Yoga and Ecology: Why it is Better to Eat Carrots Rather Than Cows
By Roar Ramesh Bjonnes
To live a life according to the directives of ecology is the most urgent
task for humanity
right now. But what does it mean? How can we develop a genuine environmental
ethics?
And what will it look like?
For science, viruses represent the smallest accumulation and diversity of
molecules which
is recognized as "life." Maybe in the near future, when more advanced
techniques are
employed, we will recognize the sentience of smaller aggregations of
molecules. For now,
viruses personify the boundary between life and non-life.
According to the so-called Santiago theory, developed by Francisco Varela
and Humberto
Maturana, the process of cognition is intimately linked to the process of
life. Hence,
the brain is not necessary for the mind to exist. A worm, or a tree, has no
brain but has
a mind. The simplest forms of life are capable of perception and thus
cognition. For the
spiritual sages of India, it is impossible to draw a final line between
animate and inanimate
beings. According to Yoga philosophy, there is "mind" even in the so-called
inanimate
world of rocks. This type of "mind" is dormant, as if asleep, because there
are no
nervous system rocks.
Native Americans certainly experienced this mind in the cosmos. In the
international
best-seller, The Secret Life of Plants, Peter Thompkins and Christopher Bird
report that,
when killing a tree, some Native Americans tribes have a heart-to-heart
conservation
with the tree. In no uncertain terms would they let the tree know what was
going to happen,
and finally they would ask for forgiveness for having to commit this
unfortunate act
of violence.
In the same book, they also documented scientific experiments on plants with
a modified
lie detector. The instrument would register when a plant's leaves were cut
or burnt. Not
only that, when a plant "understood" it was going to be killed, it went into
a state of shock
or "numbness." Thus, the scientists explained, possibly preventing it from
undue suffering,
which again may explain the "warnings" given to trees by some tribal
peoples.
Such laboratory tests, may sound outrageous to materialists, but not to the
ancient, animist
peoples from all over the world, nor to Indian yogis or Westerns mystics.
They have
for long informed us that we do not live in a dead and meaningless universe.
But unfortunately,
nature cannot always express its grief when it is damaged or destroyed. To
protect it, we must therefore conserve and properly utilize all natural
resources.
If nature - earth, trees, and water - truly experience a form of existential
pain or grief,
at least when destroyed and polluted, our conservation efforts and our
ecological outlook
must first and foremost acknowledge this innate suffering. And by
acknowledging
it, nature becomes part of us. To paraphrase noted psychologist James
Hillman - one
of the innovators in the new field of eco -psychology - our mind is enlarged
to include
nature; the world becomes us. And if we destroy that world, out of ignorance
or greed,
we destroy a part of ourselves.
Since mind or consciousness is part of all living beings and lies dormant,
even in so- called
inanimate objects as rocks, sand or mud, there is an intrinsic, spiritual
oneness in all of
creation. Thus in Tantric Yoga philospher P. R. Sarkar's world view-whose
ideas have
combined Yoga philosophy with an evolutionary understanding of the world we
live
in-we grant existential rights or value to all beings, whether soil, plants,
animals and
humans. He concedes that, in principle, all physical expressions of Cosmic
Consciousness
has an equal right to exist and to express itself but also that some beings
have higher
consciousness than others and thus "more rights".
Evolution is irreversible - amoebas eventually evolve into apes, but apes
never transform
into amoebas - thus Tantra and Yoga also acknowledges "higher" and "lower"
expressions of Consciousness. This differentiation is crucial, and it is on
the basis of this
that Yoga and some ecologists differ. Deep-ecologists, for example, believe
that no beings
are "high" or "low", all are part of an "egalitarian web of life".
The Tantric and Yogic ecological world-view, on the other hand, is both
egalitarian and
hierarchical. According to Sarkar's Tantra Yoga, for example, evolution
proceeds by expressing
more and more complex beings that are able to express higher levels of
consciousness.
On this evolutionary ladder, amoebas are at the "bottom" and humans are at
the "top." Within this hierarchical system there are various levels of
egalitarian cooperation,
but the system as a whole is hierarchical.
This notion is also supported by the new systems sciences, which proclaim
that one cannot
have wholeness without hierarchy. As Ken Wilber explains, "'Hierarchy' and
'wholeness,'
in other words, are two names for the same thing, and if you destroy one,
you completely
destroy the other." Each hierarchy is composed of increasing orders of
wholeness
- organisms include cells which include molecules, which include atoms.
In an evolutionary context, the new stage of development has extra value
relative to the
previous stage. An oak sprout is more complex and therefore endowed with a
fuller expression
of consciousness than an acorn. A monkey has a more evolved nervous system
and mind than an insect, and a human has a more evolved brain and intellect
than an
ape.
This crucial definition of subsequent higher stages of consciousness, of a
hierarchy of being,
is central to Tantra and Yoga. But this insight is often overlooked by many
Greens
or deep-ecologists. They often equate hierarchy with the higher exploiting
the lower by
transferring human pathological experiences of hierarchy-as fascism, for
example - to
the study of nature. But the ecological universe of nature could not exist
without hierarchy,
and humans, for good or for worse, are, as the most advanced expression of
consciousness in evolution, stewards of the natural world. Hence, according
to Yoga, we
need to acknowledge both unity and oneness as well as high and low (or deep
and shallow)
expressions of consciousness when developing an ecological world view.
