Abstract
In recent years there has been much attention for environmental matters in actual sport practices, ranging from greening the Olympics to reducing the ecological footprint of mass running events. In itself these adaptive developments are praiseworthy. At the same time they raise philosophical discomfort, because they do not fully address the issue of how to mitigate the effects of our over-consuming and polluting life-style in a more profound way.
This Chapter provides a rendition of a still tender and tentative philosophical and ethical debate by iteratively attempting to bridge the gap between ‘shallow’ adaptive green sport practices and ‘deep’ eco-philosophical thinking. It does so with a special focus on Sigmund Loland’s work on the ‘ecosophy’ (a portmanteau of ecology and philosophy) of sport. Notwithstanding the problematic relation between excluding and ‘agonistic’ competition on the razor’s edge and including and peaceful ‘ecological naturalism’, based on the work of Arne Naess, Loland develops a set of hypotheses and norms that gives philosophical evidence for the idea that sport can be ecologically justified. Key terms in this interactive system of fundamental normative questions and answers are ‘Self-realization!’ through engaging in sporting activities on the one hand, and the idea of ‘biospheric egalitarianism’ and ‘the democracy of all life forms’, on the other. Or: how to find the right mean between the pleasure of sporting in nature and sustainability?
After analysing and criticising Loland’s sensitive Outline of an Ecosophy of Sport (1996), I will critically access two consecutive ‘sport-ecosophical’ articles by Loland: Record Sports: An Ecological Critique and a Reconstruction (2001) and Olympic Sport and the Ideal of Sustainable Development (2006). Whereas Loland concentrates on developing a robust sport-ecosophical mindset and leaving the idea of sport records, since these represent the logic of unlimited growth in limited systems, I rather suggest perhaps ‘shallow’ but nevertheless concrete acts that actually result in a change for the ecosophical better.
If increase in joy is able to outweigh on a long-term basis the ecological costs of production and application, sport technology can be ecosophically justified
(Sigmund Loland 1996, p. 84).
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Notes
- 1.
Which also implies ‘sustainable’, I reason from the context.
- 2.
This should be 4 minutes, referring to Roger Bannister’s first sub 4 minute-mile (3:59:4) in 1954.
- 3.
To quote then IOC president’s Avery Brundage (USA) famous words after the murder of 11 Israeli athletes by Palestinian terrorists during the Munich summer Olympics in 1972.
- 4.
“Air travel has the highest specific impact on short-term warming, while on long-term warming car travel has an equal or higher impact per passenger-kilometer” (Borken-Kleefeld et al. 2010, p. 5700).
- 5.
In the case of Heidegger it seems as if his ideas are rather singled-out thoughts formulated against the very idea of a ‘regression to the mean’. This in the social sciences widespread statistical technique has turned into the very opposite of the original intention of the founder of the statistical analysis Francis Galton, who coined his calculative analysis regression to the mediocre (1886). Galton was in search of Hereditary Genius (1892), the exceptional, not in the dull mediocre “sum of them all”.
- 6.
This conviction is also uttered by Mr. Van Arkady in Paul Theroux’s novel Half Moon Street (1984). Van Arkady argues that there are only 5,000 people in the world that really matter. The rest is literally meaningless, and thus non-existent. “I believe the death of one man can change the course of history, when it is the right man and when we are fully conscious of it. But a million don’t matter, because it isn’t a number in any actual sense, unless it is applied to money” (p. 7).
- 7.
Translated to the specific case at hand: through domestication and convenience practices we have lost the ability to experience the harsh physical side of life in its unveiled bare ‘natural’ state. For a more detailed analysis of the suppressed agonistic side of life Cfr. Chap. 7 On Agon and Ecosophical Endurance: Finding your own Pace.
- 8.
Further on I will argue for the bicycle as an appropriate, relatively ‘clean’ mean to satisfy the human need for travelling.
- 9.
As already mentioned in Chap. 1 long distance race which ends with climbing (rather than running) the steep, unforgiving and unpaved slopes of Gaustastoppen (1883 m), a.k.a. ‘Zombie-Hill’. It is compulsory for every participant to have a supporting team for the last 7 extremely steep and dangerous uphill kilometres.
- 10.
Keeping golf-courses that ‘unnaturally’ green as they usually are takes huge amounts of herbicides.
- 11.
Cfr. for how an analysis of actual human visions (the so-called lay(wo)men’s perspective) of nature may help to strengthen environmental philosophy e.g. Van den Born: “An empirical turn can make environmental philosophy more responsive to the views that actually exist in the wider public. Beyond a mere affirmation or rejection of the existing philosophical notions, we can discover people’s own voice” (2007, p. 180).
- 12.
