Shi Fengge: A Critique of Ecocentrism and the Construction of a New Ecological Philosophy
While modern industrial civilization has brought material prosperity and sensory pleasure, it has also caused a worsening of the ecological environment, seriously threatening the survival of humanity itself. Faced with this situation, the Western intelligentsia took the lead in the 1960s by reflecting on the relationship between humanity and nature under traditional industrial civilization, forming many schools of thought such as environmental ethics, wilderness philosophy, and deep ecology. These are generally referred to as the ecocentric (nature-centered) ecological outlook. Ecocentrism attempts to repair the actual natural world destroyed by humans to achieve harmony between humanity and nature. On the surface, this ecological view seems flawless and reasonable; however, it is a utopian fantasy. Undoubtedly, ecocentrism reflects the concern people feel toward increasingly serious ecological problems. Yet, contrary to expectations, we have not seen a significant mitigation of current ecological issues, let alone the elimination of the ecological crisis. Where, then, does the crux of the problem lie? This has become a question over which many philosophers and ecologists have brooded. To date, people remain divided on how to solve ecological problems, and the ecological issue remains a difficult global challenge. By reflecting on ecocentrism, the famous contemporary Western leftist scholar Slavoj Žižek points out that the crux of this trend is its ontological utopia, and he provides his own answer from a psychoanalytic perspective. Below, we provide a brief analysis of this.
I. The Perfectly Balanced Primitive Nature: The Utopia of the Ecocentric Ecological Outlook
"The mainstream view of contemporary Western ecological philosophy is 'ecocentrism' [1]." We can also call it a typical ideology regarding ecological issues because it presupposes a primitive nature—a nature that not only exists but is "unpolluted," only later to be destroyed by the "human," the master of nature. Consequently, returning to the original, proto-ecological nature has become the goal of the ecocentric ecological outlook. Specifically, we can grasp the ecocentric ecological outlook through the following aspects.
First, from the perspective of philosophical ontology, ecocentrism has an ontological foundation: that perfectly balanced primitive nature. This is an ontological presupposition of nature with a "utopian" character. Of course, this natural "utopia" is essentially a retrospective construction of thought rather than an indubitable reality or fact; it is a deduction of possible causes from results, rather than a normal sequence from cause to effect. On the one hand, in terms of temporal logic, the proto-ecological primitive nature is always un-reproducible. Because it exists as a past situation, it has always already passed away; that is to say, we cannot go back to the past to confirm what the primitive nature actually looked like. Thus, the so-called primitive nature is necessarily a retrospective construction of thought. On the other hand, humans are essentially beings of cultural symbols, which requires us to endow our own existence with order and meaning. That is, for a person "to live and be able to survive, the spirit must associate itself with some kind of order. It must understand reality as an independent whole. The spirit lives in a relationship of trust with reality itself... this relationship of trust was originally and is indeed always our relationship with nature as a totality, that is, as the reality of the natural world." In other words, to dwell in the world of everyday life, people must imagine nature as an ordered, balanced, and perfect whole. This means that in the depths of the human spirit, people "find it very difficult to truly accept the fact that the flow of everyday reality will be disturbed." When people face ecological disasters that frequently disturb the balance of their daily lives, they construct a perfectly balanced primitive nature in their minds to resist this imbalance. This mental construction also accords with the essential requirements of human existence.
Second, based on the ontological foundation of "primitive nature," the various schools of the ecocentric ecological outlook have differing views. These include ecological ethics, which extends the scope of ethical relations to natural beings beyond humans; wilderness philosophy, which showcases the primordial natural environment; and deep ecology, which advocates for the "self-realization" shared by humans and other species.
