The question of whether there are laws in ecology is important for a number of reasons. If, as some have suggested, there are no ecological laws, this would seem to distinguish ecology from other branches of science, such as physics. It could also make a difference to the methodology of ecology. If there are no laws to be discovered, ecologists would seem to be in the business of merely supplying a suite of useful models. These models would (...) need to be assessed for their empirical adequacy but not for their ability to capture fundamental truths, or the like. If, on the other hand, ecology does have laws, this prompts further questions about what these laws are and why even the best candidates for ecological laws fall short of what might be expected of laws. (shrink)

We have become estranged from the cosmic movements, according to Bataille. We are confined by the error linked to the representation of ‘the stationary earth’. We have negated the immersive immanence of the whole and made nature into a fixed world of tools and things. How then do we recognise ourselves as part of the ‘rapture of the heavens’? Bataille urges us to consider life as a solar phenomenon, the free play of solar energy on the earth. This paper argues (...) how Bataille’s cosmic vision anticipates both planetary and ecological thinking. This entails a base materialism of difference based on a radical Nietzschean and Heraclitean theory of becoming and flux. This thought is developed along Bataillean concepts such as the movement of the whole, the labyrinthine, and compound beings, ipseity, as well as the concept of a communifying movement. This materialism paired with Vladimir Vernadsky’s biosphere lays the foundation for the laws of the general economy, which also constitutes an economy inclusive of a general ecology: a tragic vision of Gaia and Dionysos. Finally, poetry is considered, as a way we might reconnect with the universe and stimulate ecological imagination. (shrink)

Ecologists use a remarkable range of methods and techniques to understand complex, inherently variable, and functionally diverse entities and processes across a staggering range of spatial, temporal and interactive scales. These multiple perspectives make ecology very different to the exemplar of science often presented by philosophers. In Philosophical Foundations for the Practices of Ecology, designed for graduate students and researchers, ecology is put into a new philosophical framework that engages with this inherent pluralism while still placing constraints (...) on the ways that we can investigate and understand nature. The authors begin by exploring the sources of variety in the practice of ecology and how these have led to the current conceptual confusion. They argue that the solution is to adopt the approach of constrained perspectivism and go on to explore the ontological, metaphysical, and epistemological aspects of this position and how it can be used in ecological research and teaching"--Provided by publisher. (shrink)

Ecology - unlike astronomy, physics, or chemistry - is a science with an associated political and ethical movement: the Green Movement. As a result, the ecological position is often accompanied by appeals to holism, and by a mystical quasi-religious conception of the ecosystem. In this title, first published in 1988, Andrew Brennan argues that we can reduce much of the mysticism surrounding ecological discussions by placing them within a larger context, and illustrating that our individual interests are bound with (...) larger, community interests. Using an interdisciplinary approach, which bridges the gap between the sciences, philosophy, and ethics, this is an accessible title, which will be of particular value to students with an interest in the philosophy of environmental science and ethics. (shrink)

In _Vibrant Matter_ the political theorist Jane Bennett, renowned for her work on nature, ethics, and affect, shifts her focus from the human experience of things to things themselves. Bennett argues that political theory needs to do a better job of recognizing the active participation of nonhuman forces in events. Toward that end, she theorizes a “vital materiality” that runs through and across bodies, both human and nonhuman. Bennett explores how political analyses of public events might change were we to (...) acknowledge that agency always emerges as the_ _effect of ad hoc configurations of human and nonhuman forces. She suggests that recognizing that agency is distributed this way, and is not solely the province of humans, might spur the cultivation of a more responsible, ecologically sound politics: a politics less devoted to blaming and condemning individuals than to discerning the web of forces affecting situations and events. Bennett examines the political and theoretical implications of vital materialism through extended discussions of commonplace things and physical phenomena including stem cells, fish oils, electricity, metal, and trash. She reflects on the vital power of material formations such as landfills, which generate lively streams of chemicals, and omega-3 fatty acids, which can transform brain chemistry and mood. Along the way, she engages with the concepts and claims of Spinoza, Nietzsche, Thoreau, Darwin, Adorno, and Deleuze, disclosing a long history of thinking about vibrant matter in Western philosophy, including attempts by Kant, Bergson, and the embryologist Hans Driesch to name the “vital force” inherent in material forms. Bennett concludes by sketching the contours of a “green materialist” ecophilosophy. (shrink)

Laudato si’, with its articulation of a familial ecology reflecting Francis’s Latin American context, expands the subject of solidarity in Catholic social teaching and thought. Yet, this ecological vision of family fails to attend to the problem of gender subordination latent in Catholic social teaching, including in its approaches to ecology. A vision of solidarity that eradicates gender and ecological subordination must elaborate a familial ecology characterized by both mercy and equality.

