Until recently, the history of environmentalism was primarily a history of attention to place. In the United States, environmentalists have gotten rather good at protecting and managing particular places such as mountains, forests, and watersheds and specific resources such as trees, soil, wildlife, air, and water. Environmentalism has become an enormously popular social movement, with, by some measures, more than 80 percent of Americans considering themselves environmentalists. Thousands of organizations, ranging from local volunteer groups to national nonprofits, address issues as (...) diverse as open space, air and water pollution, biological diversity, environmental justice, and environmental effects on human health. The successes of this movement have been striking. Our National Parks, National Forests, and wilderness areas are touted as models for the world and are well complemented by state, municipal, and private protected areas. The Endangered Species Act successfully resolves many conflicts between rare creatures and development. Rivers have been cleaned up, and once-spurned urban waterfronts now draw real estate and tourism development. Americans drink cleaner water and breathe cleaner air than much of the rest of the world, and attempts to weaken regulatory frameworks are consistently met with public disapproval. (shrink)

Recently, 'ecocritics' have tried to show how literature might help us weather the global environmental crisis both emotionally and intellectually. Their arguments have been based, in part, on the assumption that despite its obvious strengths natural science has well-defined intellectual and ethical 'limits', and that environmental values are (therefore) best articulated by concerned humanists more in touch with the imagination. This essay addresses some of the problems faced by green humanists in their uneasy, mistrustful relationship with natural science, using passages (...) from Thoreau as touchstone texts and juxtaposing those passages with remarks made by Bachelard, Coleridge, Stevens, Nietzsche, and Kant. (shrink)

. The use of narrative to communicate and convey particular points of view in society has increasingly become the focus of academic attention in recent years. In particular, MacIntyre. (1985, 1988, 1990, 1999) has paid attention to the role of narrative in the conflict between different traditions when developing his virtue approach to ethics. Whilst there has been continued debate about the application of virtue approaches, some arguing that it is incompatible with business, I disagree and have already argued for (...) a form of virtue that will focus business on society’s needs rather than better business itself. Here I continue to develop the argument in two ways. First, I will explore the predominant business narrative and offer some comment on the ‘virtues’ that it promotes. However, rather than accepting this narrative, I want to challenge it with a narrative from the environmental tradition. I consider how adopting the virtues promoted by an environmental narrative it would shape business practices and challenge current business conventions. As a second step, I will focus on how we can change managers’ perceptions of business to reflect these environmentally based virtues. (shrink)

In the final chapter of his Ineffability and Religious Experience, Guy Bennett-Hunter proposes that the ineffable may be ‘bodied forth’ through works of art and ritual, and hence engage with our lives. By way of supporting this proposal, this paper discusses some relationships between experiences of music and of natural environments. It is argued that several aspects of musical experience encourage a sense of convergence or intimacy between human practice and nature. Indeed, these aspects suggest a codependence between culture and (...) nature. The paper continues by proposing that a sense of this co-dependence fosters the further sense of cultural and environmental experience as an integrated whole whose ‘ground’ must be entirely mysterious and ineffable. It is concluded that, if this is right, then music and other cultural practices indeed bring the ineffable into engagement with human life. (shrink)

El objetivo de este artículo es defender que la obra del filósofo norteamericano Henry Thoreau es importante actualmente para la reflexión ética sobre el medioambiente. En sus obras considera con frecuencia problemas que afectan a nuestro entorno natural, así como a toda la vida en general. La importancia de su pensamiento reside en su biocentrismo y en cómo a partir de él establece unos criterios éticos. Lejos de profundizar en la propuesta thoreauviana, este artículo pretende exponer sus principales cuestiones, desarrolladas (...) alrededor de los conceptos de ‘vida’ y ‘ wilderness’, para a continuación exponer su relevancia contemporánea a través de las interpretaciones opuestas de Philip Cafaro y Daniel Botkin, y de una propuesta actual: la ecología profunda. (shrink)

Define “patriotism” as love for one’s country and devotion to its well-being. This essay contends that patriotism thus defined is a virtue and that environmentalism is one of its most important manifestations. Patriotism, as devotion to particular places and people, can occur at various levels, from the local to the national. Knowing and caring about particular places and people and working to protect them is good for us and good for them and hence a good thing overall. Knowing and caring (...) and working less on behalf of more remote places and people is also good, since it allows us to focus our efforts, act effectively, and do more good in the world. Philosophical analyses of patriotism by Alasdair MacIntyre and Martha Nussbaum are complemented by the more “down to earth” understanding of the virtue presented here. While patriotism’s dangers are undeniable, so are the dangers stemming from lack of patriotism. The proper answer to bad patriotism is not cosmopolitanism, but good patriotism: the kind illustrated by environmental activists. (shrink)