The first to reflect on environmental issues was ecological ethics, proposed by the French scholar Albert Schweitzer, developed by the American scholar Aldo Leopold, and finally systematized by Holmes Rolston III. The basic tenet of ecological ethics is to extend the ethical relations originally applicable between humans to natural beings beyond humans. That is, "a land ethic changes the role of Homo sapiens from conqueror of the land-community to plain member and citizen of it. It implies respect for his fellow-members, and also respect for the community as such." This extends the original ethical concern between humans to other beings in nature. From the perspective of ecological ethics, this expansion of moral concern is grounded in the intrinsic value and inherent rights of nature. The value of nature here is not the instrumental value relative to humans within the horizon of anthropocentrism, but a creative value-in-itself determined by the structure of natural objects. This value attribute allows natural objects to adapt perfectly to nature and makes the life of Mother Nature more diverse and exquisite. As for whether nature actually has rights, the famous American ecologist Barry Commoner explained this by proposing the ecological law that "nature knows best." To illustrate this, he gave the example of a mechanical watch: the precise internal structure of a watch is the accumulation of the skills of countless predecessors and the product of careful construction. "Any random change made in this watch is likely to result in a highly disordered and destructive arrangement." Extending this to nature, we can conclude that the Earth's biosphere is a self-organizing system that has functioned excellently through hundreds of millions of years of evolution. Its internal natural substances are those that have been tested and retained by this system. "Any random change in a natural system, primarily caused by human intervention, is likely to be harmful to that system." That is to say, in the long-term evolution of nature, only those things that could be integrated into the self-organizing system and were beneficial to its survival were retained. These surviving beings attained an optimal match with the ecosystem through long-term evolution and adaptation; therefore, they are entitled to continue existing according to their inherent natural rights. It is precisely based on the intrinsic value and rights of nature that ecological ethics holds that natural beings and humans should be equal, and that humans should respect and revere nature.
Wilderness philosophy attempts to provide proof from a scientific perspective for a nature where human intervention is absent and ecological laws play a dominant role. Wilderness "is a biotic community that presents beauty, integrity, and stability," and "is a living museum, displaying the roots of our lives." Specifically, it proposes the following points: First, as the primordial natural environment, wilderness constitutes an independent self-cycling system with diversity; protecting wilderness will help protect ecological diversity. Second, wilderness has its own overall homeostasis and harmony; it contains the laws of the changing seasons and biological migration, and possesses internal interaction mechanisms among species. These mechanisms include parts beneficial to the organic whole of the wilderness as well as harmful parts, but it is precisely this dialectical unity of benefit and harm that guarantees the healthy development of the wilderness. Third, the essential attribute of wilderness is wildness, an attribute which is "the property of an organism formed by the interdependence and interaction of internal structural elements and relationships of the wilderness ecosystem [2]." Artificial interference with this wildness will lead to the loss of the organism's adaptive capacity, making it unable to survive. The wilderness is both primitive and self-sufficient/perfect—and is this not precisely the projection of the perfectly balanced primitive view of nature?
If the two schools mentioned above only mirror the primitive nature ontological presupposition of ecocentrism in part, then Arne Næss’s deep ecology displays it from a holistic perspective. Næss’s deep ecology can be called a "totalizing concept." Its basic principles are "biocentric equality" and "self-realization." It points out that human self-realization should exceed the category of the species; this "self" should transcend human society and identify with all beings. At this point, the self should be the "Great Self," an ecological self, where the human subject is merely a part of a larger whole. Consequently, Næss points out that "maximum self-realization requires maximum diversity and symbiosis. Diversity is a fundamental principle." The reason for this is precisely that human "self-realization" depends on the "self-realization" of other beings. Here, we see a more radical manifestation of the ontological presupposition of a perfectly balanced primitive nature—an ecological viewpoint that places humans on an equal footing with other organisms as merely a part of primitive nature.
Through the above analysis, we can see that ecocentrism, based on the ontological presupposition of a perfectly balanced primitive nature, has proposed theoretical reflections to deal with the ecological crisis. However, because these theoretical reflections overemphasize the dimensions of natural rights and intrinsic value, they overlook the fact that the injection of human values is the proper meaning of our reflection on ecological problems. At the same time, as a retrospective construction of thought, this ontological presupposition of primitive nature carries an obvious utopian color. The cognition of nature within this ecological outlook also makes it impossible for them to solve the ecological crisis caused by the disharmony between humanity and nature. An effective solution to the ecological dilemma must be grounded on a foundation of scientific cognition. The most primary task is to clarify exactly what kind of nature it is that we are facing.
