Earth Hour is one of the most popular environmental events in Vietnam. However, looking at the rise in electricity consumption in the country, it is impossible to feel its impact.

_Explores the ancient and perennial notion of the four elements as environmental ideas._.

Although Heidegger thinks cybernetics is the “supreme danger,” he also thinks that it harbours within itself poiēsis, the “saving power.” This article providesa justification of this position through an analysis of its relation to Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela’s Santiago theory of cognition and James Lovelock and Lynn Margulis’ Gaia theory. More specifically, it argues that Maturana and Varela’s criticism of cybernetics and their concomitant theory of “autopoiesis” constitutes the philosophical disclosure of “Being itself,” and that the extension of Santiago (...) theory’s various different conceptualizations of poiēsis to Gaia theory makes possible the rise of the “saving power.”. (shrink)

Although the words “nature” and “ecology” have to be qualified in discussing either Daoism or Heidegger, the author argues that a different and potentially helpful approach to questions of nature, ecology, and environmental ethics can be articulated from the works of Martin Heidegger and the early Daoist philosophers Laozi (Lao-Tzu) and Zhuangzi (Chuang-Tzu). Despite very different cultural contexts and philosophical strategies, they bring into play the spontaneity and event-character of nature while unfolding a sense of how to be responsive to (...) the world through a practice of “non-coercive-activity” (wuwei) and “letting be” (Gelassenheit). Significant ecological implications can be drawn from the recognition of nature reinterpreted as dao (way) and as Sein (being). The openness and receptiveness of experiencing the world as being-under-way suggests what might be called a “pluralistic holism,” involving the recognition of both the interconnectedness and the unique singularity of things, and the possibility of being responsive to the phenomena themselves in their mutuality as wellas in their particular givenness. (shrink)

Bands -- Stripes -- Ripples -- Circles -- Spots -- Grains -- Forks -- Branches -- Webs -- Curves -- Ribbons -- Swirls -- Spikes -- Grids -- Cracks.

In this essay, the author considers how one particular faith community, contemporary Judaism, in all its internal diversity, has reflected on the issue of how far the project of genetic intervention ought to go when the subject of the future - embodied, willful, and vulnerable - is at stake. Knowing, naming, and acting to change is not only a narrative of faith traditions; it is a narrative of biological science as well.

Many still seem confident that the kind of semantic theory Putnam once proposed for natural kind terms is right. This paper seeks to show that this confidence is misplaced because the general idea underlying the theory is incoherent. Consequently, the theory must be rejected prior to any consideration of its epistemological, ontological or metaphysical acceptability. Part I sets the stage by showing that falsehoods, indeed absurdities, follow from the theory when one deliberately suspends certain devices Putnam built into it , (...) presumably in order to block such entailments. Part II then raises the decisive issue of at what cost these devices do the job they need to do. It argues that - apart from possessing no other motivation than their capacity to block the consequences derived in Part I - they only fulfil this blocking function if they render the theory unable to deal with fiction and related 'make-believe' activities. Part III indicates the affinity Putnam's account has with the classically 'denotative' view of meaning, and thus how its weaknesses may be seen as a variant of the classical weakness of 'denotative' approaches. It concludes that the theory is a conceptual muddle. (shrink)

This paper is an adventure of ideas which draws on the 'magic—magician' metaphor of medieval India to define the current existential predicament of the world. The author sets an agenda for reprioritization for restoring the imbalance in the fragmented human consciousness. This, the paper suggests, can be done by a gradual return to the subjective causal source of all our problems. The waning of the Objective Age created by science-technology-industrialism has led to a 'mutilating assimilative im balance' in this world. (...) The author urges the readers to strive for a subjective metanoia to counteract the objective paranoia of our times. (shrink)

One of the paradoxes of the Culture War is that opposites conspire with each other against the rest of us. We are offered an impoverished, narrow conception of reason and knowledge, proposing a stark choice to the rest of us: approach life’s important questions through science, or turn to religion. This was a false choice two hundred years ago, and it remains so today.

