Arne Naess

Arne Dekke Eide Naess lived from January 27, 1912 to January 12, 2009 and was a Norwegian philosopher and mountaineer who became a major intellectual force in late twentieth century environmentalism. He coined the term deep ecology to distinguish superficial environmental responses from a deeper philosophical shift in how humanity understands its relationship to nature, arguing that Western environmental groups had failed to confront the underlying cultural assumptions driving ecological crisis. His own philosophy, which he called Ecosophy T after his mountain hut Tvergastein, held that every being, whether human, animal or vegetable, has an equal right to live and to blossom, and combined this ecological vision with Gandhian nonviolence; he took part in direct environmental action himself, including chaining himself to the Mardalsfossen waterfall in 1970 to protest a dam. Beyond environmentalism he also worked in semantic philosophy and argumentation theory, developing frameworks for precise interpretation of language and for productive public debate.