Abstract
Abstract Much has been written about the ecological perspectives of Buddhism and Daoism, as examples of philosophies which emphasize process, impermanence, interconnectedness, and compassion for nature. And the interconnectedness of the various elements of the biosphere and the Earth’s crust is the basis of ecological Gaia theory. Some physicists and process philosophers have drawn attention to the inadequacies of European languages to represent the world of quantum reality, radical undifferentiated wholeness and interconnectedness, and the dynamism and uncontrollability of the material world. Notable among these were physicists David Bohm and David Peat, who looked to Blackfoot, an Algonquin language of North America, for a better representation of the natural world as interacting processes. This article explores some of the commonalities between Buddhism/Daoism, process philosophies, modern physics and ecological theory. It then addresses the question of the affordances different languages and grammars provide for a deep ecological representation in tune with quantum physics and Buddhism/Daoism. The climax of the article starts with the work of Michael Halliday on the local grammar of William Golding’s The Inheritors (Golding, William. 1961 [1955]. The Inheritors. London: Faber), and performs a similar grammatical analysis of two passages from Golding’s later work Pincher Martin (Golding, William. 1956. Pincher Martin. London: Faber). It concludes that the Neanderthal mind style and life style in The Inheritors and the world of the drowning Pincher Martin are represented in a grammatical style more appropriate for a Buddhist/Daoist/quantum physics/deep ecological worldview of human interaction with the natural world.
Highlights
I begin by exploring the commonalities of modern physics, ecology, and Buddhism/Daoism, most notably their emphasis on dynamic interrelated process, and their rejection of human domination of nature
This section examines the commonalities between theories of the physical universe, namely quantum physics and Gaia theory, and religious philosophies, Buddhism and Daoism
Both quantum physics and Buddhism/Daoism stress that the material world that we regard as populated by permanent “things” is transitory and always in the flux of change, movement and process
Summary
I begin by exploring the commonalities of modern physics, ecology, and Buddhism/Daoism (the horizontal line in Figure 1), most notably their emphasis on dynamic interrelated process, and their rejection of human domination of nature. I show how contrasting patterns of transitivity in the two novels illustrate different perspectives, one opposed to the ideology of modern science, ecology, Buddhism/Daoism, and the other more in tune with it. This section examines the commonalities between theories of the physical universe, namely quantum physics and Gaia theory, and religious philosophies, Buddhism and Daoism. It discusses four commonalities: the emphasis on impermanence and process, the dynamism of the universe, the interrelatedness of all parts of the physical universe, and the spontaneity and dynamism of nature which defies human control
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