one answer to the inevitable paradox which Dale highlights, is to suggest that we just need to throw the concept of nature out full stop. My reading of much of the fascinating debate which has gone on round this on the list would be that this urge we often have to aggregate all sorts of stuff together - tigers, elephants, mudslides, and of course for many, everything humans do - together under one concept - nature, is precisely the soruce of the confusion. these are perhaps simply not phenomena which can be aggregated in this way with a concept which is always simultaneously empirical and normative. There's a very entertaining and in my view persuasive argument for htis in Bruno Latour's Politics of Nature (he refers to nature early on as 'that blend of Greek politics, French Cartesianism and American parks') out in English in I think 2004, perhaps 2003, and I think harvard UP.
Mat > there is a large literature in environmental ethics that bears on > the 'humans are part of nature' claim (it doesn't take a philosopher to > see how quickly such claims lead to paradox). those who are interested > might start with an excellent recent paper by paul moriarity, presented > to the annual environmental ethics workshop in allespark, colorado, > just last week. url: > http://www.environmentalphilosophy.org/Moriarty.pdf > > dj > > ********************** > Dale Jamieson > Professor of Environmental Studies and Philosophy > New York University > Steinhardt School, HMSS > 246 Greene Street, Suite 300 > New York NY 10003-6677 > 212-998-5429 (voice) 212-995-4832 (fax) > http://www.esig.ucar.edu/HP_dale.html > > "Kill a man, and you are a murderer. Kill millions of men, and you are > a conquerer. Kill everyone, and you are a god."--Jean Rostand > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: David Levy <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Date: Saturday, June 4, 2005 2:34 pm > Subject: Re: Strange request for leads > >> A bit of a tangent but...Adil's comments prompted me to mention this: >> >> The question of whether humans are a part of 'nature' is discussed >> in a >> recent (June 2005) special section (edited by yours truly!) of >> "Organization and Environment" honoring the 15th anniversary of >> the >> publication of Bill McKibben's "The end of nature". >> >> cheers, >> David >> >> -- >> David Levy >> Professor, Department of Management >> University of Massachusetts, Boston >> 100 Morrissey Blvd., Boston, MA 02125, USA >> Tel: 617-287-7860 >> http://www.faculty.umb.edu/david_levy/ >> >> >> >
