Biophilia

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The term biophilia (ancient Greek bios “life” and philia “love”) was introduced terminologically by Erich Fromm in Die Seele des Menschen (1964) in the context of his characterology and ethics and means “love for life” or “love for living things”. Independently of Fromm, the sociobiologist Edward O. Wilson developed the biophilia hypothesis in his book Biophilia (1984) .

The biophilic character orientation according to Fromm

Development of the term

In The Human Soul , Erich Fromm expanded the characterology he developed in Psychoanalysis and Ethics (1947) to include the description of the biophilically oriented growth syndrome and the necrophilically oriented deterioration syndrome. This was intended to explain that "a biophilic-productive or necrophilic-non-productive orientation includes certain components that converge with increasing strength of the productive or non-productive orientation." In addition, Erich Fromm added the distinction made in psychoanalysis and ethics various non-productive character orientations and a necrophilic character orientation, which he elaborated on in Anatomy of Human Destructiveness (1973). He expanded his characterization of productive character orientation to the effect that it was "the full development of biophilia".

Definition according to Fromm

Erich Fromm defines biophilia as follows:

“Biophilia is the passionate love for life and all living things; it is the desire to encourage growth, whether it is a person, a plant, an idea or a social group. "

- Biophilia according to Fromm

In addition to other related properties, the biophilic person has "joy in life and all its manifestations." The biophile has a certain relationship to the world:

"He wants to shape and exercise his influence through love, reason and example - not through violence and by treating people in a bureaucratic manner as if they were dead objects."

- Biophilia according to Fromm

The biophilic ethics

In The Human Soul and Anatomy of Human Destructiveness , Fromm also describes the principle of a biophilic ethic :

“Everything that serves life is good; everything that serves death is evil. Reverence for life is good, everything that is conducive to life, growth and development. Evil is everything that stifles or narrows life and everything that cuts it up. "

- Biophilic ethics according to Fromm

Fromm takes up a formulation by Albert Schweitzer , who wrote in Kultur und Ethik (1923): “It is good to maintain life and promote life; is evil, destroying life and inhibiting life ”and understood this as the“ basic principle of morality ”. Even if in Erich Fromm's Die Seele des Menschen there are hardly any systematic considerations on ethics and the relationship between biophilic ethics and the humanistic ethics developed in psychoanalysis and ethics remains unclear, a continuity is assumed between the two conceptions. For example, Rainer Funk writes that “humanistic ethics are identical with 'biophilic ethics'”. The term biophilic ethics was taken up a few decades later by Rupert Lay in Ethics for Managers (1991), although he detached it from its embedding in Fromm's characterology and the biocentric perspective is not formulated in him. This is his biophilia postulate : "Always act in such a way that you increase rather than decrease your personal life in your person as well as in the person of every other person." Orientations, attitudes, interests, expectations, decisions and actions are according to Lay " biophilic precisely when you increase your own and / or someone else's personal life rather than reduce it. "

Biophilic tendencies in societies

“Anti-necrophilic tendencies” showed up “in many people from all walks of life and in all age groups, but especially among young people” in many forms. In the anatomy of human destructiveness , among other things, the following are mentioned:

  • Protest against “killing life” in the general sense
  • Desire for environmental protection and peace
  • Interest in meaningful and interesting work versus high income and prestige
  • Interest in the "quality of life"
  • Search for spiritual values ​​("as misguided and naive as it often may be")
  • Try to " gain a greater vibrancy [...]"

After further explanations of the aforementioned characteristics, Fromm claims:

“The presence and even the growth of anti-necrophilic tendencies is the only hope we have that the great Homo sapiens experiment will not fail. [...] Tremendous forces are working against it, and there is no reason to be optimistic. But I think there is reason to hope. "

- Anatomy of human destructiveness

How this hope is meant is discussed in the epilogue On the Ambiguity of Hope in the book Anatomy of Human Destructiveness .

context

According to Fromm's understanding, the opposite of biophilia is necrophilia . "To avoid misunderstandings", Fromm points out that "many people are a mixture of necrophilic and biophilic tendencies", and "the conflict between the two is often the source of productive development". There are nevertheless extreme manifestations; so in necrophilic character the dominant trait is necrophilia.

Fromm is adjacent the pair of terms Biophilia - necrophilia of the terms impulse of life - death drive of Freudian psychoanalysis from. In Freud's psychoanalysis, according to Fromm, “both tendencies [...] are of equal importance”. However, according to Fromm's view, necrophilia is to be regarded as a "psychopathological phenomenon", since it "necessarily occurs as a result of inhibited growth, a mental crippling":

“Destructiveness is not parallel to biophilia, it is its alternative. Love for life or love for the dead is the fundamental alternative that every human being is faced with. Necrophilia increases to the extent that the development of biophilia is inhibited from growth. Biologically, humans are endowed with the ability to become biophilic, but psychologically, as an alternative solution, they have the potential for necrophilia. "

