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A look at the philosophy of Josef Šmajs

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This article by Dan Polansky looks at the philosophy of the Czech environmental philosopher Josef Šmajs. Šmajs is notable enough to have a Czech Wikipedia page and to be recognized by Gemini; moreover, multiple academic authors refer to him as per further reading.

Initial questions:

  • What writings by Šmajs are available online, to serve as the basis for analysis?
  • What articles about the philosophy of Šmajs are available online?
  • What key concepts are introduced by Šmajs?
  • What theories or doctrines are promulgated by Šmajs?

Articles are listed in the further reading. Some are in Czech, some in English.

Initial observations

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Šmajs introduces the key concept of evolutionary ontology (evoluční ontologie). I failed to figure out what he means by that. He does not seem to constrain the term evolution merely to replicator-based processes such as biological and cultural evolution; he also speaks of evolution in other contexts (example quotation to be added). One can ask whether there is some relationship to Hegelian dialectics.

Šmajs is concerned with destruction of environment by humans and with the risk of human extinction. He seems to believe that non-human biological entities should have some of the human rights.

Šmajs seems to suggest that a solution of environmental problems is to be sought more in what he calls společenské vědy (social sciences) than in physical and other natural sciences. Into společenské vědy (social sciences) he seems to include philosophy, a classification not matching the usual Anglophone one, by which philosophy is not a social science but a branch of humanities. He seems to be saying that the solution is to be found by philosophy.

Šmajs seems to use the term culture (kultura) to refer to totality of all currently human cultures. He posits a contrast of nature vs. culture. He seems to see culture as "predatory", or at least today's culture. It is not clear whether his use of the term matches customary uses in Anglophone cultural anthropology. One sentence suggests that culture is the same thing as technosphere: "Člověkem vytvářená globální kultura – planetární technosféra – se totiž osamostatňuje, vymyká se lidským záměrům a střetává se starší, svébytnější a sofistikovanější planetární biosférou."[1]

Nature vs. culture

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Šmajs presents culture as being pitched against nature. I am not clear this is the best approach. My Popper-inspired approach is that of technosphere vs. biosphere. There are two key differences:

  • It is unclear why the entity of concern should be culture rather than technology. Since, pre-technological cultures of humans did not seem to significantly impact the natural environment. Pre-technological would mean pre-fire. Even medieval cultures (and thus agricultural ones) were unable to cause the scale of destruction matching the industrial societies. Moreover, and that is perhaps not so important, a lay person will perhaps not readily understand the concept of culture that Šmajs invokes, which includes technology as it part. When Popper speaks of Technik als Kulturfaktor (or something of the sort), he does not take technology to be automatically part of culture, or else his point would trivially follow from definition. This is especially clear in Czech context; one would be surprised to find a technological museum under the head of Dům kultury (house of culture).
  • It is unclear that the concept of nature--any nature--is the best pick for the conflict to be analyzed. Popper analyses technology as pitched against the grüne Natur, meaning biological nature. And biological nature is the one that seems most gravely impacted by the industrial civilization. That is to say, for one thing, extraterrestrial nature (galaxies, etc.) is not impacted almost at all (one could count near-Earth space debris as extraterrestrial impact, though). And even terrestrial non-biological nature sees relatively little impact from industrial technological societies; there are quarries and reservoires, but they do not seem to achieve a scale that would mean anything like a grave destruction of landscape.

On the other hand, Šmajs does use the technosphere vs. biosphere contrast in the title "Dokážeme smířit technosféru s biosférou?"[2]. Therefore, the issue raised (about nature vs. culture) applies to some of his writing but not all of it.

Culture being predatory

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As for the culture being predatory, it is unclear why that alone should be a bad thing: predatory relationships are widespread in biological nature. Thus, a tiger eats an antelope, but that does not make the tiger bad. Sure enough, there are problems with the technosphere in relation to biological and other nature, but it is unclear that the concept of predation is the best one to point to these problems, or even an applicable one. One can admit that the word predatory is often used pejoratively to refer to certain social interpersonal phenomena deemed harmful or unjust. But that does not seem to be the phenomenon under discussion; rather, culture or technosphere is described as predatory in relation to nature. Thus, to make a wooden chair from a cut tree is to be predatory with respect to that tree. But from an environmentalist perspective, a culture that makes wooden pieces of furniture and wooden houses, even if it is "predatory" with respect to the trees, does not on this account alone present an environmental problem.

