Democratic Forest Trusts (PDF)in Watson, Alan; Dean, Liese; Sproull, Janet, comps. 2006. Science and stewardship to protect and sustain wilderness values: Eighth World Wilderness Congress Symposium; 2005 September 30-October 6; Anchorage, AK.Democratic trusts with leadership elected by citizen-members promise to solve many of the problems afflicting both traditional government and corporate ownership of forestlands. This article explores these issues in some depth.Complexity and the Dream of Human Control of Eco-Systems (PDF)in Watson, Alan; Dean, Liese; Sproull, Janet, comps. 2006. Science and stewardship to protect and sustain wilderness values: Eighth World Wilderness Congress Symposium; 2005 September 30-October 6; Anchorage, AK.The title captures it. I then explore the kinds of institutions compatible with both nature and the modern world that are implied from this analysis.Rethinking the Obvious: Modernity and Living Respectfully With Nature (PDF)The Trumpeter: Journal of Ecosophy, Winter, 1997.Modernity is usually considered a wrong turn in terms of respect for and sustaining the environment. I argue the reality is more complex, for modernity has freed us from personal dependence on agriculture, ended the economic value of children, radically reduced the likelihood of large scale wat, and shifted much production to intellectual rather than material capital. This partially decouples society from nature, which gives us important opportunities as well as problems.Towards an Ecocentric Political Economy (PDF)The Trumpeter, Fall, 1996.This paper begins my effort at showing how liberal modernity can be harmonized with an ecocentric perspective on our relationship with the natural world. It is a corrective to much “free market environmental” literature that sacrifices Nature to money as well as to anti-liberal attacks by well-meaning but economically naïve environmentalists.Unexpected Harmonies: Self-Organization in Liberal Modernity and Ecology (PDF)The Trumpeter, Journal of Ecosophy, 10:1, Winter 1993This is my initial paper exploring how what I term ‘evolutionary liberal’ thought can be an important means by which society and nature can be brought into greater harmony. The other Trumpeter papers build on it.Deep Ecology and Liberalism: The Greener Implications of Evolutionary Liberalism (PDF)Review of Politics, Fall, 1996.Liberal thought and deep ecology are usually regarded as mutually exclusive. But the “evolutionary” tradition offers a way to integrate the two through commonalties in the work of David Hume, Michael Polanyi, Arne Naess, and Aldo Leopold, providing a stronger foundation for liberalism while strengthening the case for an ecocentric ethic.(Related subjects: Ecology)Saving Western Towns: A Jeffersonian Green Proposal (PDF)in Writers on the Range, Karl Hess and John Baden, eds., University Press of Colorado, 1998.Developmental pressures in the rural and small town West involve three groups: long term residents, new arrivals, and environmentalists. Today their interests often conflict. This conflict is in part the outcome of institutions which prevent harmonizing competing interests. The concept of developmental trusts, both for rural regions and for small communities offers a means whereby these interests can be harmonized for the benefit of all concerned.(Related subjects: Politics)Social Ecology, Deep Ecology, and Liberalism (PDF)Critical Review, 6: 2-3, 1992.Murray Bookchin is considered a leading radical environmental theorist. However, his analysis is incapable of leading humankind towards a more respectful and sustainable relationship with the natural world. Criticisms of Bookchin from both the deep ecology and evolutionary liberal perspective complement one another, pointing the way towards a better understanding of how modernity relates to the environment.The paper as a whole offers an early discussion of issues that are more clearly addressed in later papers, particularly Deep Ecology and Liberalism (1996) and the three Trumpeter articles in 1997, 1996, and 1993. However, there are other ideas in the article which have not been developed more thoroughly elsewhere.
Yes, right in the heart of where the Christian Right did its
best to turn our airmen into zealots for Jesus, a stone circle has been officially
added to worship facilities at our Air
Force Academy near Colorado Springs. The article from the Academy
itself shows Tech. Sgt. Robert Longcrier consecrating the new circle with white
sage. I can barely imagine, if
that, the difficulties he and our other brothers and sisters in the service
had to go through for this to happen.
It is wonderful news at so many levels and in so many ways
that I’ll simply leave it up to you guys to explore them. You’ll probably come up with some I’d
miss.
My thanks to Niyati for tipping me off.
On this, my heart sings.
UPDATE
Celia’s Symbol Song is really appropriate here.
posted January 27, 2010 at 1:44 pm
I just graduated from there last May and never heard or saw anything about this. I walked by the circle’s location all the time on the way from Sijan to the visitors center. Not a bad spot.
posted January 27, 2010 at 4:23 pm
I hope this Circle stands unmolested. Note in this article the paragraph that mentions what happened to the one in Fort Hood:
“The Fort Hood Open Circle was vandalized on four separate occasions from 1999 to 2000, including an incident Oct. 27, 2000, in which the half-ton limestone altar was destroyed outright.”
posted January 30, 2010 at 10:04 pm
EXCELLENT! This country stands for freedom of religion. There is no reason why we shouldn’t have a place to celebrate our faith. Gold Star for the AFA.
posted February 12, 2010 at 1:43 pm
That unfortunate incident aside, my time in seminary has brought me into contact with many open-minded, proud chaplains in the US military across several of its branches, who believe firmly in long-stadding policies respecting religious pluralism. While one may run into some narrowminded folks in some places, its my sense this represents the broader work of many of our chaplains.
As a Christian, the brother to a serviceman, and friend to many more I’m proud to see the men and women putting their lives on the line for our freedoms are also being given their full rights to those freedoms of worship.
The irony, of course is that many of the fiercest opposition I’ve seen around the net on this news has been from Christians who apparently agree with the very terrorists we’re fighting — the government should become a theocracy that regulates what religions are “valid” in our country. No thanks the Christian Sharia law, I suggest these people-reread both their Constitutions and their history books.