| Looking to Buddhism for an explicit ecological ethic is tentative at best. Buddhism developed in a context wherein environmental degradation was not perceived to threaten humankind. Contemporary ecoBuddhism adapts elements of Buddhist expression and adopts elements of non-Buddhist spiritual and secular philosophies to express a Buddhist inspired environmentalism that appears at odds with the core ethic of Buddhism. This discussion contends that Buddhist spirituality manifests as qualities of action that reflect a fundamental transformation of one's view of the relationship of human action to the subjective self and the objective other. Buddhism does not require an explicit ecological ethic. Buddhism's core ethic, while not objectively environmental, applies to environmental concerns as it applies to any worldly concern, regardless of paradigm. |