Although Spinoza never explicitly refers to deism in his writings, his philosophy shares a lot in common with the idea of God as an absent ‘clock-winder’, who enables life but does not steer it in a pre-determined direction. A de-spiritualized neo-Darwinian version of this image is presented in Richard Dawkins’s The Blind Watchmaker (1987).
- 13.
Which still is possible in an environmentally positive manner, I will argue.
- 14.
Zwart (2017) points at the changing nature of skiing by referring to the days when Heidegger was skiing from his famous hut in Todtnauberg to the lecturing hall of the university of Freiburg: “The meaning of skiing may have changed dramatically during recent decades, however, so that nowadays skiing not only exemplifies forgetfulness of nature but also the inauthenticity of contemporary consumerist existence” (p. 2).
- 15.
“From word to world, from deduction to induction” (Zwart 1999, my translation).
- 16.
“He who knows how to breathe the air of my writings knows that it is an air of the heights, a bracing air. One must be made for it, otherwise the danger is no small one of catching cold in it. The ice is near, the loneliness is tremendous—but how peacefully all things lie in the light! How freely one breathes! How much one feels beneath oneself! Philosophy, as I have understood and lived it hitherto, is the voluntary living among ice and high mountains—the seeking-out of all things curious and questionable in existence, everything that has been put under a ban by morality hitherto” (Nietzsche 2004, p. 8).
- 17.
In 2014 I experienced that quite dangerous, un-secured hikes over windy cliffs, which probably would lead to a nation-wide political discussion in The Netherlands, in Norway are labelled as family-friendly pastimes.
- 18.
The good life in the deeper Aristotelian sense, beyond shallow pleasure or hedonism. Eudaimonism often has a ‘mental’ connotation. In due course I will argue for a more ‘physical’ interpretation of well-spiritedness.
- 19.
Cfr. Keulartz (2005) for a more detailed account of mitigation (a radical change of lifestyle, making a u-turn) versus adaptation (adjusting your lifestyle, steering away) and for how only boundary work and post-metaphysical pragmatism can help us out of the stalemate between a light-green market-liberalism and radical dark green approaches. In Chap. 5 Continental Pragmatism: Enduring Life in the Strenuous Mood I will propose a synthesis of both visions.
- 20.
Mark Twain (1835–1910) already questioned the supposed supremacy of mankind: “Man has been here 32,000 years. That it took a hundred million years to prepare the world for him is proof that that is what it was done for. I suppose it is, I dunno. If the Eiffel Tower were now representing the world’s age, the skin of paint on the pinnacle-knob at its summit would represent man’s share of that age; and anybody would perceive that the skin was what the tower was built for. I reckon they would, I dunno” (1993, p. 106).
- 21.
In Chap. 6 Continental Pragmatism: Enduring Life in the Strenuous Mood will argue that Naess’s relational field ontology overlaps with William James’s subtle pragmatism.
- 22.
Once more Ortega y Gasset prima vista seems to have the oldest rights in this case (cfr. Footnote 18). Ilundáin-Agurruza (2014, p. 286) argues that, next to ‘circumstance’ and ‘salvation’, ‘love’ is the third pillar of his ratio-vitalism, which paves the way for an optimistic concept about sport. “Phenomenologically, he uses sport to reveal the structure of life and how we experience it” (p. 288).
Learning to love something or someone is about making the other the centre of our life. In keeping with thick holism, I conceive this as a perspectival shift that entails the union of lover and loved. It is about unity, about bringing together what was asunder before. We cannot live without the loved object—we consider it part of ourselves—and through concatenation of those things about which the loved one cares and so on, we ultimately are led into a Spinozistic ‘pan-holism’ where all is united. Ortega’s and Spinoza’s holism correlate, for different reasons, with Eastern views that endorse egolessness, emotionally and ontologically. This bypasses the perennial problem of the one and the many and the subject/object dichotomy, if for a time: ‘Love […] binds us to things, even if only temporarily’ (Ortega y Gasset 1963, p. 33). One who acts thus becomes a noble exemplar for Ortega and is willing to take risks most others skirt around (Ilundáin-Agurruza 2014, p. 295).
I argue, however, that Naess’s interpretation of the spinozistic unio mystica is far more receptive to contemporary environmental issues. Whereas Ortega largely stays in the realm spiritual connection, Naess also includes pets and plants.
- 23.
It should be noted, however, that Naess makes an exception for the fulfilment of so-called ‘human basic needs’. The problem is, however, that these seem to change over time. These days many (Western) people will consider a yearly air trip to a sunny destination a basic need.
- 24.
According to Arnold Gehlen (1940/2009), from a purely biological perspective humans are ‘Mängelwesen’, deficient beings.