Philosophy of Science in Practice (PoSiP) has the “practice of science” as its object of research. Notwithstanding, it does not possess yet any general or specific methodology in order to achieve its goal. Instead of sticking to one protocol, PoSiP takes advantage of a set of approaches from different fields. This thesis takes as a starting point a collaborative and interdisciplinary research between two Ph.D. students from distinct areas: ecology and philosophy. This collaboration showed how a scientist could benefit (...) from philosophy of science (in this case study the philosophical approach of. mechanistic explanation) to construct a model of his explanandum, by means of heuristics approach (heuristics as an instrument but also a methodological approach) and, also allowed philosophy of science take a closer look into the scientific practice to investigate how explanations are constructed and how scientific understanding is achieved (in this thesis, with a dialogue with the contextual theory of scientific understanding). As a result, it is asserted that (i) mechanistic explanation possess limitations but may work as epistemic instruments that mediate between theories, data, scientists, and models; (ii) explanation construction and scientific understanding deeply relies on intuition; (iii) scientific understanding is an instant, a moment, a temporary achievement, and its process may happen in degrees; (iv) philosophy of science, by means of heuristics process, may enhance scientists’ epistemic virtues, improving his academic skills, by means of self-evaluation. This research shows that interdisciplinarity and collaborative work can act, through heuristics, as a toolbox for PoSiP to achieve its goal of understanding how science is made. Despite its success, an analysis of this collaborative practice leads to some fundamental issues. First, philosophy of science in practice is a philosophy of past practice, in that the majority of examples used by mainstream PoSiP come from the final products of science. Second, is it philosophy of [science in practice] or philosophy of science [in practice]? How to practice philosophy of scientific practice and, how to practice interdisciplinarity in the philosophy of scientific practices simultaneously to its scientific activity? This research exposes the epistemic role heuristics and interdisciplinarity possess as methodological toolboxes for philosophy of science in practice. It is defended that other ways of constructing sciences would be through different dynamics such as collaborative networks and interdisciplinarity research contributing to the vision of Trading Zones from Peter Galison, in which bridges between specialized disciplines are created in order to exchange knowledge and information. (shrink)

This paper assesses the proposal to transform the monetary system into an Ecology of money, that is, into a system made of a large diversity of complementary currencies. Its central aim is to examine whether this proposal could provide a systemic solution to both the ecological and financial crises, as several authors, most notably Lietaer and Douthwaite, have argued. To this end, it analyses the two main arguments in favour of this proposal. First, it focuses on the claim that (...) an Ecology of money would be more resilient and less prone to crisis than the present monetary system. It shows that this argument suffers from several conceptual flaws and argues that it fails to provide sufficient normative reasons to favour an Ecology of money. Second, this paper analyses the claim that an Ecology of money could help defeat the monetary growth imperative that supposedly plagues our economies. The paper raises serious doubts about the existence of such an imperative and questions the claim that an Ecology of money could contribute to weaken it in a significant way. (shrink)

I claim that the balance of nature metaphoris shorthand for a paradigmatic view of natureas a beneficent force. I trace the historicalorigins of this concept and demonstrate that itoperates today in the discipline of populationecology. Although it might be suspected thatthis metaphor is a pre-theoretic description ofthe more precisely defined notion ofequilibrium, I demonstrate that balance ofnature has constricted the meaning ofmathematical equilibrium in population ecology.As well as influencing the meaning ofequilibrium, the metaphor has also loaded themathematical term with (...) values.Environmentalists and critics use thisconflation of meaning and value to theiradvantage. This interplay between the balanceof nature and equilibrium fits aninteractionist interpretation of the role ofmetaphor in science. However, it seems theinteraction is asymmetric, and the balance ofnature metaphor has had a larger influence onmathematical equilibrium than vice versa. Thisdisproportionate influence suggests that themetaphor was and continues to be a constitutivepart of ecological theories. (shrink)

