Lesson from the Environmental History of the World

A few interesting points of Ideas and Impact of J. Donald Hughes (An Environmental History of the World: Humankind’s Changing Role in The Community of Life).

1. Human system of ideas about the natural world might be classified into three general categories:

a. Traditional à evolving system that included earlier ideas with new ones that might be found in the Hinduism, India and Shinto’s thought in Japan. The symbols and practices of ancestral on hunting-gathering, agrarian, and pastoral societies and the attitude toward nature typical of them. They have already transmuted but the process of change in these systems was typical evolutionary than revolutionary. They tend to retain the worship of natural entities including nature gods and their teaching practice might embody the issue of conservation of nature.

b. System created by reformers à the reformers who taught the oneness of life including the humans and nature. Those people are Mahavira (Jainism), Sidharta Gautama (Buddhism), Lao Tsu (Taoism), and philosophers. They view the universe as an organism of which humans and other creatures are parts. The behavior of creatures is closed related to the motion of the nature. In Buddhist ethics we can find the teaching of “do not harm” neither to humans, to animals or plants, or to things usually considered inanimate, so does in Jainism (well known as ahimsa). Taoism also counseled their followers making few demands on environment. Appreciate the nature is a few key words of those reformer teaching.

c. Monotheistic religion à this faith made humans God’s steward with dominion over and responsibility for the creation. This group arose under the monotheistic faith including in Zoroastrianism and “Abrahamic” religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) in which they believe only to one supreme God. Humans are his representatives, and their donation over and stewardship of the earth and its non-human inhabitant must be exercised within ultimate responsibility to the creators. In Islamic thought, for example, human depicted as a steward on the earth, they have power to regulate the nature, and they must be in obedience of God’s law including to protect it and to not make destroy it. Nevertheles, those religions, have been blamed for motivating ecological damage because they seem to separate God from nature, leaving nature without spiritual worth, and because by placing humans above the rest of creation, they apparently give them permission to use other creatures and the earth itself without considering they have any value of their own. It is, however, to other historical factors that we must look for the explanation of the fact that the homelands of that monotheistic faith became environmentally devastated even in early times.

2. Two important roles of human in the changing process of natural world in the late of ancient history might be classified into types:

a. The human attitudes to nature including their ability to organized number of people in vas project that transformed the landscape.

b. The human action impact to natureà including pollution, deforestation etc.

3. How do those human roles in historical perspectives of their relationship to nature, there are three examples lesson from Athens, Xian, and Rome in the ancient times.

a. Athens: mind and practice

① The philosophers dominated the system ideas of the ancient Greek. The philosophers had great ideas about development particularly in building cities and their associated work. The people, however, who actually built and operated them did not always trust and followed the philosophers.

② Water is a limiting factor in Athens thus in 530 BC a famous tunnel on the island of Samos was constructed to carry an aqueduct to the city. It was taking from springs in the hills (length 1000 m). Euphalinus designed it perfectly based on the order of the tyrant Polycrates, but the contractor of that building did not rely on the theoreticians and resorted it to trial and error. Plato and Aristotle were other philosophers known introducing issues on conservation of water including on the new construction of tunnels, irrigation and fountains project. Related to extraction of water from the arid countryside, its impact to the biota also existed. Thus, water purification had come to issue in this city.

③ Even in the Greek city-state, the city and countryside consider as a unit, but city seemed became the main concerned. This city grew organically and planlessly, thus the environmental deterioration in ancient Athens foreshadows the modern ones. Athens suffered from crowding, noise, air and water pollution, accumulation of waste, plagues, and additional dangers to life and limb.

④ Philosophers suggested the ruler to consider the population number regulation (limiting the numbers). They also introduce a concept of “autarchic” city, the city that could raise its own natural resources needed from its own territory. Even though, this idea was not achieved in the classical Athens due to its local ecosystem limitation, thus the Athenians enhancing trade and conquest through a development of military powerful city. Forest product was one of important trading commodity as well as the main source of shipping industry and the shipping fuels. Related to the forest issue, Plato and Aristotle emphasis the important of conservation and both introduce some practical suggestion to avoid further deterioration of this resource. By the mid-fifth century BC, the surface of Attica, Athens’s land, was largely deforested. Deforestation affected to the declining of the agriculture and a chronic shortage of wood and other forest product. Such condition drove the Athenians to expand the timber searching from abroad and group of Athenians colonist’s were dispatched to some others region abroad.

