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論文要旨（別紙）
Summary
Environmental crises in recent times have drawn significant attention from all concerned.
The anthropogenic impact on the ecosystem has adverse effects, such as pollution, global warming, polar-ice melting, climate change, drought, and considerable cumulative effects on the natural environment. Environmental crises have the capacity to bring about changes to a great extent but one consequence of these crises is to create significant inertia. By depending only on people’s ecological awareness, it is quite impossible to mitigate the problem. However, by introducing a certain kind of ethical behavior, we can address the problems in relation to the exploitation of nature. A suitable ethical theory can ensure appropriate action and can encourage people to save the environment from drastic anthropogenic effects. For this reason, this thesis attempts to find the answer to the following question: why do environmental ethics matter? In response to this question, this thesis focuses on the biocentric elements in environmental ethics.
Therefore, it begins with biological as well as theo-philosophical evidence with a view to supporting the relationship between man and nature. Some eastern theo- philosophical traditions, such as Vedism, Jainism, Buddhism, and Taoism explore the views that nature includes not only all forms of life, but also animate and inanimate entities, and microbes, etc. In the western world, Aldo Leopold, Albert Schweitzer, and Arne Naess gave equal emphasis to the entire interrelationship among the different components of the ecosystem. Leopold’s view of land ethics, Schweitzer’s idea of reverence for life, and Naess’s concept of the relational total-field image emphasize the relationship between human beings and nature. The present thesis also attempts to show that our consumptive attitude, scientific discoveries, and use of chemical elements have brought forth adverse effects which, as a consequence, have created a critical point for mankind’s life on the earth. To overcome this problematic situation created by human beings, a kind of ecological insight is now required that would maintain interrelationships among different entities.
Therefore, the present thesis begins with the view of biocentrism, a viable notion of environmental ethics, which encourages people to include wild animals, plants, species,
2 populations, ecosystems, forests, all living beings, etc. In doing so, it intends to reconstruct the notion of biocentrism found in ancient traditions as well as in secular traditions of thoughts and religions. However, the thesis has also focused on the differences between religions and philosophies, between the east and the west, and the nature of ancient and new views. Here, I have taken the concept of religion to mean a system of beliefs and worship, while philosophy is regarded as a discourse that deals with the problems of values, knowledge, mind, reason, and language. Such differences are also present among religious as well as secular environmental philosophers regarding the question of “life”.
The present thesis also proposes two viewpoints from the Jain religion. One is ahīmsā (non-violence) which conveys the idea that every living thing, including plants, animals, microbes, and human beings, is equally dependent. The second viewpoint is the concept of parasparograha jivānām, which emphasizes that we are to cooperate with all beings rather than subduing or destroying them. This thesis has shown that both Vedism and Jainism focus on the interdependency as well as the interconnectivity of all living beings in this universe.
It has been made clear that the concept of life cannot be defined through intrinsic value and moral status as has been done by western environmental philosophers. If we accept the view that moral status is only determined by the criterion of being a rational being or having rational capacity, it will be quite clear to us that living organisms do not have any moral status. If this is so, biocentrism would be an impossible theory.
Throughout the thesis, it has been argued that most traditions in the east and the west frequently claim that ‘life’ is everywhere. Both traditions believe in the notion that “all living organisms are full of life”. This interpretation shows that these popular religions have many of the conceptual resources of biocentrism. Both Vedic and Jain traditions emphasize the relationship between living beings and natural elements and uphold that this is necessary in the sense that living beings cannot exist without cooperation from other elements of nature. In the Vedas, the concept of ‘environment’ appears as a reality of interconnectedness which can produce different forces from individual elements. This force can be renamed as the source of life.
3 Biocentrism, at least within the western framework, has had to confront some sticky problems which attempt to extend “intrinsic value” beyond sentient beings, living organisms, or the environment as a whole. However, eastern thoughts, particularly the Indian tradition of ethics, emphasize the mandate to refrain from any sort of harm, suffering, injury, or killing of “life”. This is the first precept that exists in the Indian tradition within the context of interdependence. The same urge is also found in the notion of “biocentric equality” found in the west. This notion urges the relationship between livingness and all-inclusive “self-realization” in the sense that if we damage, injure, or kill any of the living components of nature, we are rather injuring or killing ourselves.
However, it has been claimed that western traditions emphasize the individual’s interests.
Unlike western thoughts, Indian traditions of thoughts see nature as an interdependent and individual entity which is not or cannot be isolated from the whole.
In spite of some similarities in thoughts between the east and the west, the key differences between them cannot be ignored. These differences exist due to their paradigmatic distances in thoughts and practices. Life and philosophy are regarded in the Indian traditions of thoughts as being inseparable from one another. Nature, God, and the whole universe exist together. However, this thesis has sought to investigate the concepts of biocentrism in the traditions of eastern and western thoughts. Biocentrism is found to be present in both traditions.
