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Post-Sustainability and Environmental Education pp 79–91Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

Sustainability and Human Being: Towards the Hidden Centre of Authentic Education

Part of the Palgrave Studies in Education and the Environment book series (PSEE)

Abstract

It is argued that while the idea of sustainable development fails adequately to provide a way forward for addressing our current environmental crisis, the idea of sustainability contains the germ of an understanding of the character of human consciousness that places our relationship with nature at the heart of both human being and authentic education. A phenomenological approach is developed to explore some key aspects of our experience of nature—particularly its “otherness” and intrinsic normativity. The potential of the mutually sustaining relationship with nature that emerges for shaping our outlook on the world, and revealing the subverting effects of the scientism that is taken to permeate contemporary Western-style culture, are discussed. Some broad implications for a re-envisioned education are sketched.

Keywords

  • Authentic education
  • Human being
  • Intentionality
  • Nature
  • Scientism
  • Sustainability

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Notes

  1. 1.

    This is not to say that we should never seek to modify nature. It is simple to introduce the point that there is an important sense in which nature is normative and that recognition of this is relevant to responsible thought and action.

  2. 2.

    There are resonances here with some interpretations of Aristotle’s nous pathetikos (De Anima iii 4)]. See, for example, Skúlason (2015).

  3. 3.

    Working in a very different (analytic) philosophical tradition, Peter Strawson (1964) comes to a similar conclusion with his notion of “persons.”

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Independent Scholar, UK Universities of Cambridge, London, Bath, England

    Michael Bonnett

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  1. Michael Bonnett
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Correspondence to Michael Bonnett .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Lakehead Univeristy, Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada

    Dr. Bob Jickling

  2. Centre for Sustainable Futures (CSF), University of Plymouth, Plymouth, United Kingdom

    Stephen Sterling

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Bonnett, M. (2017). Sustainability and Human Being: Towards the Hidden Centre of Authentic Education. In: Jickling, B., Sterling, S. (eds) Post-Sustainability and Environmental Education. Palgrave Studies in Education and the Environment. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-51322-5_6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-51322-5_6

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