Sallis situates himself within the discourse of the “end of metaphysics” that in various idioms traversed the twentieth century. This lineage has variously declared the fulfillment and completion of the epoch of Western philosophy as metaphysics, exposed metaphysics to the discipline of the question, inverted its hierarchical structure with a view to overcoming the privileges of disembodied reason. Yet, even within such a lineage of systematic exhaustion and often spectacular provocations, John Sallis’s work stands out for its radical traits. First (...) and foremost, for the unrelenting interrogation of the things below. His deconstructive gesture does not simply rest on textual encounters, but crucially also on the frequentation of the things of sense and the cultivation of intimacy with them. (shrink)

Since its inception in the years following World War II, the green revolution has been defended, not just as a technical program designed to alleviate world hunger, but on moral grounds as a program to achieve world peace. In this paper, I dispute the moral claim to a politics of peace, arguing instead that the green revolution is warist in its treatment of the environment and indigenous communities, and that the agricultural practices that the green revolution was designed to supplant—principally (...) indigenous women’s agriculture—are forms of ecological peacemaking, akin to pacifism. I argue, as well, that the warist intentions of the green revolution are characteristic of a form of domination called developmentalism. A complete understanding of domination necessitates linking developmentalism with other forms of domination such as racism, sexism, and naturism. (shrink)

Philosophers are uniquely qualified to negotiate a balance between the reflective potential of globalization and the great routine powers of nations, states, tribes, and families. Here's how we can do it: we can teach the difference between playing a game and choosing a game. From time immemorial people of all tribes and cultures have marked a sharp distinction between those individuals deemed qualified by age, expertise, or status to choose or write the rules, and those other, lesser individuals who are (...) obliged merely to obey those rules. This is the traditional difference between a person, on the one hand, and a utensil, on the other: persona est sui iuris; servus non est persona ("A person chooses its own laws; a slave is not a person"). Persons, but not utensils such as shoes, have, and deserve, good will. To a person, a culture is a means of creating a sustainable humane environment. To a culture, a person is a means for the culture to replicate itself. Placing culture first is a tradition we can no longer afford to maintain, because it makes enduring peace impossible. The purposes utensils can be made to serve have become too terrible (and, with the advent of global communication, too obvious) for the human race to endure, and the capacity of the voiceless to express themselves violently is increasing without limit. Hence we must create new traditions in which we teach all our children reflective thought, with which rules are pragmatically justified rather than unquestionable. To that end I propose to distinguish random, routine, and reflective thought and action. Each of these three levels of thought and action has its costs and its benefits; together they contain the entire range of human possibility. Three familiar philosophical concepts support my claim that reflective thought and action can and must be taught to and learned by all. (shrink)

It’s quite unlike anything else. One just gets the sense of a breadth and variety of philosophy that’s going on. I’m making a point of going on the whole to sessions in areas which aren’t close to my specialised scholarly interests and hearing people from countries I don’t normally encounter. One could stick to mainstream Anglo-American analytic philosophy – there’s enough of that going on here – but why come all this way for that?

In this article, we reflect on the conditions under which new technologies emerge in the Anthropocene and raise the question of how to conceptualize sustainable technologies therein. To this end, we explore an eco-centric approach to technology development, called biomimicry. We discuss opposing views on biomimetic technologies, ranging from a still anthropocentric orientation focusing on human management and control of Earth’s life-support systems, to a real eco-centric concept of nature, found in the responsive conativity of nature. This concept provides (...) the ontological and the epistemological condition for an eco-centric concept of biomimetic technologies in the Anthropocene. We distinguish five principles for this concept that can guide future technological developments. (shrink)

Earth consciousness involves an understanding of our relationship with earth. It involves the study of earth forms, their life processes and inherent needs. The concept has created a field of frameworks and knowledge systems permeating into the day to day lives of humans including their political-economic-cultural spaces. The expression earth consciousness can be interpreted in many ways to include human awareness of nature & its processes, or the bond with mother earth and all its forms (...) . Earth consciousness or the universal respect for nature and all of its forms is manifesting in different ways. The multidisciplinary approaches that build the idea of Earth consciousness have added much weight to building frameworks for protection & preservation. One can see an influence of cultural, ethical, legal, philosophical, religious, & spiritual perspectives in the realization of a deep & meaningful relationship between humans with nature. This document sheds light on the diverse frameworks evolved and evolving to give effect to the growing earth consciousness. Much emphasis also placed on the "Rights in Nature Framework" and the "Post 2020 Bio-diversity Framework". (shrink)