After thinking some more, I have a few more thought on this topic. I hope
at least a few of you out there are interested in this thread.
Eric:
> With ethics as "just another trade off which needs to be balanced"
> it is easily compromised or lost all together. And a compromised ethic is
> none at all.
> And aren't designs a subset of objectives and
> objectives a subset of ethics, in that our obectives and actions always
> illustrate our ethics? Perhaps it isn't having the wrong objective or
> design, but having the wrong ethic.
I was thinking more about this and realized that ethics are the key.
Except perhaps as a matter of degree in effectiveness, it doesn't matter
what methods, techniques, objectives, designs, systems, etc. you use.
Without a guiding ethic you'll be all over the place, contradicting
yourself at times. With a destructive ethic you will cause destruction,
even with the "greenest" methods or techniques. Solar power and Bermuda
grass fibers use to make toy ciggarettes for kids is a bad idea. This is
not to lower the importance of effective methods and techniques, they are
important (and the appropriate choice of them) once the ethic is there.
But since we seem to love to work with new methods and technologies, I want
to point out how crucuial our choice of ethics are.
As an aside, I want to briefly define what I mean by the word ethics. To
me it includes all of the basic values and priorities that we hold. It
sets relative importance of one thing compared to another and therefore
regulates our choices of action and belief.
Eric:
>Therefore, evaluating your true ethics
> based on what you acutally do may be even more useful. If your current
> ethics are not what you want them to be, then the problem is different than
> if your actions do not follow your ethics. The distinction is crutial in
> my opinion. It is much easier to change a design than an ethic.
So, realizing the ethics you currently operate under is very important.
Unrealized ethics may be working against your stated goals. One tool is to
look at what you ARE DOING NOW and see what that can tell you about your
ethics. It might be easier for someone else to look at your actions more
objectively, so this might be a good idea too. In your evaluation you have
to try to eliminate the reasons why you think you are doing something.
Your thinking may be in line with stated goals, but your actions may not.
Eric:
> The problem is adopting new ethics
> without the necessary work to make them a part of oneself. One only 'has'
> an ethic when it is reflected in all (most) of what one does. "Actions
> speak louder than words."
I see room for a lot of work in this area. How can we come to regonize our
truely held ethics? How can we change our ethics? What things influence
the development of ethics as we grow up?
Jeff:
> > The idea that we can
> > have cooperation and not competition doesn't fit my thinking.
Eric:
> I suppose competition always exisits from one point of view. But somehow I
> feel competition assumes greed or lack of abundance. When there is plenty
> for all things, is there still competition? Is it possible to have plenty
> for all?
A couple of examples came to mind. Do branches of a tree compete with each
other? Or are they cooperating? Since they each have the same objective
(help supply nurishment to the tree as a whole) they loose their importance
as an individual. Any given branch may be sacrificed if it is not helping
the whole organism: loss of sufficient light, out of balance, disease, etc.
As it allows the organism as a whole to flourish, it is not seen as a
"loss". All try to do their best to accomplish the health of the tree.
Perhaps it is our view of ourselves as individuals rather than a community
or species or bioregion or planet that gives us this idea of competition.
So you may say, but the different plant compete with each other for
sunlight and nutrients. Here too, perhaps we need a larger view. Just as
each branch help the whole tree, each tree helps the whole forest /
ecology. They can be seen as cooperating to help continue the health of
the bioregion. With this perspective, how can we as humans help continue
the health of our bioregions. Our individual confort and prosperity
becomes unimportant in so much as it is a subset of the health of the area
as a whole. We should be doing our best to be human-as-part-of-Nature in
support of the whole.
Another example: Do cells of your body compete or cooperate with each
other? With an abundant supply of nutrition there may be planty for all to
flourish, but even still one can see an element of competition for each bit
of nutrition that floats by. With a limited supply of nutrition the
competition seems even more obvious. But, here again, there are different
perspectives. They can be seen as individuals trying their best to get
what they can, and in doing so are able to help the organism as a whole.
Or they can be seen as a whole all parts doing what they do in concert
creating a healthy body. Our current societal perspective makes as act
more like cancerous cells greedily taking up as much nutrition and space as
we can to the detriment of the whole. If we can see how we fit in to help
the whole, we light be able to do our part more effectively.
That's enough for now - a favorite subject of mine : ) What do you all
think? How easy is it for you to see them? How did you came to hold the
ethics you hold? What has helped you change your ethics?
Eric:
