I kept in mind that Naess writing may have been quite innovative and revolutionary at the time of writing, his idea of studying how scientists did science for instance when they were all involved in behaviourist experiments on animals, his ideas about individualised and shared philosophies and diversity, the relating to his mountaineering in so far as there are many routes to the same destination and non-violent thinking or correspondence with Ghandi during the build up to WW2 and resistance during the war. The main body of writing is more interesting than the biographical and introductionary sections, written by other authors and feeling a little uncritical, lacking in depth and a little repetitious for my own liking. Some of these dimensions of the thinking I felt failed to be elaborated upon as much as I would have hoped for and its part of the reason why I decided to give this less than a five star review. The main differences being between whether or not humans are pivotal to the ecological perspective, Naess making an able representation of the alternative position that all life matters, which can sound harmless enough until some of the logical consequences of the position, such as Peter Singer's arguments about the moral equivalence of human life and that of great apes or the extreme elements of groups like Earth First! considering war, famine and even resurgent disease fulfilling a benign and beneficent function.

I was aware of the whole controversy and divisions within environmental and green movements, much like any other movements, between moderation and militancy, framed in the greens case as the difference between deep or 'shallow' or 'pale' greens or ecologists, and it was interesting to read these points elaborated upon.

Arne Naess is a big figure in the ecology movement but I have to admit that I had not heard of him and was unfamiliar with his writing before reading this, my only previous acquaintance with some of the topics discussed herein was a chapter upon ecology in Andrew Vincent's book on Modern Political Ideologies.

The Ecology of Wisdom by Arne Næss