II. Critique of the Ontological Presupposition of the Ecocentric Ecological Outlook: Nature Does Not Exist
Regarding the ecocentric ontological presupposition of a perfectly balanced primitive nature, Žižek provides a powerful critique from a psychoanalytic perspective. Starting from the psychoanalytic concept of "trauma," he points out that "man is a 'wound of nature,' and the balance of nature can never be restored; the only thing man can do to live in harmony with the environment is to fully accept this breach, this rift, this structural uprooting, and repair it as much as possible after the fact." Accordingly, Žižek clearly puts forward his own view of nature: that "Nature" does not exist; nature is always already a broken and imbalanced nature. He provides full demonstrations of this from two aspects: the inherent attributes of nature itself and "second nature."
First, Žižek believes that nature, in terms of its inherent attributes, is full of disasters and imbalances. He explains this through a dialectical reading of Darwinian evolution. The common interpretation of Darwinian evolution is that species are perfectly designed to adapt to nature; Žižek, however, points out that "this reference to Darwin is a deep misunderstanding." He believes that the current system of species "evolved" is merely "nature’s bumbling improvisation, where every limited success is accompanied by heavy costs and disasters." Clear evidence strongly proves this point: "90% of the human genome is 'junk' DNA with no clear function." This evidence regarding humans precisely illustrates the ultimate contingency of human existence. That is to say, in the evolutionary history of species, there is "no evolution: disasters and the breaking of balance are all part of natural history. At many moments in the past, life could have turned in a completely different direction. Our main source of energy (oil) is itself the result of unimaginable past catastrophes." Does this not precisely reveal the true side of nature to us? It is itself full of unpredictable disasters and crises. Real nature is not as pleasant and harmonious as green shade and drifting clouds; real, proto-ecological nature is like the scenery of southern Iceland: "a magnificent and vast coastal plain, misty with green, scattered with large moss-covered stones, which unavoidably appears as uncontrolled, morbid, cancer-like protrusions." Do these not all show us the truth of the chaos and disorder of natural reality, thereby negating the ecocentric ontological presupposition of a perfectly balanced primitive nature from within nature itself?
Second, Žižek believes that nature since the birth of humanity has always been a "second nature"—a humanized nature—and that with the development of biological genetic technology, nature will cease to exist. Starting from the idea that man is a wound of nature, Žižek believes that the birth of humanity has long since left deep scars on nature.
"The balance of nature can never be restored." Human intervention in nature has become so profound that any sudden interruption of large-scale industrial activity would lead to a catastrophic collapse. That is to say, "'nature' on Earth is already so 'adapted' to human intervention that human 'pollution' is already thoroughly included in the fragile, unstable balance of the reproduction of 'nature' on Earth." Meanwhile, the development of contemporary biogenetic technology will lead to the disappearance of nature: on one hand, we see more diverse forms of humanized nature, including "natural monsters, deformed cows and trees, or—a more positive dream—genetically controlled organisms improved to be more suitable for us"; on the other hand, we see a "second nature" in the sense of the autonomization of the results of human action—results that "produce monsters possessing a life of their own." The result of the superposition of these two aspects is that "a second nature in the sense of automated social processes is producing a second nature in the sense of artificially created nature and natural monsters."
Thus, the contemporary world fits the definition of second nature more closely than ever before. Furthermore, the subversive significance of biogenetic technology for traditional views of nature lies in the fact that this technological breakthrough brings about the "end of nature." Because of the unique capacity of biogenetic technology to create entirely new lives, the "spontaneous-natural character" of "natural" life is "retroactively lost, becoming one among a series of artificial synthetic plans" [3], and an imperfect species at that. This subversive power led Žižek to reach an even more radical view of nature: in the contemporary world, we have already lost nature. It can be said that Žižek’s view of nature provides a better interpretation of the "second nature" proposed by Marx. Second nature refers to the world of human creations; it is a spiritualized product of humanity. As Marx pointed out in his critique of Feuerbach’s intuitive materialism, "He does not see that the sensuous world around him is, not something directly given as it were from all eternity, remaining ever the same, but the product of industry and of the state of society; and, indeed, in the sense that it is an historical product, the result of the activity of a whole succession of generations... even the objects of the simplest 'sensuous certainty' are only given him through social development, industry and commercial intercourse" [4]. This is also the fundamental point where Marx’s dialectical view of nature transcends the old materialist view of nature—namely, that "what distinguishes Marx’s concept of nature from all other views of nature from the start is its socio-historical character."
