HUMAN ECOLOGY AS AN INTERDISCIPLINARY CONCEPT
41
into a complete discussion of the nature of the philosophical inquiry into
the relationships between man and environment; limitations of space
and my own inadequacies in philosophy prevent such a discourse. I can,
however, offer a pars pro toto, a part for the whole, and then hope that it
will prove sufficient to generate discussion as an aid toward increased
understanding: heuristic even where not wholly acceptable.
One example of this unfound tradition in the history of thought can
be identified in pre-Socratian philosophy, in the still continuing dialogue
between Parmenides and Heraclitus, both Greek philosophers of the
fifth century B.C. Parmenides denied both change and diversity in the
name of unity and “immutability of the First Principle” (Capek, 1967).
Parmenides tried to define the world in terms of One over-all Being, in
terms of a monist theory. Being is one, homogeneous, unchanging, the
same throughout, containing and permitting no void or non-being.
Heraclitus argued that Parmenides’ reasoning that “all change is
contradictory, therefore it does not exist”, should be altered to “all
change is contradictory, therefore contradiction is the very essence of
reality”. Capek (1967) called contradiction the “unity of opposites” and
described Heraclitus’ world as subject to the “dynamics of process”.
Each is a conception of reality: heracliteanism resulting in a philosophy
based on the theory that everything is in flux and that the world is made
of the four elements fire, water, earth and air which are continually
transmuted into one another; parmenidean philosophy emphasizing a
conception of reality as an absolute, unchanging eternal.
From one of the existing fragments (Fragment 10) of his writings,
Heraclitus can be quoted as interpreting his unity of opposites in a
cosmological sense: “Things taken together are whole and not whole,
something which is being brought together and brought apart, which is
in tune and out of tune; out of all things there comes a unity, and out
of a unity all things”. Heraclitus would recognize a balance in all things,
but a balance in flux (symbolized by the comings and goings of fire,
by the material changes in the process of combustion). To Heraclitus
the world is a process. He defines that as the Logos, the orderly process
whereby all change takes place. The Logos, in the heraclitean doctrine, is
the true One.
This theme has ecological implication in a number of ways but notably
in the traditional philosophical concern with the antinomy of Being and
Becoming. Being has perhaps the strongest position in the majority of
philosophical systems, but Becoming might be accepted as the more
ecological. Plat0 emphasized Being while admitting that perfect reality
cannot be “devoid of change and life”. Aristotle was closer to Heraclitus,
recognizing the reality of change and diversity and worrying that with
the philosophy of Parmenides, the beginnings of natural science achieved
41
into a complete discussion of the nature of the philosophical inquiry into
the relationships between man and environment; limitations of space
and my own inadequacies in philosophy prevent such a discourse. I can,
however, offer a pars pro toto, a part for the whole, and then hope that it
will prove sufficient to generate discussion as an aid toward increased
understanding: heuristic even where not wholly acceptable.
One example of this unfound tradition in the history of thought can
be identified in pre-Socratian philosophy, in the still continuing dialogue
between Parmenides and Heraclitus, both Greek philosophers of the
fifth century B.C. Parmenides denied both change and diversity in the
name of unity and “immutability of the First Principle” (Capek, 1967).
Parmenides tried to define the world in terms of One over-all Being, in
terms of a monist theory. Being is one, homogeneous, unchanging, the
same throughout, containing and permitting no void or non-being.
Heraclitus argued that Parmenides’ reasoning that “all change is
contradictory, therefore it does not exist”, should be altered to “all
change is contradictory, therefore contradiction is the very essence of
reality”. Capek (1967) called contradiction the “unity of opposites” and
described Heraclitus’ world as subject to the “dynamics of process”.
Each is a conception of reality: heracliteanism resulting in a philosophy
based on the theory that everything is in flux and that the world is made
of the four elements fire, water, earth and air which are continually
transmuted into one another; parmenidean philosophy emphasizing a
conception of reality as an absolute, unchanging eternal.
From one of the existing fragments (Fragment 10) of his writings,
Heraclitus can be quoted as interpreting his unity of opposites in a
cosmological sense: “Things taken together are whole and not whole,
something which is being brought together and brought apart, which is
in tune and out of tune; out of all things there comes a unity, and out
of a unity all things”. Heraclitus would recognize a balance in all things,
but a balance in flux (symbolized by the comings and goings of fire,
by the material changes in the process of combustion). To Heraclitus
the world is a process. He defines that as the Logos, the orderly process
whereby all change takes place. The Logos, in the heraclitean doctrine, is
the true One.
This theme has ecological implication in a number of ways but notably
in the traditional philosophical concern with the antinomy of Being and
Becoming. Being has perhaps the strongest position in the majority of
philosophical systems, but Becoming might be accepted as the more
ecological. Plat0 emphasized Being while admitting that perfect reality
cannot be “devoid of change and life”. Aristotle was closer to Heraclitus,
recognizing the reality of change and diversity and worrying that with
the philosophy of Parmenides, the beginnings of natural science achieved