We need to emulate nature in advancing what Riane Eisler calls
"actualization hierarchies;"
we must learn to maximize our species' potential, both in relation to
ourselves
and to nature. In other words, a self-actualized humanity can learn to
integrate itself in
relation to nature. Learn to realize our oneness with the "other." Learn to
recognize that
being on top of the evolutionary ladder does not give us the right to rob
and exploit those
lower than ourselves.
Because of the many pathological expressions of hierarchy in human society -
such as
fascism, Nazism, communism, or corporate capitalism - many so-called new
paradigm
thinkers are suggesting a new and supposedly healthier model termed
"heterarchy".
In a heterarchy, rule is established by an egalitarian interplay of all
parties. For example,
atoms may have a heterarchical relationship amongst themselves, but their
relationship
to a cell is hierarchical. In other words, the various heterarchies are
strands in the everevolving
web of hierarchies, and when functioning optimally, the relationship between
them is one of coordinated cooperation. By negating hierarchy and favoring
heterarchy
only, we establish just another pathology, because the existence or validity
of heterarchy
does not disprove the existence or importance of positive or actualized
hierarchy. There
is, according to the evolutionary Yoga philosophy of Sarkar, an ongoing
movement toward
greater complexity and higher consciousness in evolution, while at the same
time
there is, on a deeper level, ecological cooperation and spiritual unity
amongst all beings.
In other words, there are both heterarchy and hierarchy. To disprove the
hierarchical
flow of evolution by saying that all of us - whether leaf, tree, monkey, or
human - are
equal, heterarchical partners in the great web of life, is to impose on
nature faulty and
limited concepts. It reduces the wondrous complexity of creation to a lowest
common
denominator, and that serves neither nature nor humans well.
According to Yoga, there is unity of consciousness amongst all beings,
because we all
come from, and are created by, the same Spirit, by the same Cosmic
Consciousness. But
nature is also infinitely diverse, and thus consciousness is also expressed
in various ways,
both "high" and "low". Hence, a seedling is more complex and therefore more
conscious
than an acorn, and an oak is more complex and conscious than a seedling.
Another way of expressing this is that a dog has more capacity for mental
reflection and
self-consciousness than a fir tree. Both are conscious beings, both are
manifestations of
Cosmic Consciousness, both have mind, and both have equal existential value
- but
because of the difference in expression of depth and quality of
consciousness, the dog is
higher on the natural hierarchy of being than the fir tree. So when we
develop our ecological
ethics, both the "low" and the "high" expressions of nature must be valued
and
accounted for.
Nonhuman creatures have the same existential value to themselves as human
beings have
to themselves. Perhaps human beings can understand the value of their
existence, while
an earth worm cannot. Even so, no one has delegated any authority to human
beings to
kill those unfortunate creatures. But to survive, we cannot avoid killing
other beings.
To solve this dilemma, the Yogi selects articles of food from amongst those
beings where
development of consciousness is comparatively low. If vegetables, corn, bean
and rice are
available, cows or pigs should not be slaughtered. As Ken Wilber maintains,
it is better to
eat carrots rather than cows.
Secondly, before killing any animals with "developed or underdeveloped
consciousness,"
a Yogi must consider deeply if it is possible to live a healthy life without
taking
such lives.
Thus, in addition to existential value, various beings, based on their depth
of consciousness,
have a variable degree of what is often termed "intrinsic value." The more
consciousness
a being has, the deeper the feelings, and the more potential for suffering.
Eating
plants is therefore preferable to eating animals. As George Bernhard Shaw
once said,
"Animals are my friends ... and I don't eat my friends."
It is also ecologically more sustainable to extract nourishment from
entities lower down
on the food chain. Vast land areas are used to raise livestock for food.
These areas could
be utilized far more productively if planted with grains, fruits,
vegetables, and legumes
for human consumption. It is estimated that only 10 percent of the protein
and calories
we feed to our livestock is recovered in the meat we eat. The other 90
percent goes literally
"down the drain."
In addition to existential value, and intrinsic value, all beings have
utility value. Throughout
history, human beings usually preserved those creatures which had an
immediate
utility value. We are more inclined to preserve the lives of cows than of
rats, for example.
But, because of all beings' existential value, we cannot claim that only
human beings have
the right to live, and not non-humans. All are the children of Mother Earth;
all are the
offspring of Spirit or Cosmic Consciousness.
Sometimes it is difficult to know what the utilitarian value of an animal or
a plant is;
therefore we may needlessly destroy the ecological balance by killing one
species without
considering the consequences of its complex relationship or utility value to
other species.
A forest's utility value, for example, is more than just x number of board
feet of lumber.
It serves as nesting and feeding ground for birds and animals; its roots and
branches
protect the soil from erosion; its leaves or needles produce oxygen; and its
pathways and
camp grounds provide nourishment for the human soul. As a whole, the forest
ecosystem
has an abundance of ecological, aesthetic, and spiritual values which
extends far beyond
its benefits in the form of tooth picks or plywood.
All of nature is endowed with existential, intrinsic, and utility value.
This hierarchical,
and ultimately holistic understanding of evolution and ecology, formulates
the basic
foundation for a new, and potentially groundbreaking ecological ethics
deeply grounded
by the philosophy of Yoga.
If we embrace the divinity in all of creation, the expression of our
ecological ethics will
become an act of sublime spirituality. Our conservation efforts and our
sustainable resource
use will become sacred offerings to Mother Earth, and ultimately to Cosmic
Consciousness,
the God and Goddess within and beyond nature.
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