Abstract

With the proclamation of a new geochronological age called the ‘Anthropocene’, it is now made abundantly clear that humankind has become the most powerful influence on planet Earth. The interdependency of nature and culture is apparent more than ever, and the ecological crisis – essentially human-made – along with climate change and massive species extinction, has become an encompassing menace threatening all life on Earth, including the human lifeform itself. Against this background, a revision of the prevalent human-nature-relationship on the part of philosophy of nature and ethics is overdue. In the last decade, the interdisciplinary research field of the Environmental Humanities has responded to this task. In line with this direction of research, the present article illuminates two historical characters – natural scientist Alexander von Humboldt and natural philosopher Friedrich Wilhelm Josef Schelling – in order to examine their relevance for an engagement with current ecological challenges. Instructive for this purpose is the assumption that both scientists, at certain times of their careers, represented the position of a Romantic Empiricism which entails some notable potential for a necessary realignment of the human-nature-relationship.