ABSTRACT
This chapter rejects individualism and voluntarism as a basis for ethics. Using Ecolinguistics, it challenges a view of science where ethics is outsourced to policy makers, regulators, and experts. In clarifying the danger, the chapter contrasts UN sustainable development goals (SDGs) with a Chinese aspiration to build an ecological civilization. Leaving politics aside, the chapter stresses that while SDGs depend on experts, appeal to ecological civilization enables all who care for the land to contribute. Just as life draws on simplex tricks, ways of knowing are re-energized by science. In biological terms, vision, simplexity, observation or, simply, vitality enables knowing to draw on living. At once, they make science necessarily normative. Its models serve as epistemic hubs that can be used to meet perceived needs. The view permits an actional ethics where global concerns link with local inequities and bio-ecological needs. Ethical response is shaped by what is happening now. In this culture, Wissenschaft is appliable because it is normative. Scientific models inform many kinds of knowing – objectively valid knowledge can help wisdom, skills, and know-how as people act to reverse both human inequities and bioecological degradation.
