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that the beauty in the environment is not damaged. To use a new phrase, we should not harm the environmental health and thereby the health and happiness of the humanity at large. The Way Out
There can be no two opinions about the truth that there should be a cordial and harmonious relationship between humans and the environment. This harmony can be maintained only if we take a reverential attitude towards all of Nature and life, particularly human life. But this attitude must be rooted in a philosophical standpoint of the spiritual Advait type or Ishavasyamidamsarvam.5 The Divine Reality that resides in me is the reality that dwells in Nature. In the language of the Gita and devotionalism, the Reality underlying both man and Nature is God who may be called by any name. This sort of philosophy engenders love for both God and the Universe. However, the responsibility of the acts of man is not of God's but is of ours. We are free to maintain or mar the harmony between man and Nature. The above mentioned type of outlook or attitude is found in the ways of thinking and living of the true saints like Saint Francis of Assist and Saint Tukaram and a host of others. For such souls the universe is friendly. Moreover, the world is to be understood as a series of opportunities to be utilised for the allround development of human beings. There is a note of optimism in this outlook for every difficulty is a sort of opportunity. This view is not against the value of utility. But utility is only one of the several values such as beauty, love, gratitude, justice, truth and so on and so forth. Besides man must also take a holistic approach to the world, both human and nonhuman, living and non-living. Narrow outlook distorts the view of the world and the vision of human life. Philosophy aims at synoptic view of the universe and life. Of course, it must also inspire the way of living which is based upon such a view of life and the world. Understood in this sense, the Nature is not a totally alien and hostile something that needs to be defeated and conquered.
Moreover man has also to look within and get at the greed and lust which equally need to be understood and controlled. It is this greed or what is correctly dubbed as 'greedy capitalism that generates the possessive and exploitative attitude in man. Self-understanding and selfcontrol therefore are essential to stop the dehumanisation or brutalization of man. Similarly, the individual man, society and non-human existents in this universe are to be conceived not as concentric circles but as constituting the spiral systems in which anything in the world is continuous with the totality of things and beings in the cosmos. The damager or the destroyer of the ecological balance can be linked to the man who cuts, on the wrong side, the branch of a tree on which he
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| SR No. | 007005 |
| Book Title | World of Philosophy |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | Christopher Key Chapple, Intaj Malek, Dilip Charan, Sunanda Shastri, Prashant Dave |
| Publisher | Shanti Prakashan |
| Publication Year | 2011 |
| Total Pages | 1002 |
| Language | English |
| Classification | Book_English |
| File Size | 30 MB |