The Presence of Nature: A Study in Phenomenology and Environmental Philosophy

176 Pages·2009·1.317 MB·English

by  Simon P. James (auth.)

The Presence of Nature
Also by Simon P. James
ZEN BUDDHISM AND ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS (2004)
BUDDHISM, VIRTUE AND ENVIRONMENT (with David E. Cooper, 2005)
The Presence of Nature
A Study in Phenomenology and
Environmental Philosophy
Simon P. James
Durham University, UK
© Simon P. James 2009
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2009 978-0-230-22236-6
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10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09
Contents
Acknowledgements vi
Abbreviations vii
Introduction 1
1 Our Place in Nature 16
1.1 Being-in-the-world 16
1.2 Involvement 21
1.3 Inherence 30
2 Animal Minds 38
2.1 Cross-species intersubjectivity 38
2.2 The problem of animal minds 43
2.3 The lives of animals 55
3 Nature’s Value and Other Obsessions 65
3.1 How nature matters 65
3.2 Technology 69
3.3 The hegemony of values-thinking 80
4 Why Conserve Nature? 90
4.1 Phenomenology and moral normativity 90
4.2 Selfless attention to nature 103
4.3 Responses to some objections 109
5 Beyond the Human 117
5.1 Realism and anthropocentrism 117
5.2 The alterity of nature 120
5.3 The transhuman nature of perception 136
Conclusion 148
Bibliography 156
Index 163
v
Acknowledgements
In writing this book, I have benefited from the help of many friends
and colleagues. I am especially grateful to Alex Carruth for reading
through a draft of the entire manuscript and for making a number of
suggestions that greatly improved the finished product. But I would
also like to extend special thanks to David E. Cooper for his encour-
agement and advice, and for the many, characteristically perceptive
comments he made on several draft chapters. I am indebted to
Matthew Ratcliffe, Helen Curry, Alison Stone, Wayne Martin, Charles
Brown, Wolfram Hinzen, Liz McKinnell, Amanda Taylor and Ian
Kidd for the feedback they provided on pieces of work that eventu-
ally made their way into the final manuscript, and I am also grateful
to Priyanka Gibbons, at Palgrave Macmillan, for the help and advice
she has given me throughout the writing process.
Material from this book has been aired at talks I have given at the
universities of Durham, Lancaster and Liverpool, at conferences in
Oregon, Colorado and Dundee, and at workshops at the universities
of Durham and Edinburgh. I would like to thank the audiences at
these events for providing me with so much food for thought.
Some of the material in this book has been published elsewhere. I am
grateful to White Horse Press, the publishers of Environmental Values,
for granting permission to reprint parts of my article ‘Phenomenology
and the Problem of Animal Minds’ in Chapter 2. Moreover, Chapter
5 is loosely based on my article ‘Merleau-Ponty, Metaphysical Realism
and the Natural World’, and I would like to thank Maria Baghramian,
the editor of theInternational Journal of Philosophical Studies, for grant-
ing permission to reprint this material.
Finally, I would like to extend a heartfelt thanks to Mum and
Carole for all those Saturday and Sunday morning walks with
Winston and Lucy on Puttenham Common. If I hadn’t had a chance
to spend so much time out in nature as a child, I doubt I would have
had so much time for it as an adult.
vi
Abbreviations
Works by Husserl
CES The Crisis of the European Sciences and Transcendental
Phenomenology: An Introduction to Phenomenological
Philosophy, trans. D. Carr (Evanston: Northwestern
University Press, 1970).
Works by Heidegger
BT Being and Time, trans. J. Macquarrie and E. Robinson
(Oxford: Blackwell, 1997).
BW Basic Writings, D. F. Krell (ed.) (Oxford: Blackwell, 1996).
CP Contributions to Philosophy (From Enowning), trans.
P. Emad and K. Maly (Bloomington: Indiana University
Press, 1999).
DT Discourse on Thinkinggg, trans. J. M. Anderson and
E. H. Freund (NY: Harper & Row, 1966).
FCM The Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics: World, Finitude,
Solitude, trans. W. McNeill and N. Walker (Bloomington:
Indiana University Press, 1995).
IM An Introduction to Metaphysics, trans. R. Mannheim (New
Haven: Yale University Press, 1959).
N Nietzsche, trans. F. A. Capuzzi (San Francisco: Harper &
Row, 1979–87). (Four volumes: N1, N2, etc.)
Pa Pathmarks, trans. W. McNeill (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1998).
O Ontology – The Hermeneutics of Facticity, trans. J. van Buren
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999).
PLT Poetry, Language, Thoughtt, trans. A. Hofstadter
(NY: Harper & Row, 1971).
QCT The Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays, trans.
W. Lovitt (NY: Harper & Row, 1977).
vii
viii Abbreviations
Works by Sartre
BN Being and Nothingness, trans. H. E. Barnes
(London: Routledge, 1991).
Works by Merleau-Ponty
BWr Basic Writings, T. Baldwin (ed.) (London: Routledge, 2004).
EP In Praise of Philosophy, trans. J. Wild and J. Edie (Evanston:
Northwestern University Press, 1970).
N Nature: Course Notes from the Collège de France,
compiled by D. Seglard, trans. R. Vallier
(Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2003).
PP Phenomenology of Perception, trans. C. Smith
(London: Routledge, 1996).
PrP The Primacy of Perception and Other Essays on
Phenomenological Psychology, the Philosophy of Art, History
and Politics, trans. J. M. Edie (Evanston: Northwestern
University Press, 1964).
S Signs, trans. R. C. McCleary (Evanston: Northwestern
University Press, 1964).
SB The Structure of Behaviourr, trans. A. L. Fisher
(London: Methuen, 1963).
SNS Sense and Non-Sense, trans. H. L. Dreyfus and
P. A. Dreyfus (Evanston: Northwestern University Press,
1964).
VI The Visible and the Invisible, trans. A. Lingis (Evanston:
Northwestern University Press, 1968).
WP The World of Perception, trans. O. Davis (Routledge:
London, 2004).
Introduction
Environmental philosophers have had a great deal to say about
nature as it has been conceived by scientists. They have had much
to say about nature as it has been conceived by other philosophers.
But they have had comparatively little to say about nature as we
experience it in the living of our lives. In the following, I argue that
this lack of attention to nature-as-experienced is a cause for regret,
and not just for rhetorical reasons, not just because it makes the
discipline of environmental philosophy seem disagreeably abstract
and high-flown. I contend that this inattention to experience is a
bad thing because environmental philosophy that fails to connect
with our lived experience of nature is, more often than not, bad
philosophy.
If the first general aim of this book is to challenge a popular,
overly abstract approach to environmental philosophy, its second
is to show, through example, the merits of an alternative approach.
My second general aim, then, is to do environmental philosophy by
paying close attention – closer than is usual – to how we experience
the natural world. Accordingly, I engage not just with the works of
philosophers, but also with the testimonies of a diverse collection
of naturalists, scientists, poets and explorers – from the writings of
J. A. Baker to the poetry of William Wordsworth, and from the pas-
sionate prose of Henry David Thoreau to the more sober reflections
of modern-day scientists.
Taking such an experience-focused approach, I develop original
accounts of (1) what the natural world is, and (2) how we oughtt to
act towards it. And along the way, I hope to cast new light on some
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