Predatory spiritual paradigm

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Šmajs talks about predátorské duchovní paradigma (predatory spiritual paradigm per Šmajs 2013[3]). The translation of duchovní as spiritual may be imperfect; it stands in contrast to duševní, mental. It remains to be figured out what, if anything, is this predatory spiritual paradigm, and what makes it spiritual. (As an aside, paradigm is an overused sociological buzzword originally stemming from Kuhn's classic Structure of Scientific Revolutions. From what I recall, Ms. Masterman identified 21 meanings/ways in which Kuhn used the word.)

Ontic

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Šmajs uses the word ontický, which could be rendered into English as ontic. M-W defines ontic as "of, relating to, or having real being".[4] I am struggling to make sense of Šmajs' sentences using the word. The Czech word ontický is absent from Czech dictionaries PSJČ and SSJČ and is absent from the website IJP. It would seem reasonable to require Šmajs to define the term (given the absence in dictionaries), but he does not seem to do so. cojeco.cz defines ontický as 'spekulativní pojem německého filozofa M. Heideggera označující vše, co náleží „jsoucnu“, na rozdíl od pojmu „ontologický“, jímž vyjadřuje vztah k „bytí“'[5]. If Šmajs has this meaning in mind, he would do well to say to.

Exploitation of natural forces

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Šmajs talks of "vědeckotechnické vykořisťování přírodních sil" (science-technological exploitation of natural forces), e.g. here: "Vysoká produktivita práce, založená na přímém vědeckotechnickém vykořisťování přírodních sil, nutně vede k nadměrné saturaci méně naléhavých abiotických potřeb lidí, tj. i k novým způsobům jejich uspokojování, podněcování a vytváření."[2] To my mind, the Czech word vykořisťování, which is used in Marxists philosophy in relation to capitalists and laborers, seems unduly pejorative, perhaps even more so than the English exploitation. A less charged word could be využití. To my mind, vykořisťování reads as if the natural forces were cast/interpreted as a person suffering from the yoke of technosphere. For instace, building a dam and a hydro powerplant would be such an exploitation. I struggle to find the "poor" gravitational force acting on water properly understood as a poor/unfortunate exploited person. Similarly, I struggle to interpret wind as a person exploited (vykořisťována) by a windmill. At least in Czech, vykořisťování sounds very anthropomorphic and negative, relating to kořist (prey or spoils).

A search for "vykořisťování přírodních sil" in Google finds nearly exclusively texts from Šmajs.

A search for "vykořisťování přírody" in Google and Google Books finds a broad range of sources, some apparently environmentalist.

A search for "exploitation of natural forces" finds, among others, the following quotation from Marx: "This Prometheus of M. Proudhon's is a queer character, as weak in logic as in political economy. So long as Prometheus merely teaches us the division of labour, the application of machinery, the exploitation of natural forces and scientific power, multiplying the productive forces of men and giving a surplus compared with the produce of labour in isolation, this new Prometheus has the misfortune only of coming too late."[6]

A search for "exploitation of nature" finds a range of sources, many of which seem to be environmentalist. The phrase does not seem positive.

A search for "Ausbeutung der Natur" finds a range of sources, showing the phrase to be common. German Ausbeutung, in Marx, corresponds to Czech vykořisťování. German Beute corresponds to Czech kořist.

English exploit has, according to M-W, two senses, one neutral ("to make productive use of"), one negative ("to make use of meanly or unfairly [...]").[7] This suggests that the ideological effect of English exploitation is rather different from that of Czech vykořisťování. The neutral (or even positive) sense of exploit could probably be translated as využití or vytěžení, and imperfective využívání and vytěžování.

To get the ideological effect of Czech vykořisťování and German Ausbeutung, we could consider outpraying or outspoiling (and thus plunder).

We see the following candidate metaphors:

  • Humans and their technological culture are beast of prey, predators (such as a tiger or wolf); nature (including mineral ores) is prey.
  • Humans and their technological culture are plunderers; nature (including mineral ores) is store of goodies to be plundered.