- Relationship between biophilia and necrophilia

Wilson's Biophilic Hypothesis

The biophilia hypothesis is a theory formulated from an evolutionary perspective by Edward O. Wilson, which he expounded first in his book Biophilia and later with Stephen Kellert among others in The Biophilia Hypothesis (1993). Since Wilson does not quote Erich Fromm, it is unclear whether he knew his theories. Wilson defines biophilia as "the innate tendency to focus on life and lifelike processes". In the course of evolution , "people have developed an affinity for the many forms of life and for the habitats and ecosystems that make life possible." An attempt was also made to make the biophilia hypothesis the starting point for environmental ethical considerations. For example, Wilson writes of a Conservation Ethic , according to which life and biodiversity should be preserved and protected.

literature

  • Erich Fromm: The human soul: its ability to do good and evil. 1964a. In: Erich Fromm complete edition in 12 volumes (Ed. By Rainer Funk). Stuttgart, 1999. pp. 159-268.
  • Erich Fromm: Anatomy of human destructiveness Rowohlt-Verlag, Hamburg, 25th edition, November 2015. ISBN 978-3-499-17052-2
  • Erich Fromm: Anatomy of human destructiveness. 1973a. In: Erich Fromm complete edition in 12 volumes (Ed. By Rainer Funk). Stuttgart, 1999. XIII-400.
  • Edward O. Wilson: Biophilia. Cambridge, 1984.
  • Stephen R. Kellert, Edward O. Wilson, (Eds.): The Biophilia Hypothesis. Washington, 1993.

See also

Web links

Sources / footnotes

  1. ↑ Rainer Funk: Courage to people: Erich Fromm's thinking and work, his humanistic religion and ethics . Stuttgart 1978, p. 309 .
  2. ↑ E. Fromm, 1964a, GA II, S. 186th
  3. ↑ a b c E. Fromm: Anatomy of human destructiveness. Rowohlt-Verlag, Hamburg, 25th edition, November 2015. ISBN 978-3-499-17052-2 . P. 411ff
  4. ↑ Analogously also in: E. Fromm, 1973a, GA VII, p. 331.
  5. ↑ Here, in Anatomy of Human Destructiveness, this passage is referred to as " Albert Schweitzer's main thesis ".
  6. ↑ E. Fromm, 1973, Anatomy of human destructiveness, p. 411
  7. ↑ E. Fromm, 1973a, GA VII, p 331 and in another translation E. Fromm, 1964a, GA II, S. 186th
  8. ^ Albert Schweitzer: Culture and Ethics. Cultural Philosophy, Part Two. S. 378. In: ders .: Collected works in five volumes. Volume 2. Zurich. Pp. 95-420.
  9. ↑ Rainer Funk: Courage to people: Erich Fromm's thinking and work, his humanistic religion and ethics . Stuttgart 1978, p. 179 .
  10. ↑ Even if Rupert Lay always only presents his ethical principles in a personalistically narrowed form, there are scattered indications in his work that not only human life is relevant for him. So he writes in ethics for business and politics. (1983): “Nature (which always means the natural world) has its own dignity that is not only inferior to that of the human-made cultural world, but is fundamentally superior to it. The dignity of a living tree is certainly greater than that of a car or a Mahler symphony […]. Everything living has a higher dignity than everything man-made. ”(Rupert Lay: Ethik für Wirtschaft und Politik. Munich, 1983. p. 204. See also p. 211.)
  11. ^ Rupert Lay: Ethics for Managers . Düsseldorf; Vienna; New York 1991, p. 60 .
  12. ^ Rupert Lay: Ethics for Managers . Düsseldorf; Vienna; New York 1991, p. 62 .
  13. ↑ E. Fromm, 1973, Anatomy of human destructiveness, pp. 402f
  14. ↑ Probably to be seen in the context of the text of the entire chapter, in which a. also about a new, modern character type. ( Necrophilia and the deification of technology , p. 384ff)
  15. ↑ E. Fromm, 1973, Anatomy of human destructiveness, p. 403
  16. ↑ E. Fromm, 1973, Anatomy of human destructiveness, pp. 487-491
  17. ↑ E. Fromm, 1973, Anatomie der Menschen Destrukten, pp. 371–372 (footnote no. 4)
  18. ↑ E. Fromm, 1973, Anatomy of human destructiveness, p. 411ff
  19. ↑ E. Fromm, 1973, Anatomy of human destructiveness, p. 412
  20. ↑ See Peter H. Kahn Jr .: Technological Natur / Adaption and the Future of Human Life . Massachusetts 2011, p. 11 .
  21. ↑ Edward O. Wilson: Biophilia . Cambridge 1984, p. 1 .
  22. ↑ Erhard Olbrich: Building blocks of a theory of the human-animal relationship . In: Carola Otterstedt, Michael Rosenberger (ed.): Companions - Competitors - Relatives / The human-animal relationship in scientific discourse . Göttingen 2009, p. 113 .
  23. ↑ See the chapter Conservation Ethic in: Edward O. Wilson: Biophilia . Cambridge 1984, p. 119-140 .