Land management in the United States has been historically framed by varying views including preservation, conservation, and restoration. Though often used interchangeably, they differ in the role they ascribe to human intervention in nature. This essay will examine these American approaches to land management from a Stoic perspective to provide an answer to the ethical question: how should humans manage the land? The essay will first give a brief history of land management in the United States before detailing the Stoic conception of Nature. Stoic ideas will then be put in conversation with American land management concepts before ultimately concluding that a land ethic is needed that reexamines our limited definition of nature and incorporates a more integrated Stoic idea of Nature.
Please note that different senses of the word ‘nature’ will be used throughout this essay. Instances where ‘Nature’ is capitalized refer to the Stoic usage of the word; instances where ‘nature’ is not capitalized refer to the colloquial uses of the word to mean the non-human aspect of the natural world.
A Brief History of Land Management in the United States
American environmental practice has its roots in 18th and 19th century writers such as Alexander von Humboldt and Henry David Thoreau, among others, who advocated a new interdisciplinary ecological worldview that decentered humanity and combined science, philosophy, aesthetics, and spirituality (Byers, 2021, p. 67). This emerging thought ran counter to prevailing ideas on the relationship between humans and nature which was built on domination and extraction. As industrialization and urbanization continued to increase in the early 20th century, natural landscapes became a source of refuge and recreation due to emerging transportation methods and a nostalgic and romanticized view of the natural world (Park, 2023). As a result, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, forestland and land deemed important for scenic and recreation purposes was preserved by federal, state, and private entities (Chapman, 2020). Against this intellectual backdrop along with protections for natural landscapes, a practical ethical question emerged: to what degree, and how, should humans manage the land they were now protecting?
In 1896, a four-month tour of the American west made by the National Forest Commission resulted in a recommendation that the federal government protect over 21 million acres of forest; this tour also provided the meeting ground for two personalities whose perspectives, and eventual clash, would come to define the extremes in the philosophy of land management in the United States (Keel, 2020). Gifford Pinchot, the eventual first chief of the US Forest Service, is best known as the voice of the conservationist perspective and believed that nature was a resource to be managed so that it could be used sustainably. John Muir, a naturalist and an early advocate of the National Park System, was a preservationist and believed that nature should be protected to preserve it from the touch of humanity. Initially, these two men were friends, and their lengthy correspondence indicate that they had considerable respect for and influence over the other (Keel, 2020). However, their perspectives, and ultimately their friendship, came head-to-head during a debate on whether to build a dam in the Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park to provide a stable water supply to a San Francisco that was still reeling from the 1906 earthquake and fire (Keel, 2020). Muir argued that Hetch Hetchy Valley should be protected as it was to preserve its scenic beauty, and Pinchot argued in favor of damming the valley to provide a managed water supply. Pinchot and the conservationist perspective won out and Hetch Hetchy was dammed in 1913 (Chapman, 2020).
This debate between preservation and conservation became more nuanced throughout the 20th century as the human role in land management has become more direct and interventionist. Governmental, non-profit, and grassroots organizations work to address habitat restoration, pollution, and recreation access among other issues. Other land management perspectives have emerged that do not fit neatly into conservation or preservation. This includes the idea of restoration/remediation which utilizes intensive human management to return landscapes to their past state and mitigate negative effects caused by humans (Chapman, 2020). As land management practices diversify, we see that the debate between conservation and preservation, as it has been historically framed, is outdated and presents an oversimplified view of humanity’s role in land management. Furthermore, conservation and preservation, being defined by the role they ascribe to human intervention in the natural world, both carry the implicit assumption that humanity is distinct from nature. Even more nuanced views that emerged in the 20th century regarding restoration/remediation still view humanity as an outside force acting upon nature. Before we can answer the ethical question posed above regarding how humans should practice land management or act upon nature, a more nuanced definition of what we mean by nature is needed.
Stoic Definitions of Nature
To begin, we must first define nature from a Stoic perspective. Stoicism uses the word Nature to describe both individual objects, what I will call the particular sense, and to make a claim about the structure of the cosmos, what I will call the ontological sense. These two senses are not distinct from each other as the particular sense is encompassed by the ontological. However, examining how the particular sense and ontological senses relate to each other is crucial to see how the individual relates to the whole.
The particular sense refers to that force which gives rise to and forms the material for an individual being or object (Sellars, 2006, p. 91). This force, or pneuma, is detailed at four different levels of description as follows: hexis or cohesion is the force that holds something together, phusis is the force by which something is said to be alive, psuchē or soul builds on phusis to include perception and impressions, and logikē psuchē is responsible for rationality in adult humans (Sellars, 2006, pp. 91 and 105). The particular sense of Nature is what is meant when we speak of ‘the nature of something.’ For example, the nature of a plant is generally to photosynthesize, take up water, and reproduce thus falling under phusis. The nature of an animal includes perception and sense impressions and falls under psuchē. A mature human’s nature includes hexis, phusis, psuchē, and logikē psuchē culminating in the development of rationality. This rationality characterizes humanity, but has its ultimate source in Nature.