Studies of the association between wealth and fertility in industrial populations have a rich history in the evolutionary literature, and they have been used to argue both for and against a behavioral ecological approach to explaining human variability. We consider that there are strong arguments in favor of measuring fertility (and proxies thereof) in industrial populations, not least because of the wide availability of large-scale secondary databases. Such data sources bring challenges as well as advantages, however. The purpose of this (...) article is to illustrate these by examining the association between wealth and reproductive success in the United States, using the National Longitudinal Study of Youth 1979. We conduct a broad-based exploratory analysis of the relationship between wealth and fertility, employing both cross-sectional and longitudinal approaches, and multiple measures of both wealth (income and net worth) and fertility (lifetime reproductive success and transitions to first, second and third births). We highlight the kinds of decisions that have to be made regarding sample selection, along with the selection and construction of explanatory variables and control measures. Based on our analyses, we find a positive effect of both income and net worth on fertility for men, which is more pronounced for white men and for transitions to first and second births. Income tends to have a negative effect on fertility for women, while net worth is more likely to positively predict fertility. Different reproductive strategies among different groups within the same population highlight the complexity of the reproductive ecology of industrial societies. These results differ in a number of respects from other analyses using the same database. We suggest this reflects the impossibility of producing a definitive analysis, rather than a failure to identify the “correct” analytical strategy. Finally, we discuss how these findings inform us about (mal)adaptive decision-making. (shrink)

Ecology and sustainability are current narratives about the behavior of humans toward themselves and the environment. Ecology is defined as a science, and a philosophy of ecology has become a recognized domain of the philosophy of science. For some, sustainability is an accepted, important moral goal. In 2013, a Special Issue of the journal Sustainability dealt with many of the relevant issues. Unfortunately, the economic, ideological, and psychological barriers to ethical behavior and corresponding social action remain great (...) as well as obvious. In this paper, I propose that a new, non-standard and non-propositional logic of real processes, Logic in Reality (LIR) grounded in physics applies to the science and philosophy of these narratives and helps to explicate them. Given the ecological role of organizations and institutions, reference is often made to organizational or institutional logics as guides to ecological practice. This paper suggests that these logics are either too abstract or too informal to have an impact in a conflictual world. Recognition of the suggested new, transdisciplinary logical dimension of ecological processes may provide credibility and support to new initiatives in ecology and its philosophy. (shrink)

Over the past several decades environmental ethics has grown markedly, normative ethics having provided essential grounding in assessing human treatment of the environment. Even a systematic approach, such as Paul Taylor’s, in a sense tells the environment how it is to be treated, whether that be Earth’s ecosystem or the universe itself. Can the environment, especially the ecosystem, as understood through the study of ecology, in turn offer normative and applied ethics any edification? The study of ecology has (...) certainly increased awareness of the fact that it is not possible for a moral agent within the ecosystem to step outside its intricate mesh of actions and events, of causes and effects. That is, absolutely everything that an agent can do can have some, often unforeseeable, outcome in the environment. An incompletely snuffed-out match tossed out a car window can cause a forest fire, which causes biome destruction, which causes x, y, and z. In sum, the ecosystem can edify ethics in terms of the scope of ethics, which remains an unsettled, if too-often ignored, matter. By such an inclusive view of moral scope, as derived in part from ecology and as presented here, the scope of moral behavior would include—whether or not adventitiously—every action an agent may do. By this view, moral scope is, in essence, unlimited. The article offers some ramifications of this view of moral scope. (shrink)

Evidence that humans play a dominant role in most ecosystems forces scientists to confront systems that contain factors transgressing traditional disciplinary boundaries. However, it is an open question whether this state of affairs should encourage interdisciplinary exchange or integration. With two case studies, we show that exchange between ecologists and economists is preferable, for epistemological and policy-oriented reasons, to their acting independently. We call this “exchange gain.” Our case studies show that theoretical exchanges can be less disruptive to current theory (...) than commonly thought. Valuable interdisciplinary exchange does not necessarily require disciplinary breakdown. (shrink)

There has recently been considerable discussion of the relative merits of deep ecology and ecofeminism, primarily from an ecofeminist perspective. I argue that the essential ecofeminist charge against deep ecology is that deep ecology focuses on the issue of anthropocentrism (i.e., human-centeredness) rather than androcentrism (i.e., malecenteredness). I point out that this charge is not directed at deep ecology’s positive or constructive task of encouraging an attitude of ecocentric egalitarianism, but rather at deep ecology's negative (...) or critical task of dismantling anthropocentrism. I outline a number of problems that can attend not only the ecofeminist critique of deep ecology, but also comparable critiques that proceed from a broad range of social and political perspectives. I then proceed to argue that deep ecology’s concem with anthropocentrism is entirely defensible-and defensible in a way that should be seen as complementing and expanding the focus of radical social and political critiques rather thanin terms of these approaches versus deep ecology. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThe crisis of European sciences in Husserl’s late work diagnoses Galilean science as specifically and necessarily losing touch with the intuitive evidence that would legitimate it due to its reliance on a formal-mathematical conceptual apparatus. While the vast majority of Husserl’s late work was focussed on a critique of the formal-mathematical paradigm of the physical science of nature, at several points the possibility of biology as the exemplary science is raised to suggest that the lack of a reliance on formal-mathematical (...) conceptual language would mean that a systemic crisis would not occur in such a case. This investigation considers the grounds for the expectation that biology would not engender a crisis, suggests that a paradigmatic role for ecology would more adequately address this expectation, and finally claims that the question of the relation between a specific exemplary science and transcendental phenomenology is not fully resolved even in this case. (shrink)

Recently, Dollimore criticized our claim that Organizational Ecology is not a Darwinian research program. She argued that Organizational Ecology is merely an incomplete Darwinian program and provided a suggestion as to how this incompleteness could be remedied. Here, we argue that Dollimore’s suggestion fails to remedy the principal problem that Organizational Ecology faces and that there are good reasons to think of the program as deeply incompatible with Darwinian thinking.

