The Scientific and Philosophical Justification of the Respect to Nature. Teilhard de Chardin, Arne Naess and the Pope Francisco

Abstract

Three models of sensitivity relating to Social Ecology are visible today in relation to nature. The first, the most atavistic, consists of the instinctive indifference. The second, something more elaborate, of utilitarian conservation. And the third, the most consistent, of essential respect for her. And there, in the vertex of the thinking human hierarchy: isolated, a few, romantic and illuminated we find several of characters that try, tiresomely, to expand a “strange” message in between a tangled, present techno science; the committed environmentalism. Its imperative is unappealable: we are the only living being in the world gifted with sufficient self-awareness and, for that reason, we have required responsibility. Above all, in the case that there could exist sufficient arguments that link our own lineage with the rest of the living beings on this Earth. And that’s the objective of this article. Teilhard de Chardin, Arne Naess, and the Pope Francisco are the three best examples that have contributed to the scientific and philosophical justification of the respect owed to Nature. In them, we focus our analysis.