Chrisoula Andreou's “No Avail Thesis” states that many environmentally-harmful conveniences and luxuries do not significantly contribute to human happiness, making the costs they incur largely a waste. The first half of this short paper affirms the ethical importance of this thesis, with special reference to global climate change. Growing evidence suggests that implementing efficiency measures will not be sufficient to allow humanity to avoid catastrophic climate change and that such measures will have to be supplemented by reductions in consumption itself. (...) Convincing people that they can reduce consumption without harming their wellbeing could open up the political space needed to successfully mitigate climate change. The second half of the paper explores the implications of Andreou's “shallow” route to accepting the “No Avails Thesis,” grounded in empirical research that suggests people's sense of material wellbeing is largely set through interpersonal comparisons. Psychological evidence for this shallowness does seem to provide reasons for a wider range of ethical theorists to consider the “No Avails Thesis,” beyond its usual advocates among ethical perfectionists. However, from a practical perspective, this human shallowness stands as an impediment to effective political action on climate change. So philosophers concerned to convince a wider public of the “No Avails Thesis” may find themselves advocating perfectionist methods designed to help individuals question conventional ideals of material wellbeing. One way or another, effective action to avert catastrophic climate change probably depends on cultivating more adult views of the proper role of consumption in a good human life. (shrink)

In this paper we explore material simplicity, defined as the virtue disposing us to act appropriately within the sphere of our consumer decisions. Simplicity is a conscientious and restrained attitude toward material goods that typically includes (1) decreased consumption and (2) a more conscious consumption; hence (3) greater deliberation regarding our consumer decisions; (4) a more focused life in general; and (5) a greater and more nuanced appreciation for other things besides material goods, and also for (6) material goods themselves. (...) It is to be distinguished from simple-mindedness, a return to nature, or poverty. Simplicity overlaps with traditional virtues such as temperance, frugality, and wisdom, and sustains and enables traditional virtues such as justice and generosity. Simplicity is a virtue because it furthers human flourishing, both individual and social, and sustains nature’s ecological flourishing. For analytic purposes, we consider six areas in which simplicity can make important contributions: (1) basic individual flourishing, (2) basic societal flourishing, (3) individual freedom or autonomy, (4) the acquisition of knowledge, (5) living meaningfully, and (6) preserving and protecting nonhuman beings. The proven failure of materialism to secure subjective happiness or objective flourishing argues for the practice of voluntary simplicity and for the radical reform of modern consumer societies. (shrink)

This paper presents a critique of a prevailing conception of the relation between moral reasoning and judgment on the one hand, and moral goodness on the other. I argue that moral reasoning is inescapably vulnerable to moral, as opposed to merely theoretical, failure. This, I argue, means that there is something deeply misleading in the way that Kant's moral theory, and some of its main rivals, have invited us to conceive of their subject matter.

In this open access book, Timothy Aylsworth and Clinton Castro draw on the deep well of Kantian ethics to argue that we have moral duties, both to ourselves and to others, to protect our autonomy from the threat posed by the problematic use of technology. The problematic use of technologies like smartphones threatens our autonomy in a variety of ways, and critics have only begun to appreciate the vast scope of this problem. In the last decade, we have seen a (...) flurry of books making “self-help” arguments about how we could live happier, more fulfilling lives if we were less addicted to our phones. But none of these authors see this issue as one involving a moral duty to protect our autonomy. (shrink)

In 1929, John Dewey said that “the problem of restoring integration and cooperation between man's beliefs about the world in which he lives and his beliefs about the values and purposes that should direct his conduct is the deepest problem of human life.” Using this as its theme, this article begins with an examination of Gilbert Harman's reasons for denying the existence of moral facts. It then presents an alternative account of the relationship between science and ethics, making use of (...) the writings of Dewey and Henry David Thoreau. For both Dewey and Thoreau, the dichotomy between a scientific approach to the world and an ethical approach to the world is a false one. The article explores the reasons for believing that the dichotomy is a false one, agreeing with Thoreau that there “is no exclusively moral law—there is no exclusively physical law.”. (shrink)