- 25.
Further on I will argue that from a pragmatic point of view it doesn’t matter if acts are undertaken out of inner or conviction or outer obligation. It is the result that counts.
- 26.
Recent ethological studies (e.g. De Waal 2006/2016) show that the mind and self-consciousness are a matter of evolutionary degree rather than uniquely human. Stephen Jay Gould even has argued (Scientific American, October 1994) that “[o]ur impression that life evolves towards greater complexity is probably only a bias inspired by parochial focus on ourselves.” Over time ‘the wall of simplicity’ (bacteria) has proven to be more adaptive and more resistant to changes such as the meteorite impact on Yucatan, some 65 million years ago, which caused the Triassic-Jurassic extinction. The life-style of bacteria therefore has remained the most common and most successful. “We must understand that little twigs [e.g. homo sapiens sapiens, rw] are contingent nubbins, not predictable goals of the massive bush beneath” (p. 91).
- 27.
This might seem quite appropriate considering the current state of affairs (sea-level rising due to carbon emission, large scale deforestation, human-induced extinction of species that exceeds the Triassic-Jurassic extinction by far, over-population etc.) But the pivotal question than is: who is in charge of the human plant planet earth meanwhile has become? Who will control the control-panel? There seems to be no way back, thus ludditism will not help, eventually.
- 28.
I here refer to Aristotle’s idea that phúsis is its own source of bringing its potentiality to actuality, which perfectly fits in Naess’s ecosophical scheme. Techné,on the other hand, requires a source of motion outside itself, thus is at best shallow ecological. This resembles Sloterdijk’s distinction between nature-friendly homeo-technology and alienating allo-technology already referred to in the introductory Chap. 1 Prologue: The Good Life, Asceticism and Sustainable Cycling. Vincent Blok (2014) points at the more intricate relation between phúsis and techné in Heidegger. “As a representation of the phúsis, techné has to be understood as an addition or supplement to the original phúsis. Why? Because phúsis has the tendency to conceal itself, only a technical supplement or re-presentation of the phúsis is able to give us access to the original phúsis. It is in this respect, that we can say that the techné is demanded by phúsis in order that it can reveal itself” (p. 324). A Heidegger-inspired take on (sustainable endurance) sport will be developed in Chap. 5 Ascetic Practices, Hermeneutical Cycles and Ecosophical Endurance.
- 29.
Sport philosophers often carry their own background into the debate. Loland’s roots are in skiing. Mine are in endurance sport, especially long distance cycling. Skilfulness, agility and exhilarating joy versus perseverance, resilience and diligence. Loland refers to Spinoza’s concept of hilaritas (“a strong positive emotion with thestructure of a holistic Gestalt” (1996, p. 77). I rather feel sympathy for Peter Sloterdijk’s (quasi-)Sysiphean idea of man the diligent practitioner. Loland doesn’t deny that “periods of monotonous, hard work are sometimes necessary to reach deeper insight and values”(p. 80)—and thus in the end may result in augmented ecosophical joy—, for Sloterdijk the ‘joy’ is in the hard work itself. This different basic attitude towards repetitive practices will be tested in the following chapter.
- 30.
Also the mentioned relatively slow Norseman triathlon and the relavitely fast Roth triathlon are quasi-record races.
- 31.
In Chap. 5 Ascetic Practices, Hermeneutical Cycles and Ecosophical Endurance I will argue that the philosophy of sport so far has overestimated the un-committal game-character of sport and underestimated endurance sports, which usually are not very ‘ludic’.
- 32.
It should be noted that in the ancient Olympics included running, long jump, shot put, javelin, boxing, pankration (a form of martial art, combining wrestling and boxing) and equestrian events. So there were no ball (or puck) games, nor gymnastic disciplines!
- 33.
Mathematician Reza Noubary calculated this as the ultimate time for the 100 m dash. After Usain Bolt’s astonishing world record of 9.58 in Beijing 2009 he however proclaimed that his prediction probably would go down a bit (Yong 2012). Supposed ultimate records always have been proved human constructs. Breaking the 10 s barrier at the 100 m sprint was thought to be impossible for a long time and also Roger Bannister first sub 4 minute mile (1954) had been thought an impossible hurdle to overcome for a long time. One never exactly can tell how training techniques will develop and evolution goes. Of course there is a logical absolute limit: athletes will never be able to arrive earlier at the finish-line than they start. But on the other hand there is the possibility of breaking records by ever smaller units, such as ten thousands of seconds.
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Welters, R. (2019). Sport and the Environment: Considering Sustainable Thoughts. In: Towards a Sustainable Philosophy of Endurance Sport . Library of Ethics and Applied Philosophy, vol 37. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05294-2_2
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