Increased education, or ecological literacy, is not the answer to the ecological crisis

In his article, Leopold states that our most serious obstacle in the evolution of “The land ethic” is the fact that our educational and economic systems are headed away from instead of toward the consciousness of land. Here he is saying that we need more education about the land in order to get people to believe in and follow the land ethic. He even goes as far as to say later that higher education seems to deliberately avoid ecological concepts. I’m not sure exactly how I feel about that statement since we are studying ecological concepts in higher education courses right now. But what I really wanted to focus on was both of these educational statements by Leopold, but also something Calliot said in his piece that relates. He states that the key to emergence of a land ethic is, simply, universal ecological literacy.
I agree that when people have more knowledge about things they are more likely to change their minds or realize their faults and change their actions about certain things. So, on that respect I agree that more education and ecological literacy among the human inhabitants of the world would most likely do a great deal to decrease the destruction of the earth. But do I think that the reason people haven’t accepted the land ethic is due to lack of education? No. Do I think that if people were more ecologically literate they would accept the land ethic? No. Like, I said, the increase education would help but I do not, by any means think it would be the cure or the “key to emergence of a land ethic”. I think the way people treat the earth are long ingrained ideas about how they should think about other species and even trees and water. I think if a person can dump their chemical wastes into the ocean, education about ecology wouldn’t change his actions. He most likely knows he is doing something morally wrong, whether because he is “harming” the waters, or the man downstream. He knows it’s not right and I don’t think education is the answer. I’m not sure what my answer is but I know more education may slightly help, but not enough to make a difference.