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SHS Introduction to the Philosophy of Human Person Quarter 1 – Module 10 THE HUMAN PERSON AND THE ENVIRONMENT

Introduction to the Philosophy of the Human Person Quarter 1 – Module 10: THE HUMAN PERSON AND THE ENVIRONMENT Republic Act 8293, section 176 states that: No copyright shall subsist in any work of the Government of the Philippines. However, prior approval of the government agency or office wherein the work is created shall be necessary for the exploitation of such work for a profit. Such agency or office may, among other things, impose as a condition the payment of royalties. Borrowed materials (i.e., songs, stories, poems, pictures, photos, brand names, trademarks, etc.) included in this book are owned by their respective copyright holders. Every effort has been exerted to locate and seek permission to use these materials from their respective copyright owners. The publisher and authors do not represent nor claim ownership over them. Regional Director: Assistant Regional Director: Regional EPS: Division EPS:

Gilbert T. Sadsad Jessie L. Amin Sheila C. Bulawan Presyl A. Bello

Development Team of the Module Writers:

ROMMEL U. QUIÑONES - Homapon HS, SDO Legazpi City ALLAN JAKE B. DIMACULANGAN - Carolina NHS, SDO Naga City

Editor:

JESSIE MARIE MATA MORCOSO-- Pawa HS, SDO Legazpi City ALVIN A. SARIO, PhD - University of Santo Tomas, Legazpi

Reviewers:

GERRY A. BAJARO - Oro Site HS, SDO Legazpi City JESON D. BALINGBING - Pag-asa NHS, SDO Legazpi City ROMEO A. TUSI - Homapon HS, SDO Legazpi City

Illustrator:

VIAN GABRIEL SPES B. QUINONES - Grade 7, Philippine Science HS, Goa, Camarines Sur

Layout Artist: Cover Photo: ALLAN JAKE B. DIMACULANGAN- Carolina NHS, SDO Naga City

INTRODUCTION As a Senior High School student, do you consider yourself already playing a vital role in the development of your environment? Why is it so that man has to take care of it? Scientists and environmentalists are providing theories and facts on how to preserve and protect mother nature. Upon learning these, do we still need to participate and contribute in the sustainable development of our environment? This lesson shall provide you with the answers to these questions as it deals with the relatedness of man to his environment. As we all know, humans have been connecting with the environment ever since people first walked the Earth. Humans need the environment because it is from where man get food, water, building materials, gas, medicines, and many other things. Some questions may linger in your mind and through this module you may learn that your actions can take part between the relationship of humans and their environment and how taking care of the environment contributes on your health and well-being as a human person. For example, humans have been cutting down forests to clear land to grow crops for centuries and by doing so we have altered the environment. Conversely, the environment affects us in many different ways as well. A simple example is the way we change our clothes in response to cold or hot weather. Advances in science and technology have helped us to exploit the environment for our benefit, but we have also introduced pollution and caused environmental damage. In this lesson you will learn about the relationships between humans and the environment, and the ways in which we use environmental resources. It will introduce some of the ways in which humans influence their environment and how the environment influences us, both positively and negatively In this module you will learn ways on how to appreciate and understand the value of taking care of the environment and learn ways on to contribute in the development of the environment through sustainable development.

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OBJECTIVES At the end of this module, you should be able to: 1. Show that care for the environment contributes to health, well-being and sustainable development 2. Recognize the relatedness of man and environment 3. Present the ways on how to care for the environment towards a sustainable environment.

VOCABULARY Now, that you know your targets for the day, have a glimpse of the new words below which may appear in this module. Anthropocentrism - In an anthropocentric view, the focusis primarily or exclusively on humans, with the natural world ignored or merely a background. Atomistic individualism - The idea that a human being is such an individual possessing a separate essence which radically separates the human self from the rest of the world. Biosphere - the ecosystem comprising the entire earth and the living organisms that inhabit it. Domination - is a kind of power, and usually social power, that is, power over other people by virtue of key characteristics or social influence. Environment - Our environment means our physical surroundings and the characteristics of the place in which we live. It also refers to the wider natural world of land, sea and atmosphere. Intrinsic Value: Something has intrinsic value if its value is “for itself” and independent of its value for something else. Patriarchy - An ideological system that devalues women and the feminine along masculine lines. It is based in transcendental dualism and the logic of domination: transcendental reality over the natural world, humans over animals & plants, culture over nature, mind over body, reason over emotions, men over women.

