Teilhard and the Environment

Abstract

Many people concerned with the environment have taken an interest in the writings of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955): Al Gore has quoted him in this context and short passages of Teilhard’s writings have served as mottos for conferences on the ecology. At the same time, other environmentally concerned people have expressed strong reservations. Teilhard worked as both a priest and geologist doing extensive research on the geology of Asia; he was much involved with the fossils known as Peking Man. His scientific writings are collected in ten volumes and his religious-philosophic writings are collected in thirteen; ten volumes of his letters have been published. This essay will try to explain Teilhard’s basic concern with the earth and the two processes he found in it: evolution and entropy. He favored the first over the second.