The etymology of English exploit does not suggest anything remotely relating to kořist (prey or spoil).[8]

The theme of exploitation/vykořisťování of nature is invoked in Šmajs 1982, per this: "I když současné ekologické problémy souvisejí s technologií, která vznikala v období živelné kapitalistické industrializace, i když se zhoršování životního prostředí i v době vědeckotechnické revoluce dále prohlubuje ziskovými motivy exploatace přírodních zdrojů, zbrojení a válečnými přípravami imperialistických zemí — kapitalistickým vykořisťováním přírody, které je analogické vykořisťování lidské práce — socialistické společenství se plně hlásí k úkolům aktivní ochrany a cílevědomé tvorby pří znivého životního prostředí."[9]. Here, the capitalist exploitation of nature is claimed to bear an analogy to exploitation of human labor. Contrary to an implication made in the above by Šmajs, the socialist block was approximately as guilty (if not more?) of destruction of the environment as the capitalist block (recall not only Chernobyl but also Aral Lake).

A Constitution for the Earth

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Šmajs is an author of "A Constitution for the Earth", linked below at earthconstitution.eu (there are other similarly-named documents online). It seems to be a rather radical document. Let us consider:

"We commit ourselves to protecting the Earth from the selfish expansion of the predation-oriented Culture. We shall enforce by any means its values, claims and rights, which are superior to both human beings and to Culture. [...] The Earth represents the highest value for both our species and for human Culture. It constitutes the oldest, broadest and most powerful creative activity, the unique planetary subjectivity. We have to defend its right to evolution, and its right to maintain a planet-wide balance between animate and inanimate systems."

It seems that the Earth is then to be construed as a person ("planetary subjectivity"). Like a person, it has "rights". These could be defended by a guardian; let us recall that some countries are now recognizing rivers as legal persons, and similarly, the Earth could be recognized as a legal person. The rights are to be enforced "by any means"; that sounds like an exhortation/call to ecoterrorism (Šmajs perhaps does not mean it, but that is what he says). It could easily lead to the proposal to eliminate humankind to protect the Earth's rights (again, the enforcement is to be "by any means").

On purely factual (non-normative, non-axiological) level, it is untrue that the Earth "constitutes the oldest, broadest and most powerful creative activity" (as for "oldest"); there was creative activity in the universe before the origination of the Earth.

What these Earth's rights are in practice is unclear. Does it mean that any intrusive human project would now need an approval of the appointed legal guardian? Why would the guardian approve any project? Would e.g. all dams, quarries and mines now be illegal? Could also agriculture (deforestation) become illegal?

Why the word "Culture" is capitalized in unclear. It is reminiscent of Pirsig's capitalization of the word "Quality". It could be an insinuation that Culture is something like a god or semigod, perhaps something like Tolkien's Melkor/Morgoth, in any case a person or person-like entity. I don't really know. This capitalization seems peculiar to the English version (a translation from Czech?); the Czech version does not capitalize "kultura" as "Kultura". It would be interesting to know who the translator into English was. At the bottom of the page, it says "Copyright © 2025 Josef Šmajs | Webdesign: PRO, s.r.o.". Perhaps Šmajs translated the pages into various languages himself; perhaps his translation suppliers are not stated. If he did it himself, he would be able to translate from Czech into English, German, Russian and Slovak; that would be plausible enough, on the face of it.

As for the date of publication, it seems unclear. earthconstitution.eu does not seem to host a wiki with a revision history. Wayback Machine for https://www.earthconstitution.eu/en/proposal has only one capture (as of 2 Feb 2025), from 14 Jan 2025.[10] However, ustavazeme.cz/cz/navrh-ustavy has a 2021 capture in WayBack Machine[11]. Judging from cupress.cuni.cz, the original date of publication could have been 2015, with ISBN 9788089057597, publisher Pro[12].

As for the license, none seems to be stated, and in particular, CC-BY-SA or a similar Creative Commons license is not stated. As a result, one cannot translate the document into other languages if wished, e.g. French or Spanish, unless one gets a permission from the author first. Moreover, when quoting the document, one has to be careful to do so in view to Fair Use or whatever similar provision exists in non-Anglophone copyright law.

Further reading:

Declaration of Dependence

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Deklarace závislosti (perhaps A Declaration of Dependence) seems to be a 2011 or 2012 precusor of "A Constitution of the Earth".

One has to check whether the items below in the further reading are exactly the same versions of the text.

An English version/translation is available in PermaBook Wiki below. No license such as CC-BY-SA appears to be stated.