III. A New Ecological Philosophy Facing the Truth of Nature: The Future Perfect and Collective Action
Through the above analysis, we have gained a more comprehensive and scientific understanding of the truth of nature—namely, that in the actual world there is no perfectly balanced original nature. What we directly face is a nature with a broken balance, a second nature where ecological disasters have already occurred and which has long been humanized. It is on this basis that Žižek proposes a new ecological philosophy that directly faces the truth of nature.
The primary characteristic of this new ecological philosophy is manifested in its view of time: a view of the "future perfect" (先将来时). The "future perfect" (le futur antérieur) is a tense specific to the French language that denotes an action that will have been completed before another future action takes place; that is, the future is conditional upon an already completed action. Therefore, the "future perfect" is a view of time that looks at the present from the perspective of the future, retroactively determining our current actions through the presupposition of the future. Regarding the "future perfect," Žižek provides a systematic exposition in In Defense of Lost Causes: he points out that the "future perfect" introduces a "projected time" (投射的时间) that is different from the traditional linear historical view of time. In the traditional linear view of history, "possibility precedes choice"; people merely passively choose from among various possibilities, and the realization of any one possibility correspondingly cancels out the others. In contrast, the "projected time" relied upon by the "future perfect" points toward "the idea of a choice/action that retroactively opens up its own possibilities." This "projected time" is a closed-loop time between the past and the future, which means that "causally, the future is produced by our acts in the past, while the way we act is determined by our anticipation of the future and our reaction to this anticipation." Under this view of time, past possibilities are retroactively changed by this anticipation and thereby remain open.
This is precisely how the "future perfect" view of time deals with ecological problems: we should regard ecological disaster as an inevitable fate, and by accepting this perspective of ecological disaster, actively project ourselves into this fate. It is precisely through projecting the dimension of ecological disaster onto the future that people’s agency is stimulated to act proactively to avoid encountering that disaster. As Žižek points out, "we should retroactively insert into its past (the past of the future) a counterfactual possibility ('if we had done this or that, the catastrophe we are now living through would not have happened!')" [3]. According to this presupposition, we should actively organize and implement actions that will change fate itself; here, choice or action retroactively endows the past with new possibilities. In summary, the "future perfect" is a view of time that transcends itself and moves toward the future. At the same time, Žižek regards it as our only effective strategy for dealing with contemporary ecological problems. As he notes, when facing ecological disaster, "one cannot say 'the future is still open, we still have time to act to prevent the worst'; one should instead accept that the disaster is inevitable, and then act to retroactively undo what was already 'written in the stars' as our fate." Žižek suggests starting from the perspective that natural ecological disaster is always already here, using the "future perfect" view of time to face existing ecological problems directly, and implementing active intervention to avoid a true encounter with a catastrophic outcome.
The shift from a traditional linear view of time to a future-perfect view of time has profound practical significance. It targets the deadlock of choice (选择僵局) hidden by the spontaneity of "objective spirit" (客观精神) in the contemporary social field. Objective spirit is the "cunning of reason" formed through the interaction of people; it creates a new Big Other [5], thereby allowing the consequences of people's actions to be treated in an anonymized or systematized way. The result of this anonymization in ecological matters is that there is no clear agent responsible for ecological problems because they are the result of an "objective process." But in fact, we clearly know that we should be responsible for it, yet "objective spirit" "prevents us from adopting this knowledge and assuming this responsibility." Žižek believes the reason for this situation lies in the "deadlock of choice" in contemporary society—"the necessity to decide on matters that will fundamentally affect our lives, yet without a proper foundation in knowledge." To this end, Žižek borrows Donald Rumsfeld's terminology, calling it "unknown unknowns." Regarding ecological disasters, we do not know where the tipping point is, nor do we know exactly what kind of disaster we will face. Consequently, regarding ecological disaster, when we truly realize it, it is always "already too late," because as soon as an ecological disaster appears, it brings a subversive impact to the existing symbolic order. It is precisely this unpredictability of ecological disaster that causes contemporary people to face a deadlock of choice when dealing with ecological problems that affect us. The "future perfect" view of time is specifically aimed at this paradoxical dilemma of choice.