Prediction is an important aspect of scientific practice, because it helps us to confirm theories and effectively intervene on the systems we are investigating. In ecology, prediction is a controversial topic: even though the number of papers focusing on prediction is constantly increasing, many ecologists believe that the quality of ecological predictions is unacceptably low, in the sense that they are not sufficiently accurate sufficiently often. Moreover, ecologists disagree on how predictions can be improved. On one side are the (...) ‘theory-driven’ ecologists, those who believe that ecology lacks a sufficiently strong theoretical framework. For them, more general theories will yield more accurate predictions. On the other are the ‘applied’ ecologists, whose research is focused on effective interventions on ecological systems. For them, deeper knowledge of the system in question is more important than background theory. The aim of this paper is to provide a philosophical examination of both sides of the debate: as there are strengths and weaknesses in both approaches to prediction, a pluralistic approach is best for the future of predictive ecology. (shrink)

Deep ecologists have criticized reform environmentalists for not being sufficiently radical in their attempts to curb human exploitation of the nonhuman world. Ecofeminists, however, maintain that deep ecologists, too, are not sufficiently radical, for they have neglected the cmcial role played by patriarchalism in shaping the cultural categories responsible for Western humanity’s domination of Nature. According to eco-feminists, only by replacing those categories-including atomism, hierarchalism, dualism, and androcentrism - can humanity learn to dweIl in harmony with nonhuman beings. After reviewing (...) the eco-feminist critique both of reform environmentalism and of deep ecology, I sketch a critical dialogue between eco-feminism and deep ecology. (shrink)

New Blackfriars, Volume 103, Issue 1104, Page 220-233, March 2022.

Environmental theory and practice can benefit greatly from Emmanuel Levinas’ non-ontological philosophy of the Other in order to address the current global environmental crisis. From this viewpoint, this article focuses on 2 major positions within deep ecology. We discuss the significance of transitioning from one of them, which represents biocentric responsibility, to the other, which seeks to achieve environmental justice by challenging the hegemony of institutionalised environmentalism. In Levinasian terms, this is represented by moving from the anarchic realm of (...) ethics (face-to-face) to the totalising realm of politics (humanity), where the naked face of the Other becomes visible in the presence of a Third, and decision-making and concrete disputes resolution becomes necessary. Within this framework, historical and current inequalities compel the global North to degrow in order to allow the Others to weather the consequences of resource overconsumption and inequality. (shrink)

This article explores the influence of Spinozism on the deep ecology movement and on new materialism. It questions the stance of supporters of the DEM because their ecosophies unwittingly anthropomorphise the more-than-human-world. It suggests that instead of humanising the ‘natural’ world, morality should be naturalised, that is, that the object of human expression of ethics should be the more-than-human world. Moreover, the article discusses Deleuze’s Spinozism that informs new materialism and argues that stripping the human of its ontological privilege (...) does not deprive the human animal from its ethico-normative distinctiveness. Implications of the discussion for an education aimed at cultivating human sensibilities are explored. (shrink)

Despite claims to the contrary, the science of ecology has a long history of building theories. Many ecological theories are mathematical, computational, or statistical, though, and rarely have attempts been made to organize or extrapolate these models into broader theories. The Theory of Ecology brings together some of the most respected and creative theoretical ecologists of this era to advance a comprehensive, conceptual articulation of ecological theories. The contributors cover a wide range of topics, from ecological niche theory (...) to population dynamic theory to island biogeography theory. Collectively, the chapters ably demonstrate how theory in ecology accounts for observations about the natural world and how models provide predictive understandings. It organizes these models into constitutive domains that highlight the strengths and weaknesses of ecological understanding. This book is a milestone in ecological theory and is certain to motivate future empirical and theoretical work in one of the most exciting and active domains of the life sciences. (shrink)

