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Horkheimer and Adorno) is the revolt of non-human nature against its irrational exploitation
(Leiss, 1972). The unrestrained use of nature destroys the material conditions for its own
continuation, as the inexorable expansion of capital at the expense of the environment undercuts
our natural resource base (Merchant, 1989).
Modern science is also indicted by environmentalists for its mechanistic assumptions and
narrow definition of what constitutes a fact (Devall & Sessions, 1985) as well as for its cognitive
orientation toward the substantive rather than the relational (Valdez, 2001). These tendencies, it
is argued, operate to blind modern science to ecological concerns (which are rarely mechanical
or narrow in scope and are generally relational in character). In addition to this cognitive
disadvantage, modern science is accused of being ill suited from a political viewpoint to the
needs of a truly democratic society. Science, it is argued, is largely closed to the oppressed and
disadvantaged (Jennings, 1993) and is a conceptual element of a patriarchic social structure that
represses women as much as it does nature (Evans, 1995).
Finally, it is argued that even the scientific detachment that lies at the heart of the
research process is ecologically self-defeating. This detached attitude has been associated with
an estrangement from human emotion and ethical principle that allows even those whose careers
involve the study of nature to participate in its devaluation (Gismondi and Richardson, 1994).
All of these criticisms have led many to conclude that science, in so far as it applies to
intervention in nature, will inevitably lead us to disaster (Dizard, 1993). These views have led to
a deep suspicion of the scientific establishment among environmental activists that creates a gulf
which is difficult to bridge (Foreman, 2002).
A different perspective on science is offered by a number of environmentalists who,
while not entirely uncritical of the techno-scientific character of modern democracies, are
Convention