From this, we can see that the "future perfect" view of time contains a dimension of action. This action is fundamentally different from the utopian fantasy of attempting to return to pristine nature; it is grounded in the actual dialectical relationship between humans and nature—that is, the trauma brought to nature by the appearance of humans and the resulting tension between the two. Based on this, such action looks forward to ensuring the long-term survival and development of humanity as a whole through intervention. That is to say, the future perfect considers the present based on human values regarding ecological issues. What kind of action is this? The action we must resort to is collective action.
Žižek provides a systematic exposition on this, arguing that people must first abandon the following prejudice: "the belief that linear evolutionary time is 'on our side,' that history 'works for us' in the guise of a mole digging tunnels, doing what the 'cunning of reason' requires." The subversive dimension of ecological disaster means we can no longer consider ecological problems according to the "cunning of reason," as this could lead to the destruction of humanity and its history. Accordingly, Žižek believes we must re-assert the concept of collective action and actively assume responsibility for addressing ecological problems. Žižek elucidates his view of collective action by infusing new meaning into the four moments of Alain Badiou’s "eternal idea" of revolutionary egalitarian justice.
First, we must adhere to "strict egalitarian justice" to deal with ecological disasters. Ecological disasters possess a destructive power that can interrupt human history. Therefore, when sacrifices are needed for environmental protection, everyone should pay the same price. The most typical example is the issue of energy consumption: to better protect the environment, we demand that "every person in the world has the same standard for per capita energy consumption, carbon dioxide emissions, etc."
Second, we must instill a sense of terror (恐怖意识) in the subject—that is, to ruthlessly punish all those who violate the imposed environmental protection measures, thereby achieving the goal of everyone actively complying with mandatory environmental protection measures.
Third, we must advocate voluntarism (唯意志论). This thought is opposed to the rationalism of individualism. Rationalism emphasizes that the "spontaneous" behavior of each person pursuing their own maximum interest objectively promotes the development of overall equilibrium; it emphasizes the maximization of individual interests and an inherent "spontaneous" logic. In contrast, voluntarism emphasizes an irrational will, a strong will that exceeds human rational intellect. This is precisely the attitude people should have when facing ecological disasters that concern the fate of humanity: to avoid ecological disaster, we are willing to make the necessary sacrifices, which means limiting the spontaneous and blind development of humanity. To achieve this goal, people must resort to large-scale collective action, which precisely reflects the willpower of the human collective.
Finally, we must have full trust in the people. Only in this way can the previous three measures truly take effect. We need to place a wager—that is, to believe that "the majority of the people will support these harsh measures, regard these measures as their own, and be ready to participate in the implementation of these measures." This is precisely a call for subjectivity (主体性) in our response to contemporary ecological disasters; we need a decisive acting subject. Žižek believes that to effectively deal with the ecological crisis, we need to go even further: "one should not be afraid to demand the activation of a role in all egalitarian-revolutionary terror as a combination of terror and trust in the people—the 'informant' (告密者) who reports the perpetrator to the authorities." What Žižek wants to express here is that while activating the "abyss of negation" [6] of the people's subjectivity, we should also form a gaze of the Other (他者的凝视), thereby deterring those who want to sabotage strict protective measures.
The future perfect and collective action together constitute Žižek’s new ecological philosophy. They complement each other, jointly describing the overall logic and practical path of the new ecological philosophy in responding to ecological problems. The future perfect is the fundamental attitude we should hold when facing ecological problems and the premise upon which we carry out collective action. At the same time, collective action, which emphasizes the power of human will, is also our only way out to realize the vision of the future perfect and avoid ecological disaster.