Contemporary capitalism is caught in a dual crisis of economy and ecology. Central to both dimensions of this crisis is the issue of growth. On the one hand, capitalist economies must exhibit perpetual growth in order to function properly. On the other hand, the expansion of capitalist production and consumption ultimately interferes with the processes of natural growth that we find within the domain of ecology. Parallax of Growth explores the ideas of economy and ecology and the (...) factors that have put them on a collision course. Among other things, the book aims to explain why our current mode of economic organization seems to be inherently committed to perpetual growth. A key answer, argues Bjerg, is that contemporary capitalism is characterized by an inherent ′debt drive′, whereby the creation of money through the issuance of commercial bank credit has locked our economy in a vicious circle of forced growth and increasing debt. Parallax of Growth is not a catalogue of solutions to the ecological or the economic crisis. The book aims to shift the inquiry from ‘what shall we do?’ to ‘why have we not already done it?’ In order to address the challenges of our contemporary times of crisis, it is not enough to point out all the different reasons why perpetual economic growth is impossible and unsustainable. We need to understand how the idea of growth is deeply ingrained in the ideology as well as the organization of our society. The book aims to open the space for philosophical thinking about this important issue. (shrink)

Forms characteristic of the earth itself are inherent in the design of man. Man's being emerged out of a cosmic matrix whose morphic aspects man himself expresses. These forms and their functional interrelationships are the very conditions of consciousness. This paper proposes that the relationship between human consciousness and its complete environment should be the subject matter of an emerging discipline, the ecology of consciousness. Constructs useful in the ecology of plants and animals should be coordinated to psychological (...) constructs. These coordinating constructs should be based upon study of the most pervasive morphic regularities at the biophysical level. An analysis of the design of man suggests many possibilities, especially when one considers the known neurophysiological and biochemical conditioners of consciousness. Educational (experiential) strategies for the transformation of consciousness should also be explored. These might include the manipulation of variables such as volume, duration, and intensity of sensory stimulation, including various combinations of modalities. A systematic effort should be made to state the fundamental problems to which a scientific ecology of consciousness might address itself. New methods must be devised. A preliminary program for an ecology of consciousness is proposed. (shrink)

Journal of Religious Ethics, Volume 49, Issue 4, Page 768-792, December 2021.

Pantheism is a metaphysical and religious position. Broadly defined it is the view that (1) "God is everything and everything is God ... the world is either identical with God or in some way a self-expression of his nature" (H.P. Owen). Similarly, it is the view that (2) everything that exists constitutes a 'unity' and this all-inclusive unity is in some sense divine (A. MacIntyre). I begin with an account of what the pantheist's ethical position is formally likely to be (...) (e.g. objectivist etc.). I then discuss the relationship between pantheism and ecology in the context of the search for the metaphysical and ethical foundations for an ecological ethic. It is claimed that it is no accident that pantheism is often looked to for such foundations. (shrink)

Presents a provocatively anthropocentric analysis of the way forward for green politics and environmental movements, exposing the deficiencies and contradictions of green approaches to post-modern politics and deep ecology. This title available in eBook format. Click here for more information . Visit our eBookstore at: www.ebookstore.tandf.co.uk.

We examine the evolution of the concept of stability in community ecology, arguing that biologists have moved from an emphasis on biotic communities characterized by static balance, to one of dynamic balance (returning to equilibrium after perturbation), to the current concept of stability as persistence. Using Wimsatt's (1987) analysis of how false models can often lead to better ones, we argue that failed attempts to link complexity with stability have significant heuristic value for community ecologists. Nevertheless, we argue that, (...) (A) because there is no common characteristic that stability terms presuppose, community ecology might be better served by abandoning the concept of stability and by employing instead specific terms such as 'persistence', 'resistance', and 'variability'. (B) The current emphasis (of stability terms) on persistence of species provides little basis for explaining possible mechanisms that might account for persistence. (shrink)

How has the concept of wild nature changed over the millennia? And what have been the environmental consequences? In this broad-ranging book Max Oelschlaeger argues that the idea of wilderness has reflected the evolving character of human existence from Paleolithic times to the present day. An intellectual history, it draws together evidence from philosophy, anthropology, theology, literature, ecology, cultural geography, and archaeology to provide a new scientifically and philosophically informed understanding of humankind's relationship to nature. Oelschlaeger begins by examining (...) the culture of prehistoric hunter-gatherers, whose totems symbolized the idea of organic unity between humankind and wild nature, and idea that the author believes is essential to any attempt to define human potential. He next traces how the transformation of these hunter-gatherers into farmers led to a new awareness of distinctions between humankind and nature, and how Hellenism and Judeo-Christianity later introduced the unprecedented concept that nature was valueless until humanized. Oelschlaeger discusses the concept of wilderness in relation to the rise of classical science and modernism, and shows that opposition to "modernism" arose almost immediately from scientific, literary, and philosophical communities. He provides new and, in some cases, revisionist studies of the seminal American figures Thoreau, Muir, and Leopold, and he gives fresh readings of America's two prodigious wilderness poets Robinson Jeffers and Gary Snyder. He concludes with a searching look at the relationship of evolutionary thought to our postmodern effort to reconceptualize ourselves as civilized beings who remain, in some ways, natural animals. (shrink)

