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Does Eco-Politics Exist and Does it Have Need of a Philosophy? 115 subjection of an environment that is distinguished from and set against man to the interests of man, whatever those may be. Man, however, has no “environment”. He has a world, the world of language and reason, of which he is at once creator and creation. Ihis world is not merely an inseparable part of mans being, but also fully and clearly belongs to him: he is responsible for it. (Ihis will be discussed in more detail in the second chapter of the book) Responsible care or practical use? These are two mutually exclusive descriptions of our relation to the world. Behind them lie two types of understanding of knowledge itself. Is knowledge power, as proclaimed by the modernity which celebrated its triumph over nature, following Francis Bacon? Or is it the exact opposite of power: a sympathetic participation in the lives of others? Whether this question is a more epistemological or a fundamentally ethical one is itself the subject of debate. However, without resolving it we cannot even begin to take account of our opportunities and tasks. How can we know what truth is if we have realised that it is precisely the knowledge that we relied on which has let us down? On what basis, then, can we decide what to do, where to seek the way out of the crisis of our civilisation and what future we can hope for ourselves? What can I know — if the trust in knowledge has been lost? What should I do— and why me? What can I hope for — from politics? The three questions which Immanuel Kant sought at the end of the 18" century to answer once and for all, relying on the universal laws of the right use of reason, have remained questions. They gain new meaning in our times. I do not believe that I have found an answer to any of them. My undertaking promised to be more modest and practical. While I sought the theoretical foundations of ecopolitics, I repeatedly came up against the fundamental philosophical questions of modernity — the chapter titles, with some self-irony, allude to this. May it serve as my excuse that the task, the execution of which exceeds my capacity, is not of my choosing. The task found me, who wished to occupy himself with something quite different, but who was born in the wrong era. Or the contrary. As Simone Weil noted during the darkest hours of World War II, “You could not be born at a better period than the present, when we have lost everything”. When everything goes dark, we become aware of even the smallest ray of light.