Through these differences, the present thesis claims that the eastern traditions of thoughts, particularly Vedism, Jainism, and Buddhism do not incorporate any kind of mechanical tool. Instead, we find certain concepts about eco-balance, natural integrity, interdependency, and non-violence. Regarding the question of the “valuing of life”, this thesis provides an insight into the ideas found in the Indian traditions in which natural values are articulated in accordance with the biocentric nature. Therefore, it also emphasizes that the early Indian traditions, particularly Vedism, Jainism, and Buddhism, expound a view of interconnectivity between the cosmic personality and the living earth.
Keeping this concept of life in mind, I have attempted to investigate consistent thoughts about life in an environmental philosophy based on some perspectives from the east and the west.
4 I have also explored the idea of biocentrism as found in the Greek materialistic mind and in Aristotle’s notions of autopoisis and the philosophy of nature. Here, I have endorsed the view that the ancient Greeks generated a biocentric approach within their spiritual, emotional, and holistic concepts of the relationship between human beings and nature. This ancient Greek tradition is similar to the modern biocentric approach. Thus, I suggest here that the liveliness and inner force of a matter can be found in the philosophy of Thales, Heraclites, Democritus, and Pythagoras. It has been claimed that the conceptual sources of biocentrism existed in ancient Greek philosophy. From a different perspective, the present thesis has also tried to show that the metaphysical processing of the environment offered by Aristotle is one of the best instances of the biocentric outlook.
Therefore, the thesis has firstly attempted to defend the perception that Aristotle’s view of the environment is not constructed on the basis of an anthropocentric worldview. In response to this criticism, this research puts forward some relevant points, such as Aristotelian views of cosmology, autopoisis, and entelechy, and his comprehensive analysis of different souls. All these concepts suggest that life is inherent in all beings in nature, including plants and organisms. This is why I have intended to show that Aristotle’s philosophy of nature is also a very good example of biocentrism.
It has at times been argued that most Christian theologians, even Saint Thomas Aquinas and Saint Augustine, were influenced by Aristotle. However, their theo- philosophical approaches to nature have been criticized as being anthropocentric in nature. In spite of these criticisms, the present research has shown that the Franciscan tradition of Christianity maintains a biocentric worldview.
A change in biocentrism has been noticed in the latter chapters of the thesis. This change can be seen in the environmental thoughts of Albert Schweitzer and Paul Taylor.
Schweitzer’s study of Jainism, Buddhism, and Gandhianism led him to create new ethics for all living organisms. In so doing, Schweitzer followed neither the Christian worldview nor any other philosophy found in the west. Instead, he was significantly influenced by eastern thoughts, particularly by Jainism and Buddhism, and the philosophies of life found in the works and activities of Mahatma Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore. However, neither did he deny the western ideas of spirituality. So,
5 we find both eastern and western influences in his philosophy known as reverence for life.
Given Schweitzer’s ideas, the present thesis tries to answer the following question: in what ways do Schweitzer’s views of life open a new avenue for further developing ethics that point towards direct moral concern for the well-being of non-rational beings? I have gained the impression that Schweitzer’s view was that we should not give less priority to other living beings. And, he appeals for an assessment of the strength of other living beings, such as human beings and great apes. The same urge expressed differently has been found in Taylor’s notion where he claimed that every living thing has life which has intrinsic or inherent value. Formally, he used the term “biocentric outlook” in his book Respect for Nature. In his notion, he argued that all living beings have a good that is their own because they have striving capacity. This has given them a “teleological center for life”. Some relevant questions have been raised challenging Taylor’s views which may help us to better understand these views despite their limitations.
It has been clearly seen that eastern thoughts are different in pattern and nature from western thoughts. However, the present thesis has taken the position that environmental ethics should emerge on the basis of a life-centric approach. I have claimed that biocentrism has not been developed only in the traditions of western thought. The elements and spirit of biocentrism also exist in the Indian theo-philosophical tradition.
Therefore, this research has also kept in mind the difference between these two approaches but it also acknowledges some common and basic concepts in the traditions of both eastern and western thoughts. Very clearly, it can be argued that the differences between animate and non-animate beings are maintained both in the east and the west.
For that reason, this thesis has enthusiastically claimed that while the west invented a theoretical notion of life-centric approach in the 1970s, the east had incorporated the inner sense of biocentrism as a thought pattern of valuing nature three thousand years before. On the other hand, as the west is an over-consumptive and techno-based society, the question may be whether the west can address such a life-centric view in formulating environmental policies.
Finally, this thesis has proposed the application of biocentrism as an ethical toolkit in formulating environmental policy. Why do we see biocentrism as an ethical toolkit? The
6 present thesis has defended the view that biocentrism can help in understanding that all living components of the environment are interconnected and interdependent. The life of human beings cannot be sustained without cooperation of the other entities in the environment. Life is interdependent: there is no room to think independently or even individually that life belongs to human beings. Therefore, we should be as aware of our duty towards other living beings as we are in our own case.
