Personal Values and Beliefs, Education and the Natural World

The major force that is shaping the way in which people see the environment today is on the surface personal value and beliefs; however, when these values and beliefs are examined, it can be seen that the education system has a major influence on shaping them. Unfortunately, these values and beliefs reflect a separation from the environment with the environment being seen as a source to be exploited for human gain. Fain, Barantovich and Martin (2004) contrast traditional education systems, which involve the transmission of knowledge from the elders to the younger generations to modern education systems, which focuses on scientific knowledge. These traditional education systems included educating for sustainability and harmony with nature, as “knowledge of the moral world would provide insight into the duties and responsibilities of human beings related to the creation of a more sustainable future for this and future generations of homo sapiens” (para. 12). The modern education system, however, achieves essentially the opposite of this harmonious relationship with nature. According to D. W. Orr (1994), “most students graduate without any broad integrated sense of the unity of things” (p. 3). It is this lack of unity that contributes to the current disconnect with nature. In relation to nature, Bai argues that humans in the West have become de-animated. Bai (2009) traces this de-animation to the philosophical ideas of Descartes and Plato, which have had a direct impact on our educational systems. Basically, Descartes contributed to the de-animation of the western perspective by adopting Plato’s concept of the separation of mind and matter. As Bai points out, “The most disturbing implication of Descartes’ theory of substances is just how degraded matter becomes when it is seen as having