⑤ Many problems found in the modern city are not new, ancient cities knew them to greater or lesser extent. The economic factor was one of the most importance factor effected the environmental problems and in the ancient drove a philosopher such Aristotle to gave his more attention to the role of environment and resources economic. In his opinion, economy and ecology share the same Greek root, and their concern cannot be separated without danger. Even though, the philosopher’s ideas in ancient Athens were not actual practice and they are only a tiny minority. The failure of Athens to adapt its economy to natural system in harmonious ways is a cause of its decline, and is one reason why the power it exercised in the Golden Age did not persist very long into Hellenistic period that followed.

b. Xian: Chinese environmental problems

① Xian, an ancient capital, is redolent of the Chinese past. Qin Shi Huangdi inspired awe among people and he well-known for his great idea to build the Great Wall. To grow an efficient bureaucratic autocracy Qin emperor commanded the scholars to desist from discussion the past and buried alive who protest. He also commanded to burn all books related to various discussion of philosophy, except those dealing with important issues such medicine, pharmacy, agriculture, and arboriculture, as well as divination by tortoise shell and yarrow.

② There are hundreds of schools of philosophy in the decades before Qin conquest China. Those schools thought a good relation between human and the nature and people to live in a “good and simple life” (doing as little interfere with the natural order as possible) as depicted in the basic text of Taoism written by Tao Te Ching (lived in 6 century BC). In fact, the animosity of Qin Shi Huangdi to the Confucians was not based on their attitude to nature, but to their critique on ruler who failed to follow what those schools consider as the right custom.

③ Mencius (lived in 4 century BC) depicted the rapid economy and environmental change of China particularly when business involved in markets and trade were actively done. What Mencius depicted for the China case was similar to Plato concerning the Athens. To avoid further environmental degradation, Mencius suggested a land management as one of the most important responsibilities of the state. He advise ruler to make periodic inspection tours of their domains, and to observe the condition of the land. Concerning to the deforestation and removal of wildlife issues, in Mencius’ time, the expansion of agriculture into undeveloped land was the major force. Furthermore, the ruler also established gardens, parks, and preserves that were not a wilderness.

④ Philosopher such as Mencius has criticized the extravaganza life of many nobles which wasteful resources. Even Mencius advices a middle way, some modern Chinese commentator have criticized Mencius as the “anti-development”. In most case, the ruler of China was also not taking seriously into account to the Mencius advices. The legalist philosophy was more favored to the Qin Emperor when it allowed private ownership to self-interested farmers and restricted the businesspersons. To Qin emperor, the problem of short food supply could be avoid by using two methods: i) bringing more land under cultivation and by constructing irrigation systems; and ii) store grain in years in wide areas under his military power that covered whole China.

⑤ Even the fall of the Qin dynasty was not mainly caused by the decline of the environmental of China (particularly deforestation), and it was by his ostentation particularly when he constructed a huge palace for him self in Xian (in 212 BC), this issue became a strongest one for his opposition to fight the emperor. Finally, this dynasty only has a short-lived, and so did his successor. In the Han dynasty that followed, the teaching of Confucius and Mencius returned to favor. The new leader introduced some new policies and kept some Qin policies continued especially those dealing to agriculture. However, the time to come would see an uneven but inexorable rise in population; it was also a lamentable lost of forest occurred, and danger from famine still continued in spite of expansion of agricultural land.

c. Rome: environmental reasons for the decline and fall

① Number of interacted process brought down the Rome decline. One of these was the Roman mistreatment over their natural environment including the over exploitation of scarce natural resource such as forest and soil. Roman also failure to find sustainable ways to interact with the ecosystems of Italy and the many others land including Dacia, which they conquered. Deforestation and its consequences, erosion, lead the list of disasters. Agricultural crises were responsible for rising prices, food shortages, and labor shortages. Even Industry did not make up as large segment of the economy as today, but it had significant environmental consequences such as pollution, deforestation, ice caps, etc.

② Roman attitude to the natural world failed to maintain a sustainable balance the Mediterranean ecosystem within which they lived. The root was the short-term profit and shortsighted. The trend of the Romans’ action affecting the environment over the centuries was destructive. They exploited renewable resources faster than their ability to recover, and consumed the renewable resources as rapidly as they could. Thus, environmental change as a result of human activities supposed could be judged as one of the causes of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire.

4. Conclusion

a. Systems of ideas have power to shape human action. When they commanded the allegiance of human societies, system ideas have built institution and monuments, stimulated conquest as well as resistance to conquest, and changed the face of the earth.

b. The use of the system ideas by states is far more common than the attempt of states to follow those systems whenever they conflict with what the state consider being their own interest. Therefore, the fact that environmentally positive teaching can be found in ancient religion and philosophies do not always surely indicate that they were put into practice.

c. The religions and philosophies that wish to help our species adapt, survive, and at same time preserve, the community of life must be able to change, discarding outmoded formulation and recognizing the need to respond to ever-new environmental challenges.