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PRE-TEST Are you ready to start the pre-test? Remember to write your answers in your journal. TRUE or FALSE Direction: Read the following statements. Write T if the statement is True and write F if the statement is False. _____1. The environment needs to be protected and nurtured for the best interest of the future generation. _____2. Environmentalists are the only qualified and permitted to take care the environment. _____3. To learn more about the environment, you need to understand that your actions can also affect the environment. _____4. As human persons, we are not obliged to express our attention to take care our nature since it is the obligation of the government. _____5. Sustainable development may be the best instrument in conserving the environment. Directions: Read each question and choose your best answer carefully and write it in your notebook. 6. Anthropocentric view focuses on the vitality of humans, where man is treasured than that of other living or non-living things in the world. What is true about this view? A. Man lives only based on the way nature treats him or her. B. Man is not free and all his actions are driven by his or her instincts. C. Man is valued the most while everything serves for his purpose. D. All of the above statements are correct. 7. What best illustrates the claim that “humans must recognize that they are part of nature, not distinct or separate from it.”? A. Destroying rock formation to look for minerals. B. Cutting down century old trees to build subdivisions. C. Converting rice fields and farms to construct malls. D. Cultivating lands to grow more vegetation and breeding of animals. 8. What constitutes public goods? A. Water B. Oceans C. Forests D. All choices are correct 9. What best explains the principle of “public goods”? A. The use of these goods by one does not reduce its availability to others B. They are controlled by some dominating, rich and influential people. C. Limited resources which are to be shared by people. D. Public goods cannot be shared to protect its integrity. 10. Environmental liability is an obligation lodge to _________________. A. the government C. the people B. the NGOs D. the priests 3

LEARNING ACTIVITY 1 Read and understand the poem below and identify the activities described to be destructive with the environment and the hostile effects of this activities to the environment. Write your answer and complete the table that follows. Passion for Nature By: Allan Jake B. Dimaculangan

Why do we need to cut down trees? Do they look awful to you? Is there something they did that made you mad? Or is just you, being uncontended? Why pollute the air? Is it not good to breath? Is there something in the air that made you scared? Or is just you, being selfish? Why destroy the rivers and seas? Don’t they look mesmerizing? Is there something in the waters that made you shallow? Or is just you, being alone and annoyed? You are killing us with your actions, You are trying to murder us with your words, We are the victim of shallowness and emptiness Robbing God’s creation for excess Let us survive for future needs Let us be known for future generations, You are stewards not cowards Help us get through these miserable actions As we survive you will see gems, Treasures that will never fade In human hands we commend, That Mother Nature never weep again Action of Man

Component of Nature Affected

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Hostile Effects

Guide questions: 1. What is the poem trying to tell you? 2. As human persons, are we the ones to blame for the destruction of the environment? 3. What are the causes or reasons why humans exploit the environment?

LEARNING ACTIVITY 2 What’s wrong with this picture Identify what is wrong with the picture below. The people below are taking care of their home and car but are doing things that can damage the environment. Encircle them and write in the boxes what they are doing that harm the environment.

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Guide Questions 1. What did you feel about the activity? 2. If these activities were done in your presence what would you do? 3. What activity shown in the picture you are also guilty of doing the same?

DEEPENING ME and MY ENVIRONMENT Being a Senior High School student, you are already aware of the challenges or problems of our environment nowadays. Facing our current system in the environment, where man is considered as the prime mover of its destruction, there are also a lot of ways where man can attain to care and help in preserving and protecting the environment and its resources. The ability of man to manipulate the landscape of the earth and recognize the consequences of doing it puts us in a peculiar position. As a species, we are assigned the duty to both provide and proliferate as we are endowed to be stewards of this earth and at the same time to have dominion over it. By means of survival, man’s goal is to achieve stability for ourselves and our kin. However, by obligation, man is also duty bounded to maintain the environment as we depend on the resources and services it provides. The question then that we ask is that what is our role in nature? Knowing what is our role then we ask do we have all right to exploit the land, domesticate animals, and pollute waterways? To shed light on these reasons, this lesson shall present Environmental Ethics which is a discipline in philosophy concerns with human beings’ ethical relationship with the natural environment and that studies the moral relationship of human beings, the value, and moral status of the environment and its non-human contents. The challenge on environmental ethics when it first emerged as a new sub-discipline of philosophy in the early 1970s, is to counter traditional anthropocentrism. In the first place, it questioned the assumed moral superiority of human beings to members of other species on earth and in the second place, it investigated the possibility of rational arguments for assigning intrinsic value to the natural environment and its non-human contents. What is Anthropocentrism then? Anthropocentrism is a philosophical viewpoint which argues that human beings are the central or the most significant entities in the world. A belief which is mostly embedded in many Western religions

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and philosophies. Anthropocentrism reputes that humans are separate from and superior to nature and holds that human life has intrinsic value while other entities such as animals, plants, mineral resources, and so on are resources that may justifiably be exploited for the benefit of humankind. In an anthropocentric view, the focus is primarily or exclusively on humans, with the natural world ignored or merely a background. Value is placed primarily on humans, with the natural world having lesser or only instrumental value. Many ethicists find the roots of anthropocentrism in the Creation story told in the book of Genesis in the Judeo-Christian Bible, in which humans are created in the image of God and are instructed to “subdue” Earth and to “have dominion” over all other living creatures. However, this line of thought is not limited to Jewish and Christian theology and can be found in Aristotle’s Politics and in Immanuel Kant’s moral philosophy. Philosophical Views on Environment a. Deep Ecology It is a contemporary radical school of environmental philosophy and social movement based on the belief that humans must radically change their relationship to nature from one that values nature solely for its usefulness to human beings to one that recognizes nature with an inherent value. It focuses on the intrinsic value of nature and takes a holistic approach that emphasizes ecosystems, species, and the planet as a whole. It claims that the primary cause of the problem is anthropocentrism, which it opposes by asserting that humans are fully a part of the natural world and of equal value with all other entities. Sometimes it is called an “ecosophy”. Norwegian philosopher Arne Naess, inspired by Spinoza’s metaphysics, contends the rejection of atomistic individualism which suggests that man is different from the world. Naess argues, that such separation not only leads to selfishness towards other people, but also induces human selfishness towards nature. As a counter to egoism at both the individual and species level, Naess proposes the adoption of an alternative relational image of man and the world. According to this rationalism, organisms are best understood as “knots” in the biosphere. The identity of a living thing is essentially constituted by its relations to other things in the world, especially its ecological relations to other living things.

