Teorías de discriminación

Mike works as a scientific advisor to a prominent NGO, and has been involved with their campaign against GM food. The interview took place in a park near his office.

Mike trained as a geologist, but this included aspects of the philosophy of science, which led to an interest not just in the technical detail of his specialism, but its context and wider validity. This led to a paradoxical situation where Mike was working for an oil company while campaigning on environmental issues at the same time:

PQ: I get the impression talking to you though, that the values that you have

drive very much what you do professionally - is that fair to say?

Mike: yeah, I took a conscious decision to stop working for an oil company ,

err, and do something which I could believe in for that very reason.

I felt that there was an increasing sort of schizophrenia between what I was actually putting my energy in to in my spare time which was various sorts of campaigning and what I was doing to earn my living. I was fortunate enough to be able to change that, but I still regard myself as fortunate otherwise.

Mike bridged the chasm between his professional work and his beliefs by working for an NGO, and subsequently the NGO he now works for. This is a step he feels privileged to have been able to make, and feels that it is a sad reflection on society that such a step is so unusual:

I have also certainly since I have been working in a job where I can do what I am believing in, I have felt very privileged to be doing those things, interesting in itself, that our society should be such that to be doing something that you can actually be paid for and believe in, is regarded as - at least I would regard that as being an exception rather than the rule, I mean I feel very privileged to be in that situation and I don’t take it lightly that I’m fortunate enough to be in there. [...] and I think you know that it’s a remarkable comment in itself on the nature of our society that so many people feel they have to compromise their values.

Evidently, values are an important issue for Mike, and throughout the interview, he came across as a thoughtful individual. However, when asked specifically

about ecocentric values, it is clear that he hasn’t given the idea much thought. His speech changes at this point from being quite fast, with few hesitations to being very faltering with long pauses. He begins by criticising the concept of ecocentrism with reference to what Dobson terms weak anthropocentrism (see chapter two), but then talks about why he cares for species which have no benefit for him. However, he struggles to articulate why he feels that way.

PQ: Do you think it goes beyond the sort of human centred arguments - do you

think it has value in itself?

Mike: In - umm - in terms of absolute value on biodiversity?

PQ: I don’t know whether absolute value ...this implies pounds and pennies

doesn’t it? but

Mike: I’m just trying to get my head around the question you are asking, that’s

all. Just, I mean, there’s....

PQ: You’ve explained biodiversity up until now as being important because

humanity could benefit from it, do you think -

Mike: The thing is the question of importance is a human centred question, the

questioner has to re-assess the importance from a human perspective. I suppose if you wanted... I suppose all I can think of is a sort of blue whale value kind of thing. You know that people feel there should be blue whales, even though they personally don’t benefit, nor ever see one. - umm.

PQ: Similarly with Antarctica and all the other -

Mike: yes, and people do care about those things, exactly why nobody can

show

PQ: Are you bothered about it?

Mike: I care about diversity of animals which I will never get to see in places

that I will never get to visit, but if you ask me why, I will probably have a very difficult time... but I will feel the more impoverished for feeling that some of these creatures do not survive any more.

In the following excerpt, my question expresses surprise that Mike has not given much thought to ecocentric values. He replies by locating ecocentrism at an extreme end of environmental thought, which, while it agrees with O’Riordan’s typology outlined in Chapter Two, it contrasts with the evidence for the popularity of such beliefs among the general public, and with other interviewees who one would expect to have less sympathy for ecocentrism than Mike (see Chapter Six).

PQ: I’m interested at what level do you feel that you believe in [your work],

because I’m quite interested that what you do seems to be quite value driven, and yet at the same time when I have asked you quite value laden questions you don’t appear to have given it that much thought in the past, because there’s a bit of a ... not a contradiction because you seem to be thinking about these things on a slightly different level to that - it’s not as though you haven’t thought about it.

Mike: I think you’re asking about a particular sort of value PQ: Yes I am

Mike: Which are .. I think it’s fair to say that some of the values you asked me

about are putting it on a plane which is almost the extreme end of the kind of environmental campaigning movement.

PQ: Yes, erm , yes

Mike: and so if you looked at my personal involvement with the

environmental movement, I have been much more strongly involved... [the tape is turned over at this point, but Mike talks here at length about his pragmatic concerns which have led to involvement is specific environmental campaigns]

Mike rationalises his lack of thought about values by reference to his own lack of introspection, to his gender and to the educational system:

I think to some degree I would accept the criticism, and possibly I haven’t thought through a lot of the things where I have values and I think I can answer it in some respect by saying that I’m not actually that introspective, I tend to know that I have a value, I don’t always know where I have a value. I mean, men anyhow tend to be much worse than women knowing what their feelings are, or even admitting that they have feelings if one talks about feelings, but values can be analytical as well as emotional and my view is that we have a very, very directive educational system that drives you towards certain sorts of career and it channels you to doing certain sorts of things, and the opportunities to actually step back from them and say - “hold on, I’ve been doing all of these things according to the values of the system, or my peer group, or the status quo”, but stepping back actually saying, what are my values? is something that there’s very little opportunity to do, and for me I didn’t really do that at all until I was in my mid-twenties, where I was in a situation where I thought, “hold on, I’m doing something here which I do not believe in , which I’m not prepared to be a part of and then it was a question of, what by that time was an escape route - tunnelling out, whereas a more enlightened educational system might have stopped me getting that far in the first place

The interview finishes by an expression of surprise by Mike about the material I was looking for, which confirms many of the statements he made earlier:

PQ: well, that is really what I wanted to cover.

Mike: I can’t believe that is what you wanted to cover, but it was interesting

anyway.

Categorising Mike as an ecocentric is fairly unproblematic, but many of his statements were unexpected. His career has been highly value driven, but at the same time those values have not been thought through particularly thoroughly, nor do they appear to be grounded in the writings of environmentalist writers, mainstream or otherwise. He claims to lack introspection, but sections of the interview, for example where he reflects on his own experience of the education system, and of science education in particular show a depth of thought which belies this claim.