By LEONARDO BOFF*
The global ecological crisis and the need for a new paradigm of relationship with the Earth
1.
No matter how many deniers there are, there is no denying the fact that the Earth and humanity have changed. First of all, it is taken for granted that a small planet with limited goods and services (resources) like Earth cannot support a project of unlimited development/growth, the theoretical and practical engine that has set all modernity in motion. This is the well-known Earth Overshoot (The Earth Overshoot).
China’s Deep Seek, the most advanced and freely accessible platform, has announced the “human unsustainability and historical obsolescence of the neoliberal Western economic model.” It is destined to disappear, no matter how long it continues its agony with violence, aggression and wars. This announcement has left the owners of the large platforms terrified, who have suddenly lost a trillion dollars in total.
In other words: the Earth, considered a living super-organism, feeling systematically attacked by the way Westerners have decided to relate to the Earth and nature over the last three centuries, exploiting it to the maximum in view of an unlimited accumulation of private material wealth and achieved through the fiercest competition, is reacting with increasing frequency.
It sends signals such as a huge range of viruses, bacteria, the last most universal, the coronavirus, extreme events such as severe droughts, devastating floods, erosion of biodiversity and, lately, fires, inaugurating, in addition to the current Anthropocene and Necrocene, a new geological era, perhaps the most dangerous, the Pyrocene (the era of red in Greek, from fire).
But the most sensitive and violent reaction made by Gaia is global warming. We are not heading towards it. We are already inside it. What was agreed upon in the 2015 Paris Agreement was to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as much as possible so that we would not reach 2030% by 1,5.oC was not respected. The date was brought forward. The year 2024 was the hottest in known history, reaching an average of 1,55ºC and in some places even 2ºC or more.
Scientists recognize that science has arrived too late. It can no longer reverse this warming. At most, it can warn of the coming of extreme events and mitigate their harmful effects. We no longer need science to make this observation: extreme events are occurring everywhere, making us realize that planet Earth has lost its equilibrium and is seeking another. This warmer one could devastate a large part of the biosphere and decimate millions of human beings who are unable to adapt to a warmer climate.
2.
How can we get out of this planetary crisis? We see no other realistic way than to inaugurate a new paradigm in our relationship with nature and the living Earth: seeking to live that value present in all cultures and to which I have dedicated two books: “The Search for the Right Measure”: how much to extract from nature for our subsistence and how much to preserve it so that it can regenerate and continue to offer us what we need to live.
If the dominant paradigm was that of dominus, the human being, master and owner of nature, not feeling part of it and leading us to the current systemic crisis, now imposes what common sense and biology itself have taught us: frater (brother and sister). All living beings have the same basic genetic code, as Watson and Krick demonstrated in the 50s when they identified the formula by which life is constructed, which makes us, objectively, brothers and sisters of each other.
Such a paradigm would have the power to create a collective awareness that we must treat each other, as humans and all other beings in nature, as brothers and sisters. Care, cooperation, solidarity, compassion and love would form the basis of this new way of inhabiting planet Earth. We would avoid the risks of self-destruction and create the conditions for the continuity of our life on this planet.
Otherwise, we may learn about the path already taken by the dinosaurs, who 67 million years ago were unable to adapt to the changes on Earth and disappeared forever.
3.
It is within this context that it is urgent to enrich education with the value of care, with the ethics of solidarity, with the feeling of loving kindness towards all beings and initiation into natural spirituality. As Hannah Arendt asserted: we can inform ourselves throughout our lives without ever educating ourselves. Today we have to educate ourselves in a way that is appropriate to the changes that are occurring. It is not about having a head full of all kinds of information, but a well-formed head. Education is not about filling an empty vessel, but about lighting a light in the mind.
As the Earth Charter warns us: “As never before in history, our common destiny calls us to a new beginning. This demands a new mind and a new heart.” In other words: accepting that the Earth is alive and our Great Mother; reclaiming the rights of the heart: the bond of love for all beings and overcoming utilitarianism, since each one has a value in itself. Enriching intellectual reason, so developed in modern times, with the sensitivity of the heart that makes us truly feel like brothers and sisters to one another with the ethical imperative to protect and care for the sacred heritage that is the Earth, our only Common Home.
Among other values, I would like to emphasize one that is often forgotten: recovering natural spirituality. It is not a derivative of religions, but rather draws from this source, which is more original. Natural spirituality belongs to human nature, just like intelligence, will, power and libido.
Natural intelligence is expressed through love that excludes no one, through solidarity, through an emotional bond with all beings, and through compassion for those who suffer. This spirituality must be present in schools, from the earliest childhood. In this way, we will not be consumers and users of technological means, but rather conscious, critical, sensitive and deeply humanitarian citizens.
*Leonardo Boff is an ecologist, philosopher and writer. Author, among other books, of Caring for our common home: clues to delay the end of the world (Vozes). [https://amzn.to/3zR83dw]
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