In an earlier article published in this journal I challenge Reydon and Scholz’s (2009) claim that Organizational Ecology is a non-Darwinian program. In this reply to Reydon and Scholz’s subsequent response, I clarify the difference between our two approaches denoted by an emphasis here on the careful application of core Darwinian principles and an insistence by Reydon and Scholz on direct biological analogies. On a substantive issue, they identify as being the principal problem for Organizational Ecology, namely, the (...) inability to identify replicators and interactors “ of the right sort” in the business domain; this is also shown to be easily addressed with reference to empirical studies of business populations. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis article presents a philosophy of science for ecology – deep naturalism – based on Roy Bhaskar’s transcendental realism. It includes a model of the emergence of ecosystems, analogous to...

We do not need ‘the earth’ as the space for encounter and cooperation between world religions in the way Moltmann suggests. Firstly, this fails to do justice to the contemporary situation concerning religious diversity: people from different religions have no problem in working together either for promoting ecological goals or for fighting them together. Within religions, there are often greater divergences between eco-friendly and anti-ecological adherents of that same religion. Secondly, Moltmann’s proposal misguidedly confuses boundaries of beliefs and boundaries of (...) grammar concerning religious diversity. Paying attention to religions as grammar provides a more accurate picture of the reality concerning world religions from an ecological perspective. In the final section of this article, I present some suggestions on moving forward in the debate about ecology from within this new perspective. We need to keep in mind that it is not religions but people who have opinions about ecology. The dialogue that needs to take place is not a high-level bureaucratic one between officials of different religions but one between people. In this grassroots-level discussion, it is important to listen to the other person rather than to consider him or her as a representative of his or her religion. We should not allow people to claim an entire religion for their position, dismissing others as revisionists. Religions are grammars that can express both eco-friendly and anti-ecological messages.Contribution: This article contributes to an in-depth understanding of religious diversity; it proves the usefulness of the distinction between grammar and beliefs in the study of religion and demonstrates this using the case of ecotheology as an example. (shrink)

In the 1970s, deep ecologists developed a radical normative argument for ‘ecological consciousness’ to challenge environmental and human exploita- tion. Such consciousness would replace the Enlightenment dualist ‘illusion’ with a post-Enlightenment holism that ‘fully integrated’ humanity within the ecosphere. By the 2000s, deep ecology had fallen out of favour with many green scholars. And, in 2014, it was described as a ‘spent force’. However, this decline has coincided with calls by influential advocates of ‘corporate social and environmental responsibility’ (CSER) (...) and ‘green growth’ (GG) that urge market actors to ensure voluntarily that social and environmental ‘problems are addressed holistically’. Given that CSER and GG have also been associ- ated with rent seeking, privatisation and reducing incomes of the poor, could it be that some of deep ecology’s once radical ideas today serve to legitimate forms of exploitation that they once decried? A critical realist perspective can problematise deep ecology’s highly normative response to exploitation and alienation. By settling ontological questions in favour of holism and promoting moral voluntarism, deep ecology failed to address how actors with different interests might adopt green ideas. This blind spot can be cured by focusing instead on the active deployment of ethics, morality, values, beliefs, ideas and knowledges by political actors in historically specific contexts. Both critical normative and critical realist modes of engaging with environmental values are important; however, at a time when holism and voluntarism are gaining influence, critical realism offers helpful insight into the uses and abuses of such values. (shrink)

