A list of eco-heroes was produced in the UK – it includes a) Schumacher the man who gave us ‘small is beautiful’, b) Rachel Carson – whose book Silent Spring was the first protest against ‘chemicalizing’ our environment - and HRH Prince Charles! SEE here: www.environment-agency.gov.uk/news/1498806 Who else would you include in your list of heroes and heroines of environmental and ecological matters?

Should we teach Gaia theory to our children from a young age - perhaps connected to the appreciation and creativity of myths and their making? The Gaia hypothesis is an ecological theory that proposes that the living matter of planet Earth functions like a single organism (SEE Wiki). It seems to me that Gaia theory - or hypothesis - is an interesting example of the fault-line between the scientific and the mystical.

We can accumulate evidence toward a Gaia reality, but can it do more than point to such a possibility - much like a Zen master pointing when asked a question that is outside and beyond the realm of concepts, reason and science. As always I am so grateful to Wilber for his I WE and IT description of the different human voices and ways of knowing, and Heschel for his articulation of that which is beyond the realm of concepts which he says are 'delicious snacks' but not the 'real thing, of being in the realm of awe and wonder.

But to suggest a 'fault-line' is to suggest enormous potential for creative teaching. Give children the idea or ideas that a myth conveys and ask them to produce their own myth to embody those ideas. Then enjoy & study one or more of the traditional versions. Take scientific evidence that people feel points toward substantiation of the Gaia theory and once studied scientifically see what can be done creatively - playing with different sets of rules as to what constitutes knowing and knowledge.

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