One can analyze the statements made there; this is yet to be done.

Further reading:

  • Deklarace závislosti (dowloadable pdf), ustavazeme.cz (in Czech)
  • Deklarace závislosti, by Šmajs et al., publikacie.uke.sav.sk (in Czech); formulation participants/contributors: Antonín Bajaja, Bohuslav Binka, Petr Blahut, Etela Farkašová, Milena Fucimanová, František Houdek, Vladimír Choluj, Petr Jemenka, Ivan Klíma, Aleš Máchal, Vratislav Moudr, Gustav Rosa, Jiří Sedlák, Zuzana Škorpíková, Jan Šmarda, Gerlinda Šmausová, Marek Timko, Pavel Trpák, Emil Višňovský
  • Declaration of Dependence by Josef Šmajs et al., uploaded to PermaBook Wiki on 21 July 2012[1], permabook.brozkeff.net -- disclaimer: it is not clear that this is not a copyright violation; the declaration does not seem to have any license allowing free copying and translation
  • K podstatě evoluční ontologie by Josef Šmajs, 2014, archiv.listy.cz -- has the declaration embedded, albeit without listing contributors/co-authors
  • HOW WILL THE PROMETHEAN MYTH END? by Josef Šmajs, 2013, degruyter.com -- contains Declaration of Dependence as an addendum

A Lease Agreement with the Earth

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Šmajs is the author of Nájemní smlouva se Zemí, 2004 (the date follows from the statement that the document was signed/approved by Obec spisovatelů on 4 December 2004; Šmajs sometimes states 2003 as the relevent year[13]). The rendering The Lease Contract with the Earth is used in Jemelka 2010[14]; the rendering A Lease Agreement with the Earth is used by Šmajs himself, apparently[15]. An analysis is largely pending.

Let me investigate one peculiar quotation:

"Člověk je poprvé odpovědný za svou druhovou existenci. Pochopení a přijetí této odpovědnosti však závisí na opuštění úzkých morálních, fyzikálních a technických hledisek, vyžaduje biologický a medicínský přístup, předpokládá evolučně ontologický pohled na věc."

From this, we get:

Man is for the first time responsible for his continuing existence as a species; understanding and acceptance of this responsibility depends on [...], it assumes evolutionary-ontological perspective/point of view.

But that is implausible: it says that humans can only accept their responsibility if they accept the evolutionary ontology by Šmajs. That makes little or no sense.

Further reading:

Criticism

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Some criticism of the philosophy of Šmajs is found in Melichová and Burgan 2013, which mentions among critics the biologist A. Markoš and the environmentalist D. Storch. D. Storch seems particularly harsh:

'Environmentalist D. Storch (1997, 627) directly notes that he does not want “to argue with J. Šmajs, refute his opinions and draw attention to the mistakes perpetrated by him,” because “it would be possible to challenge every single word in almost every sentence and the arbitrariness in his use of some concepts (information, entropy) and even complete scientific systems must bewilder even someone with a little knowledge”. This is especially true when J. Šmajs “knowingly or unknowingly changes [the concepts] so that they confirm his (certainly well-intentioned) thesis.”'

The above seems to be from a Vesmír article by David Storch.[16] The reference to Markoš is to another Vesmír article[17], which seems to be a worthy read (if one knows Czech) for the specificity of the criticism. Šmajs has responded to that criticism[18].

On the other hand, Melichová and Burgan 2013 quote some assessors that lavish praise on Šmajs:

'For example A. Rosa, the publisher of Šmajs’ book Ohrozená kultúra (2006) [Threatened Culture], notes that of all the titles he has published this is this one he appreciates most. It deserves the Nobel Prize for its “heuristic contribution to the formulation of realistic conditions for the survival of man on Earth,” and for his “biophilic attitude contained in the very activity of every human being.” E. Višňovský (2006, 212) does not doubt that “with his sophisticated and original ontological and posthumanist concept, J. Šmajs ranks among ecophilosophers of international importance.”'

Let me note that it is E. O. Wilson of Sociobiology, 1975, who is noted for biophilia; he published Biophilia in 1984.

