Chris writes:

>We have become destructive because of our numbers, our dominant
environmental ethic and our
>technology applied with perhaps a decreasing wisdom.  The decreasing wisdom
>is due - I would argue - to our growing psychological DISCONNECTION from
>nature and the hence the denial of that truth of our essential association
>with it (disconnection is a premise of BOTH the dominant ECONOMIC paradigms
>that sees all use as "full steam ahead" benign rationality [and never mind
>the horses], and the apparently reactive PRESERVATION paradigm that sees
any
>human involvement [other than observation] as a necessarily destructive
>evil).



It is clear you sense nature demoted by technology, and psychology. When you
say 'our growing psychological disconnection' what do you mean here? Are you
speaking for yourself, or all people? I thought that nature was everywhere.
The psychology of 'demoting' nature is what I think you mean [Studies in
Words, C.S. Lewis]. Man is an erruption in nature, man erupts [Hiedegger,
Intro. to Metaphysics].

"In wilderness is the preservation of the world." Thoreau

Arguing for modern forestry - commercial tree improvement, economic
optimization, and all that goes with the current scientific industrial
forestry - and arguing against 'preservation' is - moreover - demoting the
importance of conservation forestry, protected areas, and other rational
uses of forests besides the preservation of private interests in conserving
one or two commercial tree species for profit.

We can all use the same words to describe the understanding of the other
camp. I can say that the industrial forest paradigm with it's toxic weed
killers, short term whole tree rotation, monocropping, clearcut syndrome is
preservationist thinking in terms of profits, economic efficiency. Should I
say private forest perserves for pulp harvests on a 30 year rotation?

So what is wrong with natural selection based non-violent forestry, which
demonstrates that low extraction harvesting with long rotations is inferior?

Throwing words around and using them only one way to address obvious private
motives really does not address the issue of an ethics regarding the
conservation of biological diversity in rainforests. As it was pointed out,
the ethics of mining trees to maximize profits is based on demoting nature
to a mere single purpose for serving mankind temporarily.

The word paradigm comes from <paradigmata> which is an ancient Greek word
meaning pattern. In the Timaeus this word is used to describe how the
demiurge (the creator of the universe) created a pattern to make all things
in the universe. The universe is described as a body without organs since it
does not need organs of perception nor organs of elimination. The universe
recycles it's own wastes. However the universe is finite and so are ancient
forests finite.

The <paradigmata> are derivative of eternal <eidos> or forms that exist in
the <nous> or eternal mind. What these <eidos> or forms are unknown by
humanity, and humanity simply participates in their instantiations in
nature. Nature is called <phusis> by the Greeks, which has the meaning of
emergence. For the Greeks nature is everything that exists, and what is
becoming, both invisible and visible.

"Mind is the thinniest of substances" Anaximander

Much of what does not exist alluded to as 'psychology' is derivative of
<psuche> the ancient root word for psyche. As you can see <psuche> and
psyche are similar, just as <sema> and <soma> are similar words for body and
sign. It is the body which does the signing. Psuche and pneuma have a common
root which is wind, and wind denotes movement of the spirit. Spiration means
to inhale to give breath closing the separation between sign and body.

Words call out for explanation as they are 'semiotic', that is words 'sign'
for the 'eidos' and have a look about them that can be understood in
conversation. The ancient Greek word for idiot is spelled a little different
than the english, but what this word originally meant was not someone who
lacked intelligence, but someone who lacked training in a skill. The word is
first spoken, it can be hear, and this also closes the separation.

A bird of paradise signs with its body. This is 'hau' or gift. A gift
implies the principle of reciprocity between man and nature. With the sign
of the other body, the gift would not exist, and the demoting of nature
commences.

To demote nature to 'storehouse' and commercial forest preserve is
demote the body of the universe to a singular sign. This calculative
rationality
that characterizes the 'industrial paradigm' places human understanding at
the apex of all other speciesa as master - all other species are slaves.
It should be self-evident that other species possess understanding if they
can 'sign' with the 'body'. The existence of the modern industrial paradigm
is predicated on a 'calculative rationality'
which is predictive. To be able to muster the capacity of predictive
calculative rationality requires nature be demoted to the service of
humanity
first.

The writing arts are only 8000 years old.

For instance, modern forestry likes to refer to forest zones. One zone will
be a special management zone for ungulates, another for visual quality along
a highway or waterfront, and another will be designated a zone for the
conservation of community drinking water. In all cases the zonation of
forests preserved for short rotation and maximized growth is understood as a
'constraint' by the industrial forester. In most jurisdictions the
industrial forest enterprise considers water, wildlife, visual quality, and
biological diversity as an 'external cost' of the private or public
organization.

Forests are too important for all life on earth to let them be preserved
for short term profit maximization. This emphasis of calculative rationality
is to perfect the design of the demiurge that created
the universe from paradigmata, an eternal pattern. The lithosphere
of rock, sand, and clay are really more benign on life as housing material.

Pre-serve-means to let emerge what comes first to appearance as in the
manifest presence of <ousia> the glory and wonder of creation. This sign is
the <parousia> the bird of paradise calling.

John Foste, BsF, MSc Candidate [Forester and Environmental Scientist].


>But the best response is not to say - stop.  It is to learn to live within
>the means of the planet.  Forests are the ultimate, low-human-energy-input,
>provider of renewable products - the ultimate solar power is photosynthesis
>through chlorophyll - still a far better single molecule than anything any
>engineer has developed.  Some would say (and I would agree) that this
>molecule is the source of most life on this planet through its production
of
>carbon based energy.  In a human world that relies on carbon forms of
energy
>to a large degree, any solution that seeks to replace a renewable energy
>source with a non-renewable energy source (and I am not disparaging the
uses
>of soil, or bricks or solar power - though I am of metals, plastics and
>concrete as substitutes) is doomed to failure.  If we want to survive as a
>species we need to reduce resource use and learn to live with th
environment
>(through the development of a consumption and land ethic, as well as popn
>control), we need to restore and protect ecosystem functions, and we need
to
>move from a reliance on non-renewable energy sources to renewable sources.
>I cannot conceive of a workable solution that didn't involve our living
>within the ecosystems on this planet - and those ecosystems include forests
>as one of nature's greatest gifts to us all.  You can have your aesthetic
>and spiritual values as well as humanity.  IF you choose to have ONLY the
>aesthetic and the spiritual, then it is a slippery slope to not having
>humanity represented at all.




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