Thomas Berry on Nature and Humans - Subtitled Interview
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 3 ต.ค. 2008
- In this edited interview with cosmologist and evolutionary thinker Thomas Berry, recorded in 2006 by Caroline Webb, he speaks about the human-Earth relationship and the need for humans to learn their true position in relation to all other living beings and to all ecosystem functioning. If we can recognize the integral character of our daily existence with the larger systems of Earth and the Universe, and understand that we do not live in a bubble divorced from nature, we will become a species which enhances the planet rather than one which harms it. To that end, Thomas Berry argues that other living beings, and the ecosystems on which they depend, should benefit from legal rights. ‘Rights’ come out of existence itself he says.
For more information about Thomas Berry's foundational thought, visit www.thomasberry.org and www.journeyoftheuniverse.org. To contact Caroline: lifewebb@gmail.com
PARTIAL TRANSCRIPTION © Caroline Webb 2006
"Well, the first thing to recognize in human-Earth relationships is the Earth is primary and humans are derivative. Humans are for the perfection of the Earth rather than the Earth is here for the perfection of humans.
Because the Earth project, reading people like Aristotle, some of the great classics, and particularly Aquinas at an earlier period in Western history, mentions that the planet Earth, or the universe, is the ultimate and noblest perfection in things and everything in the universe is ultimately for the perfection of the universe. So, humans give to the universe a consciousness of itself.
In fact, in a certain sense, humans are the way in which the universe creates itself, because the human can be defined as that being in whom the universe reflects on and celebrates itself in a special mode of conscious self-awareness.
So, in this manner, the first thing to recognize is that humans must become integral with the Earth. This is a very new approach to the Western world who have been so transfixed with the glory of the human and with the rights of humans that they have missed the point as regards humans and their relationship with the Earth.
We might summarize our present human situation by the simple statement: that in the 20th century, the glory of the human has become the desolation of the Earth and now the desolation of the Earth is becoming the destiny of the human.
From here on, the primary judgment of all human institutions, professions, programs and activities will be determined by the extent to which they inhibit, ignore, or foster a mutually-enhancing, human-Earth relationship.
When we inquire just how this will work out with the various aspects of our human existence, we might select four major areas that have authority over the human project: the political-social order, the educational order, the economic order and the religious order. Now these four projects are all directly involved in this determination of the future.
Religion has an awful lot to do with it - if they would simply begin to be more aware of the revelatory significance of the natural world.
The Education is such that children need to have contact with the natural life systems. Someone has written a book about the children and their need - just simply for their emotional and mental development - to have contact with the mountains, the air, the sea, the dawn, the sunset, trees, the birds, the song of the birds. Children that don’t have these experiences have no real idea of the world they live in. They live in a house, in a school, in a city that’s all manufactured. And they began to be progressively isolated from the basic dynamics of what human life is all about.
So that is a very clear situation. It has been suggested that this lack of contact leads to ‘Nature Deficit Disorder’ for children. So, in this manner, the future of the children depends very directly on some more functional balance between the human presence and the functioning of the natural world.
Economics: We need to return to some sense of the natural life systems and realize that our disturbance of the Earth and our pollution processes are having a profound contact on the economy [ecology] of our world.
Then we have also the Political order. The most absurd thing in modern times is the idea that only humans have rights. That’s the most absurd and self-destructive thing imaginable - because every being has rights.
Rights come from existence. Rights is simply the giving to every being its due. That’s a brief definition of rights. And every being - to exist - has rights, has three rights: the right to be, the right to habitat and the right to fulfill its role in the great community of existence....[cut]
‘Rights’ is an analogous term. It is alike and different. Like a person says - “A tree has rights” - the tree doesn’t have human rights because human rights would be no good for a tree. A tree needs tree rights. Birds need bird rights. Plants need plant rights.
I am so grateful for this interview. I am in awe of the clarity Thomas had to the very end. I met him in 1996 and he continues to be one of the most significant human beings that has influenced my life. I am ever grateful to him for all his incredible wisdom, and huge heart, which will forever influence my work in this world and the eyes through which I see experience the natural world.
Late Thomas Berry gave us a so tremendous insight on most immediate challenges and vital issues to which we are co-related to. Grateful for your intiative for editing and posting same for the benefit of one and all from all quarters of the World. His lucidity and serenity are so persuasive that leaves no one indifferent after listening to him.
Thank you very much for sharing
Davidscottlevi you said it right- this is a great map of knowledge that people forget to follow or lead there lives - we are so dependent on the manufactured ways of living and we forget the balance of natural surroundings and the neglect of our planet.
Thank you, Caroline. I had not hear Mr. Berry speak. I find his essay, "The New Story," the articulation of a paradigm to replace our paradigm of "resources and standing reserve." As Heidegger noted, "only a god can save us"; well, Mr. Berry might be such a voice.
It's very interesting! I've read some Berry's book and It helps me to understand the challengers of our time. Thank you! Cheers from Brazil!
Excellent interview, thanks for sharing this.
Thank you Katherine. I am glad you watched it.
Thank you for your comment. Appreciated. Thomas Berry is a voice for the integral Earth.
Dear Caroline, I would like very much to quote the late Mr. Berry from this interview for a paper I am writing for a masters' assignment in integrated learning. Pls may I have some details about you as interviewer e.g.. "ecologist, Caroline Webb, who interviewed Berry in a video entitled Thomas Berry on Nature and Humans....." How may I describe you? Somewhere in my research I came across a page that you had done work with the BBC? Sorry for getting to the point but I have been trying to get some details for the past 2 days. Am so grateful for you r help and thank you for making this video!
Thank you Joceline.
RIP Thomas Berry-
naah many old people get that shoulder thing with time. don't really know what it's all about.
most sounds true. but for me still a bit to anthropocentric. animals and plants and rocks are in their own cosmic 'consciousness' and 'unconsciousness' and 'non-consciousness'.. naturally already celebrating life. humans too, but not balanced.., through 'consciousness' unconscious.. and vice versa.. in non-consciousness, of course.. 'nothing' is fine.. :)
If all things have rights, how does one justify removing snow from their roofs, driveways, etc.? How does one justify shooting a Grizzly Bear when he is devouring your child? How does one justify eating a salad, driving a polluting vehicle, heating a home? How does one justify the building of dams in order to provide electricity and flood control? How does one deny the right to life a medical intervention which destroys other "earth's rights?" The lack of acceptance of the primary value of the human person is a perversion of natural and spiritual rights [the nature of human persons consists of natural and spiritual parts of their being; the ultimate law of being consists of love, which was articulated and professed by Jesus Christ who professed that the human person to be treated with dignity, worth, and to be their brother/sister's keeper. That being the ultimate expression of human rights.