Further reading:

Context and originality of Šmajs' work

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Šmajs positions his work as environmental philosophy. Environmental ethics is covered in a Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP) article linked below; this includes assigning intrinsic value to natural (non-human) entities such as biological species. The SEP article covers deep ecology as tracing at least to Næss 1973. The SEP article has extensive Bibliography section, which, among the older literature, features not only Næss 1973 but also e.g. Mumford 1934 and Passmore 1974. Šmajs's claim to originality and contribution could perhaps be that he is doing ontology rather than ethics; on the other hand, his urgency is clearly ethical/denotic/axiological. The SEP article does not mention Šmajs. Indeed, no SEP article mentions Šmajs, as per the Google search '"Šmajs" site:plato.stanford.edu'. For his place in time, the oldest article by Šmajs that I found is K některým otázkám vztahu vědy a ideologie, 1973[19][20].

In so far as Šmajs emphasizes evolution in the broad sense of any change resulting in origination (e.g. of stars), a serious/devoted analyst should perhaps find out to what extent Šmajs is indebted to Hegel and Marx with their "dialectics".

Further reading:

Šmajs' philosophy before 1989

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Šmajs's writing before 1989 (the year of the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia) often references Marx and seems to accept the official philosophy/ideology of Czechoslovak socialism. Examples of statements are to be added; until then, the further reading below serves as substantiation.

Further reading:

Academic titles

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It is perhaps not without interest which academic titles Šmajs holds, although it is tangential to the topic of the article, which is his philosophy. To wit: Prof. PhDr. Ing. Josef Šmajs, CSc.[21][22] The character length of this complete identification is 34; the character length of the name alone is 11; the ratio is approximatedy 3:1.

Life

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For this article, the life of Šmajs or curriculum vitae is a tangent. This section is here to list further reading:

Further reading:

References

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  1. ↑ Filosofický koncept Ústavy Země by Josek Šmajs, 2015, blisty.cz
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Dokážeme smířit technosféru s biosférou? by Josef Šmajs, 2014, blisty.cz
  3. ↑ HOW WILL THE PROMETHEAN MYTH END? by Josef Šmajs, 2013, degruyter.com
  4. ↑ ontic, merriam-webster.com
  5. ↑ ontický, cojeco.cz
  6. ↑ The Poverty of Philosophy by Karl Marx, marxists.org
  7. ↑ exploiting, merriam-webster.com
  8. ↑ exploit, merriam-webster.com
  9. ↑ Vztah přírody a společnosti jako základní ekologický problém by Josef Šmajs, 1982
  10. ↑ earthconstitution.eu/en/proposal, Wayback Machine
  11. ↑ ustavazeme.cz/cz/navrh-ustavy, Wayback Machine
  12. ↑ Ústava Země. A Constitution for the Earth. Verfassung für die Erde - Šmajs Josef, Knihkupectví Karolinum
  13. ↑ https://blisty.cz/art/77197-filosoficky-koncept-ustavy-zeme.html
  14. ↑ Bioethics and Environmental Ethics as Part of the Training of Future Civics and Social Sciences Basics Teachers by Petr Jemelka, 2010
  15. ↑ https://www.earthconstitution.eu/en/literature
  16. ↑ Ekologická katastrofa: co víme a co nevíme by David Storch, 5 November 1997, vesmir.cz (in Czech)
  17. ↑ Cultura contra natura by Anton Markoš, 1997 (in Czech)
  18. ↑ Cultura contra natura by Josef Šmajs, 5 April 1998, vesmir.cz
  19. ↑ K některým otázkám vztahu vědy a ideologie by Josef Šmajs, 1973
  20. ↑ https://digilib2.phil.muni.cz/en/node/63766
  21. ↑ Deklarace závislosti, by Šmajs et al., publikacie.uke.sav.sk (in Czech)
  22. ↑ prof. PhDr. Ing. Josef Šmajs, CSc. – Životopis (Curriculum Vitae) (in Czech), muni.cz

Further reading

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Wikipedia:

By Josef Šmajs in English:

By Josef Šmajs in Czech:

About Josef Šmajs in English:

About Josef Šmajs in Czech:

Publication lists:

  • Šmajs, Josef, digilib2.phil.muni.cz -- a list of 68 publications, mostly in Czech but also in German and Russian; the publications seem available online as scanned pdfs
  • Josef Šmajs, blisty.cz -- lists articles published by Josef Šmajs at Britské listy
  • Josef Šmajs, phil.muni.cz -- has no links to publications, merely publication list
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