ECOLOGY OF EVERYDAY LIFE
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explained in organic evolutionary terms, we can indeed, trace the natural
history of the socio-erotic.
Thus we have two tasks at hand: to rethink the natural origins of social
desire and to cultivate a new social desire for nature. To this, we may add one
last task: to develop a way to distinguish between desire that is social and
anti-social, rational and irrational. Our discussion of social desire would be
meaningless if understandings of what constitutes ethical social desire were left
to matters of personal opinion. We must move, then, toward an objective
historical\ rather than personal and relativistic, criterion for distinguishing
between social and anti-social desire. To accomplish this task, we might look
to the natural history of social desire to explore how trends in natural
evolution toward mutualism, differentiation, and development may constitute
ecological principles that provide a theoretical ‘ground’ for an objective
understanding of social desire.
It is crucial to explore die organic origins and ethical implications of the
desire for both social cooperation within society and between society and the
natural world. Reflecting upon the origins of this desire within nature itself, we
may explore what social ecology has to offer to a discussion of objective
criteria for distinguishing between social and anti-social desire, exploring its
implications for the desire for nature. Ultimately, we may examine the social
desire for nature, moving toward a new revolutionary way to express the
yearning for a meaningful and ecological quality of everyday life.
Uhe EooEROTic: PRiNdpta Of MuruAta/i, DiffERENihiioN, AncI DeveIopment In Nature
To understand the origins of social desire, we may look to natural evolution to
find
tendencies
in
nature
development—tendencies
that
toward
are
mutualism,
homologous
to
differentiation,
dimensions
of
and
the
socio-erotic. We may call these tendencies in natural evolution the ‘eco-erotic’
which represents three ecological principles that provide natural evolution with
degrees of directionality and stability.
This discussion of natural evolution rests on an understanding of a
significant qualitative distinction between the ecological principles I will
explore and the dimensions of social desire. While the former exist prior to
human history, the latter are inseparable from historical and social constraints
that shape and limit the expression of human sociality in all of its forms. It is
for this reason that I will not explore sensual or oppositional moments within
the natural world. Understandings of sensuality are predicated on a social and
historical set of aesthetic, sexual, and relational practices specific to human
cultural practices. In turn, the idea of opposition represents a response to social
and political institutions created by societies. It is not that I believe that other
species are not sensual or that they never oppose obstacles which may