IV. Conclusion
Ecological issues concern the sustainable development of contemporary human society and are closely related to the interests of every individual, thereby garnering widespread public concern. Intellectual circles in developed countries were the first to reflect on the deterioration of the ecological environment. Most of these scholars oppose anthropocentrism and uphold a biocentric [7] ecological outlook, emphasizing the need to respect and revere natural entities other than humans. As the ecological crisis deepens, the biocentric ecological outlook increasingly highlights the inherent value and intrinsic rights of nature itself, using a retrospectively constructed "complete and balanced primordial nature" as its ontological presupposition. Consequently, ecology has gradually developed toward "dark green" [8] positions, moving toward a comprehensive biocentrism. It is undeniable that the reflections offered by a biocentric ecological outlook have helped people deeply recognize the severity of environmental problems and effectively raised environmental awareness. However, while we attend to the theoretical depth of ecological thought, we must also consider its scientific rigor and practical significance. Furthermore, we must remain vigilant against the construction of ecological theories moving toward the extreme of eco-utopianism. Ultimately, our reflection on ecological problems is for the sake of solving them more effectively to guarantee the sustainable development of humanity.
It is precisely based on such realistic considerations that Slavoj Žižek, proceeding from a psychoanalytic perspective, provides a powerful critique of the ontological presuppositions constructed by biocentric ecology. He develops his argument through two dimensions—the inherent attributes of nature and humanized nature—pointing out the absurdity of the ontological presuppositions of biocentric ecology, and thereby proposes a "new ecological philosophy." This new philosophical thought contains a dual meaning of the "future perfect tense" and "collective action." The future perfect, as our fundamental attitude for responding to ecological disaster, requires us to embed the dimension of disaster into our present reality, using this as the intellectual basis for our decisions. Collective action is the powerful guarantee by which we retrospectively change and reset possibilities to avoid an encounter with ecological catastrophe.
The construction of Žižek’s new ecological philosophy is grounded in the psychoanalytic concept of "trauma." Superficially, it appears to have no relation to the dialectical reflections of Marx and Engels on the relationship between humanity and nature, but upon close comparison, we can discern the internal links between them. On one hand, this connection is mainly reflected in their shared view that nature is already "humanized nature." Just as Marx argued that nature is the product of man’s objectified activity, thereby endowing nature with social attributes, Žižek also points out through the deep development of science and technology that nature has long since lost its "natural" attributes. On the other hand, Žižek’s dissection of the relationship between humanity and nature via the concept of "trauma" shares a subtle commonality with Engels’s dialectics of nature. Žižek regards humanity as the "wound" of nature while viewing this rift as a structural protrusion; we can only attempt to repair it, but can never heal it. Engels, meanwhile, noted: "Let us not, however, flatter ourselves overmuch on account of our human victories over nature. For each such victory nature takes its revenge on us. Each victory, it is true, in the first place brings about the results we expected, but in the second and third places it has quite different, unforeseen effects, which only too often cancel the first." That is to say, while humans conquer nature, nature also exacts ruthless revenge on humanity, and this revenge is characterized by contingency and unpredictability. Therefore, we should no longer expect to restore a state of harmony characterized by the "unity of heaven and humanity" [9]; rather, we must strive to maintain the current "fragile balance" between humanity and nature. Finally, the concept of collective action proposed by Žižek is closely related to "practice" (shíjiàn) within the horizon of Marxist historical materialism. Marx regarded practice as the mediation of the objectifying activity between humanity and nature; it is precisely based on practice that the ecological outlook we construct gains practical significance. Žižek’s collective action is itself a form of human practical activity, and simultaneously, this collective action takes the internal value of humanity itself as its inherent aim.
In the 21st century, ecological problems have become increasingly prominent, constituting a major challenge for the future sustainable development of humanity. Today’s ecological problems also increasingly bring traumatic experiences to people through their concealment, unpredictability, and sudden contingency. Žižek’s new ecological philosophy brings us new reflections on ecological issues from the perspective of the psychoanalytic concept of "trauma." It places the rift within the internal structure of the relationship between humanity and nature, allowing people to look directly at the reality that ecological disaster has already occurred. Furthermore, this new ecological philosophy focuses on the inherent value of humanity itself. It proposes a view of collective action under the "future perfect tense" as a realistic strategy for dealing with ecological problems. Consequently, the ecological issue moves from the utopian "other shore" (bǐ'àn) of biocentrism to the "this-shore" (cǐ'àn) of realistic strategies focused on the effective resolution of ecological problems. Although Žižek’s new ecological philosophy remains imperfect, it undoubtedly provides a new perspective for our understanding of ecological issues and provides new paths and methods for solving globalized ecological problems.