Rapporteur's Report, Working Group on Scientific Knowledge, Education and Communication, Environment and Society, International Joint Conference of the American Geographical Society and the American Division of the World Academy of Art and Science

Abstract

1. We are committed to the creation of a world order of human dignity in which social and political institutions exist and operate to ensure conditions for the optimal self-realization of every member of the world community. 2. Our demand for human dignity is posited on a conception of the human being as an integrated biological, environmental, social, and psychic creature, appropriately equipped to make and influence the entire spectrum of personal and group decisions of the various communities in which he lives. 3. The systematic search for and organization and utilization of knowledge will play an important role in the realization of human dignity. It is indicative of the deep fractionation of thinking about man in the environment that no single word is readily available to designate inclusively the foci of the natural sciences, the social sciences, the humanities, and the arts. We will use the word knowledge to refer to all these cognitive activities that bear on making decisions about man in nature.