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Arne Naess and George Sessions have compiled a list of eight principles or statements that are basic to deep ecology: 1. The well-being and flourishing of human and non-human life on Earth have value in themselves (synonyms: intrinsic value, inherent worth). These values are independent of the usefulness of the non-human world for human purposes. 2. Richness and diversity of life forms contribute to the realization of these values and are also values in themselves. 3. Humans have no right to reduce this richness and diversity except to satisfy vital needs. 4. The flourishing of human life and cultures is compatible with a substantially smaller population. The flourishing of non-human life requires a smaller human population. 5. Present human interference with the non-human world is excessive, and the situation is rapidly worsening. 6. Policies must therefore be changed. These policies affect basic economic, technological and ideological structures. The resulting state of affairs will be deeply different from the present. 7. The ideological change will be mainly that of appreciating life quality (dwelling in situations of inherent value) rather than adhering to an increasingly higher standard of living. There will be a profound awareness of the difference between bigness and greatness. 8. Those who subscribe to the foregoing points have an obligation directly or indirectly to try to implement the necessary changes (Naess, 1986). Fully understanding Deep Ecology, and if people would conceptualize themselves and the world in these relational terms, then people will take better care of nature and the world in general. b. Social Ecology Social ecology traces the causes of environmental degradation to the existence of unjust, hierarchical relationships in human society which is seen as endemic to the large-scale social structures of modern capitalist states. Social ecology claims that in order to resolve the crisis, a radical overhaul of this ideology is necessary. The new ideology that social ecology proposes is the absence of domination. Domination is the key theme in the writings of Murray Bookchin, the most prominent social ecologist. For Bookchin, environmental problems are directly related to social problems. In particular, he claims that the hierarchies of power prevalent within modern societies have fostered a hierarchical relationship between humans and the natural world. It is the ideology of the free market that has facilitated such hierarchies, reducing both human beings and the natural world to mere commodities. 8

Bookchin argues that within social ecology as a system, humans must recognize that they are part of nature, not distinct or separate from it. In turn, human societies and human relations with nature can be conversant with the nonhierarchical relations found within the natural world. He pointed out that within an ecosystem, there is no species more important than another, instead relationships are mutualistic and interrelated. This interdependence and lack of hierarchy in nature provides a blueprint for a non-hierarchical human society and that the liberation of both humans and nature are actually dependent on one another. Accordingly, social ecology follows that the most environmentally sympathetic form of political and social organization is one based on decentralized small-scale communities and systems of production. c. Eco-Feminism A contemporary radical school of environmental philosophy. It emphasizes the similar ways nature and women have been conceptualized, devalued, and oppressed. Oppression, hierarchy, and spiritual relationships with nature also have been central concerns of ecofeminism. Ecofeminists assert that there is a connection between the destruction of nature by humans and the oppression of women by men that arises from political theories and social practices in which both women and nature are treated as objects to be owned or controlled. Its name was coined by French Feminist Françoise d’ Eaubonne in 1974. Ecofeminism founded on the basic feminist tenets of equality between genders, a revaluing of non-patriarchal or nonlinear structures, and a view of the world that respects organic processes, holistic connections, and the merits of intuition and collaboration. To these notions, ecofeminism adds both a commitment to the environment and an awareness of the associations made between women and nature. It also asserts the close interrelationship between environmental and social issues. Ecofeminists aim is to establish a central role for women in the pursuit of an environmentally sound and socially just society. Specifically, this philosophy emphasizes the ways both nature and women are treated by patriarchal (or male-centred) society. Ecofeminists examine the effect of gender categories in order to demonstrate the ways in which social norms exert unjust dominance over women and nature. It further argues that androcentrism (male-centeredness, masculinism) as a fundamental problem must be addressed to end the subjugation of nature and women. This involves a 9

recognition of the value of the individual as part of a community, in which great value is placed on diversity, equality, and interrelatedness . The philosophy also contends that those norms lead to an incomplete view of the world, and its practitioners advocate an alternative worldview that values the earth as sacred, recognizes humanity’s dependency on the natural world, and embraces all life as valuable. Towards a Sustainable Development Caring for the environment is indeed a Herculean task since it takes global action and solidarity. The United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) is the lead agency for environmental issues within the United Nations family with a mandate to provide guidance for the world on environmental issues and assist with environmental best practices in the UN. Since Philippines is a member, we are mandated to express care towards environment and adhe...