본 연구는 인류세의 생태주의를 위한 논의로, 20세기의 생태주의에 대한 비판적 고찰을 통해 기후위기시대의 지속가능한 삶의 가능성을 살펴보는 것을 목적으로 한다. 우리는 생태 화로 갈 수밖에 없지만, 그 길은 인간과 자연이라는 이분법적 구조 안에서는 찾기 어렵다. 그 렇기 때문에 우리는 라투트가 제안하는 ANT에서 연대의 가능성을 살펴볼 것이다. 20세기의 녹색생태주의의 등장배경은 근대이후 급속도로 발전한 과학기술과 문명으로 인한 자연파괴 와 기후위기로 볼 수 있다. 그리하여 생태공동체는 위기를 야기한 주범으로 자본주의시스템 을 주목하며 자연친화적이고 여성주의적 삶을 회복하여 삶의 지속가능성을 기대하였다. 그러 나 20세기의 공동체는 인간과 (...) 자연이라는 선택지에서 갈등을 겪으며 딜레마를 벗어나지 못 한다는 한계를 가지고 있다. 특히 자연과 인간이라는 본질주의적 태도를 유지하기 때문이다. 따라서 본 연구는 인류세에 대한 이견을 수용하면서도 본질주의를 벗어나 얽힘과 연결을 통 한 집합체로서의 새로운 행위자의 행위성에 주목한다. 이는 인간 중심주의를 벗어나 자연 중 심주의를 선택하는 오류에 빠지지 않으면서, 비인간존재들을 주목하게 되는 방법이다. 이를 위한 라투르의 연결망 이론은 인류세의 존재론적 지도를 그려내기 위한 방법론으로 제시될 것이다. 또한 본 연구는 어떻게 연결되고 연대할 것인가의 물음에 라투르의 ANT를 방법론을 취하며, 번역의 과정과 그 과정이 이루어지는 장소성으로서의 ‘대지’에 관심을 둔다. 그리하 여 우리는 비로소 인류세의 새로운 공동체의 가능성을 엿볼 수 있게 되는 것이다. (shrink)

Volume 52, Issue 8, July 2020, Page 834-834.

This article investigates the characteristic attitudes of the Greeks toward nature, which formed the perceptual framework for their ecological thinking. Two major attitudes are discerned. One regarded nature as the theatre of the gods, whose interplay produced observed phenomena, but whose localization gave them particular, restricted roles. The other attitude viewed nature as the theatre of reason, and made the beginnings of ecological thought possible. The contributions of several Greek forerunners in the field of ecology are characterized. The most (...) consistent, balanced ecological writer in ancient Greece was Theophrastus, but his conception of an autonomous nature, interacting with man, was overshadowed in the history of ancient and medieval thought by the anthropocentric teleology of Aristotle. (shrink)

Mechanical reductionism, which deals entirely with homogeneous variables, will constrain and enable the activities of richly heterogeneous living systems, but it cannot determine their outcomes. Such indeterminism owes to problems with dimensionality, dynamical logic, intractability, and insufficiency. The order in any living structure arises via an historical series of contingencies that were selected endogenously by stable autocatalytic processes in tandem with, and usually in opposition to, conventional external influences (natural selection). The development of living communities thereby resembles a Heraclitean dialectic (...) between processes that build up and those that tear down. Investigating this unconventional dynamic requires metaphysical assumptions that are complementary to those that have guided science over the past three centuries. The new dynamics can be represented in terms of weighted networks of interacting processes, which facilitate the statement of testable hypotheses. Network analysis thereby implements and tests ideas that heretofore could only be addressed as verbal propositions. (shrink)

In this chapter, we analyze the relationships between the Internet and its users in terms of situated cognition theory. We first argue that the Internet is a new kind of cognitive ecology, providing almost constant access to a vast amount of digital information that is increasingly more integrated into our cognitive routines. We then briefly introduce situated cognition theory and its species of embedded, embodied, extended, distributed and collective cognition. Having thus set the stage, we begin by taking an (...) embedded cognition view and analyze how the Internet aids certain cognitive tasks. After that, we conceptualize how the Internet enables new kinds of embodied interaction, extends certain aspects of our embodiment, and examine how wearable technologies that monitor physiological, behavioral and contextual states transform the embodied self. On the basis of the degree of cognitive integration between a user and Internet resource, we then look at how and when the Internet extends our cognitive processes. We end this chapter with a discussion of distributed and collective cognition as facilitated by the Internet. (shrink)

