Anthropocentrism is the belief that humans alone possess intrinsic value, and the value of all other organism is based on how well they can serve human’s needs. Actions like deforestation, trawling, mining, they are all examples of how humans exploit the environment, believing that we have dominance over the ecosystem. In the past, our behaviours could be justified by the lack of knowledge of the consequences of degrading nature. However, in recent years are people are increasingly educated, and information about climate change can easily be found at the touch of our fingertips, rendering our actions unjustifiable now.

Human-nature dichotomy

There is an existing dichotomy between human and nature. We see humans as separate from the environment and where man-made means the lack of nature. Although in the past humans lived as hunter gatherers, the industrial revolution has isolated humans away from nature in cities and urban landscape. The greed for economic development resulted in humans being more distant from nature than ever, resulting in the development of the mindset that economic development and conservation does not overlap.

Another prominent example of human nature dichotomy is speciesism, where humans view themselves more important than other species, hence activities like animals’ experimentation, eating meat and blood sports are justified. According to the Economist, every year there are 50 billion chicken killed each year for consumption to satiate the appetite of 89% of people around the world who are meat eaters. From most human’s perspective murder of humans is considered a crime but the killing of other animals is widely regarded as acceptable. This unfair advantage is given to humans as we believe that we are evolutionary superior with the gift of intelligence, hence our emotions are more valid and held with more regard as compared to other animals, justifying why we consume them. The present dichotomy between human and nature is the reason why we believe that we have dominance over earth.

Click here to find out how evolutionary ties to human cognition relates to anthropocentrism.   

 

Header credit: Photo by James Rajaste on Unsplash