of the common good. The Polish counterpart of the phrase common sense – zdrowy rozsądek – implies that the sense is a judge (“sąd” in “roz-sądek” is the Polish term for “court, judgment”), whose judgments -- which decide about the common good -- protect the health of society and the health (the well-being) of all forms of life. In order to fully understand these reflections of a more general nature, one must see the essence of the cultural dimension of life in a broader and more profound sense. Life and culture We rarely realize that life is “cultural” by its very nature, and as such, requires to be cultivated. This follows from the fact that both on the individual and collective level, life begins with something inconspicuous, something which merely represents a potential, which calls for being cultivated towards its fully developed form. This cultivation (and culture exactly is a cultivation) takes place through the environment, which is as the other side, the reverse of the coin, the obverse of which is life. Natural and cultural heritage, nowadays often – and quite rightly so – treated as one, refers to the life broadly understood. As such, it is always passed on within the environment, through the environment, and with the environment. Thus the heritage in question consists both of life and the environment suitable for that life. The word biotope (environment) consists of two Greek words: bios and topos. They tell us that the environment is a place (topos) with all its abiotic factors and bios, that is, all the forms of life specific to that topos present within it. These two sides of the coin, life and its environment, are inseparable. What is the use of passing on the life of a species, for example a butterfly, fish, cactus or elephant in the form of a single fertilised cell (this is how life is passed on), if you do not ensure that it has the right environment where it will be able to grow into its fullness, realising all its potential? We have already observed that every form of life is “cultural”, and as such, because of its very nature, requires to be cultivated. Life always begins very in conspicuously as a kind of “book of words”, which is merely a potential. The book of biological life, written with the four-letter alphabet of the purine and pyrimidine bases in the DNA coil, is incorporated in the nucleus of a tiny cell. Uncoiling as an old papyrus scroll, it causes each of the succeeding words that are read to give birth to hunger, addressed to the environment, which sates this hunger with appropriate food – thus the word incarnates. In this way, the book is being unrolled and read, by deciphering and incarnating the successive words, causing the organism to grow, revealing, step by step, the shape and identity of the life inscribed in the book. This is similar to 3D printing of a file consisting of the computer language commands. Life and its environment, thus understood, appear to us the central values of each culture. A human being or a nation does not answer the question about who they are directly, but through culture; they answer through the way they cultivate life. It is this, culture which best tells us how and whether man understands life and its needs, how man not only ensures that life is passed on but also that it is passed on with the appropriate state of the environment, which guarantees that the full identity of life in a given place and time is revealed. Emotional and spiritual life develops in an analogous way to biological life. Cultivating any form of life requires knowing its nature and natural needs so that it is possible to provide it through a suitable environment and at the right time and place, with appropriate food (this is exactly what the love and meaning of St. Augustine’s “learn in order to love” is about). The learning of nature applies in a special way to man – the key subject, and at the same time, agent of the protection of the natural and cultural heritage. Between man of conscience and the idiot consumer We already know that in order to serve life and protect it properly, one has to learn it: to describe it in a true way. Nowadays, hardly anyone notices that the biggest problems of the world begin with false descriptions of the nature of man and the wrong “cultivation” of man, in his heart/conscience which – as we have noticed – are in the centre of every life-friendly culture. Howev er, how can one cultivate something that the contemporary, Western (in particular European) civilisation has been sending into oblivion? The man of the scientistic- secular civilisation (the biologistic Homo sapiens – according to the purely Darwinistic and behavioural conception) is a being confined by earthly life, not differing in any way from animals, and – for obvious reasons – deprived of what can be referred to as spiritual conscience. Such a man is vulnerable to the anti-culture of tabloids and advertising as an idiot consumer (as Erich Fromm described the model of man being the ideal of liberal-consumerist civilisation). Sustainable development, which seeks to preserve and pass on to future generations the entire heritage of life, along with its natural and cultural environment, must reach for the concept of man reaching deep into the sources of our civilisation – man of conscience (Imago Dei). Karl Rahner defines this man as follows: “Spirit in the World and Hearer of the Word.” Thus, man is an incarnated spirit or a spirited body; a being in which what is spiritual is irreducible to biology and not derivable from it – it cannot therefore be reduced to the “biologically” defined psyche. Just as biological man comes into existence through the incarnation of the words read (and thus also “heard”) from the unrolling DNA book, so spiritual man comes into existence through the incarnation of the words he reads, hears and decodes in the biblically understood heart (conscience being an integral part of it). Passing on natural and cultural heritage in a proper way and in a proper – i.e. living – form, is a necessary condition for the appropriate formation of conscience, which guards the incarnation of the words of the above “spiritual DNA”, ensuring man’s spiritual growth and development. Without this, in turn, continued and adequate protection of natural and cultural heritage is impossible; what is more, it would turn, then, into its own caricature, or simply into anti- culture – instead of participating (as was noted by John Paul II) in building a “civilization of life and love,” it would build a life-destroying civilization of death.

Keywords

PL

ochrona dziedzictwa przyrodniczo-kulturowego; filozofia ochrony dziedzictwa; ochrona dziedzictwa przyrodniczego; Międzynarodowa Konwencja o różnorodności biologicznej; montrealski Ze¬spół GAMMA; ochrona przyrody

• Publisher: Narodowy Instytut Dziedzictwa
• Journal: Ochrona Zabytków
• Year: 2017
• Issue: Dodatek Specjalny. Dziedzictwo w Polsce.
• Pages: 17-26

Dates

published

2017

Contributors

author

MIREK ZBIGNIEW

• Instytut Botaniki im. W. Szafera Polskiej Akademii Nauk
• W. Szafer Institute of Botany Polish Academy of Sciences

Identifiers

ISSN

0029-8247