Forum: Ecological Wisdom: Why call "Ecological Wisdom" wisdom?

According to the Green Party of New Zealand, the tenents of Ecological Wisdom are:

 * Human beings are part of the natural world.
 * This world is finite, therefore unlimited material growth is impossible.
 * Ecological sustainability is paramount.
 * Whatever we take from the earth, we must give back to the earth.

This manifesto has its origins in the personal philosophy of Arne Næss, who drew on James Lovelock and Peter Singer.

However the Deep Ecology movement takes the first point of the manifesto beyond a pragmatic 'utilitarian' position that Gaian vew point is a useful tool that helps manage the resources of the environment for human purposes.  They treat it as a moral imperitive, and tie it into various psychological, sociological and political theories and agendas such as decentralisation of authority, redistribution of resources, non-violent direct action and self-realisation.

So why does the title of this philosophy contain the word "Wisdom"?  For a philosophy to name itself wise in its own title seems to be pre-judging the issue.

Which is ironic.  Because Næss himself also wrote on other areas of philosophy.  In particular he was interested in how to make public discussions more civilized, and recommended six things to avoid:

1. Avoiding tendentious irrelevance
   Examples: Personal attacks, claims of opponents' motivation, explaining reasons for an argument.
2. Avoiding tendentious reciting
   Reproductions should be neutral regarding the subject of the debate.
3. Avoiding tendentious ambiguity
   Ambiguous arguments may be easily adopted to suit criticism.
4. Avoiding tendentious use of straw men
   Assigning views to the opponent that he or she does not hold.
5. Avoiding tendentious original research
   Information put forward should never be untrue or incomplete, and one should not withhold any relevant information.
6. Avoiding tendentious tone of voice
   Examples: irony, sarcasm, pejoratives, exaggeration, subtle (or open) threats.

Douglas 

Douglas.Reay:

For a philosophy to name itself wise in its own title seems to be pre-judging the issue.

I agree, however, you can't help but understand that nearly every philosophy thought that it itself was wisdom. In fact, to call it a philosophy is to call it wisdom - for philosophy is philos+sophy (love of wisdom) - and so any philosophy is not only wisdom, but a wisdom that someone loves (or at least that is one way to interpret these words).

I think that by calling itself Ecological Wisdom, they managed to focus on the fact that they think this is about prudent decision making rather than just descriptive axioms, and about action, rather than sitting around and constructing thoughts. Or do you think that I'm misrepresenting them?

Long time ago, Aristotle distinguished between theoretical and practical wisdom. They both aim at truth, where the latter (phronesis) serves human action.I like this distinction, and I find startegic wisdom every bit as useful (if not more useful) as the abstract theoretical wisdom. I echo Andrew in his appropriate description of ecological wisdom as what is embeded in prudent decision making.