The Earth: with dignity and rights

Leonardo Boff

03/05/2010

Opinión

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A central theme of The Summit of The Peoples on Climate Change, gathered in Cochabamba, from April 19th to the 23rd, convoked by the President of Bolivia, Evo Morales, was the subject of the Earth, her dignity and her rights. The theme is relatively new, because dignity and rights until now were reserved only for human beings, bearers of conscience and intelligence. An anthropocentric vision still predominates, as if we exclusively were bearers of dignity. We forget that we are part of a bigger whole. As renowned cosmologists say, if the spirit is in us, that shows that previously it was in the universe, of which we are a fruit and a part.

A tradition that goes back to the more ancestral origins has always considered the Earth as the Great Mother who creates us and provides us with all that we need to live. The sciences of the Earth and life, through scientific means, have come to confirm this vision. The Earth is a living super-organism, Gaia, who regulates herself, so as to always be capable of maintaining life on the planet. The very biosphere is a biological product, because it originates in the synergy of the living organisms with all the other elements of the Earth and of the cosmos. They create a habitat suitable for life, the biosphere. Consequently, it is not just that there is life on Earth; but the Earth herself is alive, and as such, she possesses an intrinsic value and must be respected and cared for as any other living being. This is one of the attributes of her dignity and the real basis of her right to exist and to be respected, as other beings are respected.

The astronauts left us this legacy: as seen from beyond the Earth, the Earth and Humanity form a single entity; they cannot be separated. The Earth is a moment in the evolution of the cosmos, life is a moment in the evolution of the Earth, and human life, a recent moment in the evolution of life. This is why we are justified in saying: the human being is that moment when the Earth began to have consciousness, began to feel, to think and to love. We are the conscious and intelligent part of the Earth.

If human beings posses dignity and rights, as is the consensus among the peoples, and if Earth and human beings constitute an indivisible unity, then we can say that the Earth partakes of the dignity and of the rights of human beings.

This is why she cannot endure systematic aggression, exploitation and degradation, by a civilization that sees her only as a thing, without intelligence, and therefore treats her without respect, solely in function of the accumulation of material goods, denying her autonomous and intrinsic value. It is an offense to her dignity and a violation of her right to continue whole, clean, and with reproductive and regenerative capacities. For this reason, there is discussion at the UN of a proposed Tribunal of the Earth, that could punish those who violate her dignity, deforest her, contaminate her oceans, and destroy her ecosystems, vital for the maintenance of the weather systems and of life.

Lastly, there is a final argument, that derives from a quantum vision of reality. It shows, following Einstein, Bohr and Heisenberg, that, deep down, everything is energy, in different degrees of density. Matter itself is highly interactive energy. Matter, from the hadrones to the topquarks, not only possesses mass and energy. All beings are bearers of information. The interplay of relationships among all, causes them to modify and store the information of that relationship. Each being relates with the others in its own way, such that it can be said that levels of subjectivity and history appear. The Earth in her long history of more than four thousand millions of years retains the ancestral memory of the trajectory of her evolution. She has subjectivity and history. It logically is different from human subjectivity and history, but the difference is not of principle (all are connected) but of degree (each in its own way.)

This is one more reason to understand, with data from the most advance cosmologic science, that the Earth posses dignity, and for that reason, she has rights. For our part, it is our duty to care for her, love her and keep her healthy, so that she may continue generating and giving us the goods and services she offers us.

Now it is time that bio-civilization begins, in which Earth and Humanity, dignified and with rights, acknowledge their reciprocal belonging, their common origin and destiny.

- Leonardo Boff, Theologian, Earthcharter Commission

(Free translation from the Spanish by Servicios Koinonia, http://www.servicioskoinonia.org. Done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.)

https://www.alainet.org/fr/node/141099