The ontological sense of Nature builds upon the idea of Nature as force. Nature is not merely a physical power that holds the world together and forms the material from which all things are made, it is also supremely rational (Long, 1986, p. 148). Nature has a creative aspect in addition to its material aspect which structures a divinely rational cosmos (Sellars, 2006, pp. 92-93). For the Stoics, Nature is not created by a god, Nature is God (Sellars, 2006, p. 93). Thus, the ontological sense leaves us with an incredibly expansive view of Nature as that which holds the world together, causes all things to exist and grow, and rationally orders the cosmos (Long, 1986, p. 148).
With the particular and ontological senses of Nature defined, we can now relate individual human nature to Nature as a whole. The Stoic position holds that as Nature infuses the cosmos, all things take part in it and are structured by it. For humans, our individual rational nature, our logikē psuchē, is part of Nature and thus we are inextricably connected to it (Frede, 2003, pp. 201-202). This is echoed by Marcus Aurelius, “There is one universe out of all things, one god pervading all things, one substance, one law, one common reason in all intelligent beings, and one truth” (Meditations 7.9). In short, we cannot separate ourselves, our material being or our rational natures, from Nature and the cosmos itself.
The Ethical Dimension of Nature
As humans are part of Nature, and take their material being and capacity for rationality from it, an ethical dimension emerges which is best summarized by Epictetus, “… it is clear that we should make it our aim in everything neither to shrink from what is in accord with Nature, nor to accept what is in conflict with Nature” (Discourses 1.26.2). Sellars expands upon this definition by noting that this includes acting in accordance with our own nature as rational beings, and by acting in accordance with Nature as a whole which is itself a rational act (2006, p. 125). This reflects both the particular and ontological senses of Nature as discussed above, and emphasizes the ethical connection between the two. Because humans are rationally bound to Nature as a whole, we have ethical responsibilities to Nature (Johncock, 2023, p. 72). Sellars continues saying, “… living according to Nature implies widening our circle of concern to encompass Nature as a whole, realizing that we are not isolated units but rather parts of a systematically integrated whole” (2006, p. 127). We see here the ultimate end of Stoic ethics, rationally expanding our moral sphere to encompass the whole cosmos.
Towards a Stoic Land Ethic
We now return to the question above from a Stoic perspective: how should humans manage land or act upon nature? As previously mentioned, historic and contemporary discourses on land management in the United States differ in the role they ascribe to human intervention, but largely share a view of nature defined as the non-human natural world. This view of nature, when examined from a Stoic lens, is inadequate. It does account for hexis, phusis, and psuchē to include landscapes, plant and animal communities, and can easily be applied to complex ecological connections. However, without the inclusion of logikē psuchē, this concept of nature is confined to the particular sense and is disconnected to the ontological sense of Nature which conceives of a divinely ordered cosmos infused with rationality. Without an account of rationality, nature remains something that is affected by humans, but does not include them, and thus does not include our ethical obligations to Nature as a whole. It is clear that we must reject this definition of nature in favor of the Stoic definition that includes humanity as a part of the whole.
A Stoic ethics of land management seeks to expand our moral sphere of concern beyond the individual, community, and human species, to encompass the world as a unified and rationally organized whole. This is expressed most elegantly in the thought of Aldo Leopold, a non-Stoic, who presents his land ethic in startlingly Stoic terms. He states:
All ethics so far evolved rest upon a single premise: that the individual is a member of a community of independent parts … The land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries of the community to include soils, waters, plants, and animals, or collectively: the land” (Leopold, 1949, p. 339).
He elaborates that this ethic does not preclude humans from altering the landscape and managing and using its resources, but rather, “ … affirm[s] their right to continued existence, and at least in spots, their continued existence in a natural state” (Leopold, 1949, p. 340). A Stoic land ethic would concur. Humans, as part of a rational and rationally ordered cosmos, have an ethical obligation to take Nature as a whole into account when choosing to act. The implications of this are wide ranging and touch upon every decision we make including what food we buy, how we manage our waste, and how we allocate freshwater use etc.
Conclusion: Looking to the Future
Ultimately, we can conclude that American land management has been informed by philosophies that erroneously excluded humanity from its conception of nature. This essay has argued for a Stoic land ethic that has at its core, a view of Nature as rational and rationally ordered. It is rational for us to expand our moral community to encompass the entire natural world and situate our species within it as an integral part. However, this essay is just a starting point. It has presented only a general ethical orientation, the Stoic land ethic, that should frame how we take the natural world into account when making moral decisions. Future work should explore how the Stoic land ethic may be applied to emerging challenges that are complicated by regional, cultural, and political differences including pollution reduction, water shortages, decline in biodiversity etc. These new approaches informed by a Stoic land ethic will require cooperation, creativity, and careful application of rationality so that we may, as Epictetus exhorts us, live in accordance with Nature.
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