ABSTRACT
In this chapter I break the many fields of ecology down into different ways of understanding the universe. I classify these ways of knowing into four categories: scientific ecology, social ecology, socio-spiritual ecology, and psycho-spiritual ecology. Scientific ecology is an objective approach to knowing, while social ecology is subjective and spiritual ecologies are intuitive. I introduce and evaluate ideas of integral ecology, which has been proposed as a comprehensive approach to knowing our environment. I identify problems with this approach, namely that it fails to reconcile the different requirements for evidence, the different ideas of dualism, and the different perception of evolutionary process, progress, and holism. There is value in the idea, however, for integral ecology correctly notes that environmental problems are issues of sociocultural context and conceptual construct. It also suggests that environmental problems occur at the intersection of ecological relationships and social relationships. To better understand these relationships, I propose that we must explore our evolutionary origins.