Abstract - Evolutionary, ecological and ethical studies are, at the same time, specific scientific disciplines and, from an historical point of view, structurally linked domains of research. In a context of environmental crisis, the need is increasingly emerging for a connecting epistemological framework able to express a common or convergent tendency of thought and practice aimed at building, among other things, an environmental policy management respectful of the planet’s biodiversity and its evolutionary potential. -/- Evolutionary biology, ecology and ethics: (...) at first glance, three different objects of research, three different worldviews and three different scientific communities. In reality, there are both structural and historical links between these disciplines. First, some topics are obviously common across the board. Second, the emerging need for environmental policy management has gradually but radically changed the relationship between these disciplines. Over the last decades in particular, there has emerged a need for an interconnecting meta-paradigm that integrates more strictly evolutionary studies, biodiversity studies and the ethical frameworks that are most appropriate for allowing a lasting co-evolution between natural and social systems. Today such a need is more than a mere luxury, it is an epistemological and practical necessity. -/- In short, the authors of this volume address some of the foundational themes that interconnect evolutionary studies, ecology and ethics. Here they have chosen to analyze a topic using one of these specific disciplines as a kind of epistemological platform with specific links to topics from one or both of the remaining disciplines. Michael Ruse’s chapter, for instance, elucidates some of the structural links between Darwinismand ethics. Ruse analyzes the Evolutionism vs. Creationism debate, emphasizing the risks run by scientists when they ideologize the scientific content of their studies. In the case of the contributions of Jean Gayon and Jean-Marc Drouin, which respectively deal with the disciplines of evolutionary biology and ecology, some central connections have been developed between these two disciplines, while reserving the option to consider in detail their topic in order to discover essential features ormeanings. Gayon analyzes the multilayered meanings of “chance” in evolutionary studies and the methodological implications that accompany such disparatemeanings. Froma similar analytical perspective, Drouin’s contribution focuses on the identification and critical evaluation of the different conceptions of time in ecology. Chance and time, factors of evolution in species and ecological systems, play a very important function in both disciplines, and these chapters help to capture their polysemous structure and development. Bryan Norton’s chapter, on adaptive environmental management, is set within an epistemological context where the Darwinian paradigm, ecological knowledge and ethical frameworks meet to give rise to practical, conservationist policies. In his contribution, Patrick Blandin pleads for the necessity of an eco-evolutionary ethics capable of fully encompassing humanity’s responsibility in the future determination of the biosphere’s evolutionary paths. Our value systems must recognize the predominant place that humanity has taken in the evolutionary history of the planet, and integrate the ethical ramifications of scientific advances in evolutionary and ecological studies. The chapter by J. Baird Callicott introduces us to a metaphorical ecological reversion with direct consequences for our moral conduct. If ecology showed that ecosystems are not organisms, recognizing organisms as a kind of ecosystem could be the basis for a new post-modern ecological ethics that lays the foundation for a better moral integration of humans with the environment. The contributions of Robin Attfield and Tom Regan delve into some of the classical issues in environmental ethics, situating them within a broader ecological and evolutionary context. Attfield’s chapter tackles the confrontation between individualistic and ecologically holistic perspectives, their different approaches to the issue of intrinsic value, and their tangled relation to monism and pluralism. Regan’s contribution ponders the criteria that allow individual beings, human and non-human, to own moral rights, the role of the struggle for existence in the relationship between species, and the logical difficulties involved in attributing intrinsic value to collective entities (species, ecosystems). Catherine Larrère’s chapter discusses the opposition between two environmental and ethical worldviews with very different philosophical centers of gravity: nature and technology. These opposing perspectives have direct consequences not only for the perception of the problems at hand and for what entities are deemed morally significant, but also for the proposed solutions. -/- To set out some foundational events in the history of evolutionary biology, ecology and environmental ethics is a first necessary step towards a clarification of their major epistemological orientations. On the basis of this inevitably nonexhaustive history, it will be possible to better position the work of the different contributors, and to build a meta-paradigm, i.e. a connecting epistemological framework resulting from one common or convergent tendency of thought and practice shared by different disciplines. (shrink)

This article charts a path between those who champion the culture concept and those who think it dangerous. This path navigates between two positions: realists who adopt realist conceptions of both the culture concept and the category of cultural groups, and fictionalists who see such efforts as just creative and fictional extrapolation. Developing the fictionalist position, I suggest it overstates the case against realism: there is plenty of room for realist positions that produce well-grounded empirical studies of cultural groups. Nonetheless, (...) I stress the importance of one element of the fictionalist critique: that the choice of ontology can lead to downstream harm. Developing an extended case study around the work of the anthropologist Julian Steward, I show how ontological decision making is an important element of contemporary scientific and policymaking work. I conclude by arguing that greater attention should be paid both to the processes by which ontologies are adopted and the potential consequences that may result. (shrink)

My main point is that the creation of a free public time implies the creation of a democratic collective inspired by the project of social ecology. The first and second parts of this article focus on the modern social phenomena correlated to the general crisis and the emergence of the Internet Age (Castells, 2012). The third and fourth parts focus on new significations that seem to inspire modern social movements and the challenges that modern democratic ecological collectivities face. I (...) use the term “social ecology” as defined by Murray Bookchin: “Social ecology is based on the conviction that nearly all of our present ecological problems originate in deep-seated social problems” (Bookchin, 2006, p. 19). And I use the term “democracy” exclusively in the original, true meaning, of direct democracy where society is self-governed by the equal participation of every individual to political decisions and functions, as opposed to a modern representative democracy or republic, where political decisions rest in the hands of an oligarchy. In this sense, a truly democratic political collectivity is a truly ecological collectivity and vice versa. (shrink)