It is natural to assume that we would not be willing to compromise the environment if the conveniences and luxuries thereby gained did not have a substantial positive impact on our happiness. But there is room for skepticism and, in particular, for the thesis that we are compromising the environment to no avail in that our conveniences and luxuries are not having a significant impact on our happiness, making the costs incurred for them a waste. One way of defending the (...) no-avail thesis fits neatly with what I will call the exalted view , according to which the key to human happiness lies in the mental (or spiritual) realm rather than in the material realm. After considering this familiar approach to defending the no-avail thesis, I sketch out a very different approach—one that will, I hope, appeal to those who have doubts about the familiar line of defense. The alternative and novel approach builds on a strand of empirical research on (self-reports concerning) happiness that suggests that we are, in a way, quite shallow, and that our happiness depends on whether we are keeping up with the Joneses. I call this view concerning happiness the worldly view . My reasoning suggests that even if the current rift between exalted pictures of human nature and happiness, on the one hand, and worldly pictures of human nature and happiness, on the other, cannot be repaired, it need not hinder agreement on the plausibility of the no-avail thesis; rather, with the rift come two different routes to the same thesis. I conclude that we should take the no-avail thesis very seriously, and that evidence that we are shallow materialists need not be bad news for the environment(alist). (shrink)

This article considers conversations in and about education. To focus the discussion, it uses the scenario of a conversation between a trainee teacher and her mentor reflecting together on a lesson that the trainee has just taught. I begin by outlining the notion of reflective practice as popularised by Donald Schön, and show how, in the scenario, the reflective practice conversation leads to talk characterised by recourse to particular dominant discourses within education, and how this in turn can lead to (...) a certain voicelessness. I then consider what the possibilities for the reflective practice conversation might be, looking first at the Greek notion of parrhēsia and how this has been discussed in the work of Michel Foucault in contrast to other forms of talk such as rhetoric or chattering. I argue that, whilst the parrhēsiastic conversation may allow for the exploration of the relationships (between the mentor and the trainee, each participant and their words and a relationship of care for the self), such possibilities are fraught with difficulty. I then move to consider how such relationships might be developed through recognising the expressive aspects of language emphasised in Stanley Cavell's notion of passionate utterance. I first trace the development of Cavell's thought through John Austin's contrast in language between the constative and the performative. I then illustrate the idea of passionate utterance from the films Cavell describes as the ‘Hollywood comedies of remarriage’, and argue that the passionate utterance opens up opportunities for the kind of conversation in education that is itself educative. (shrink)

"Before the Voice of Reason is a phenomenological critique of reason grounded in our experience of the voices that already address us and summon us prior to the ...

_Provides a critique of reason, demanding that we take greater responsibility for nature and other people._.

This paper explores three current notions of literacy, which underpin the theorisation and practice of teaching and learning for both children and adults in England. In so doing, it raises certain problems inherent in these approaches to literacy and literacy education and shows how Stanley Cavell's notions of reading, and especially his reading of Thoreau's Walden , help to construct a notion not of literacy, but of being literate. The paper takes four themes central to Cavell's work in his The (...) senses of Walden : awakening; estrangement and familiarity; conviction; and the obligation to read, and argues that these ideas offer an approach to language, and an understanding of reading in particular, that is different from current iterations of literacy. Such ideas, though alien to current - mainly empirical - work within literacy studies, have a resonance for literacy research and education today. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to investigate how alternative land ethics of agricultural stakeholders may help explain recent land use changes. The paper first explores the historical development of the land ethic concept in the United States and how those ethics have impacted land use policy and use of private lands. Secondly, primary data gathered from semi-structured interviews of farmers, ranchers, and influential stakeholders are then analyzed using stakeholder analysis methods to identify major factors considered in land use decisions, (...) priorities of factors of each group, and to define relevant mental models describing each group’s view of the land ethic concept. Results show that these stakeholder groups prioritize land use factors qualitatively differently and possess strikingly different land ethics. It is concluded that shifts in stakeholder land ethics have contributed to recent land use changes. Lastly, we discuss how current agricultural policy sends mixed signals about preferred land use and the potential ramifications based on the different land ethics we’ve described. (shrink)

Drawing upon Nel Noddings’ contention that, if children are to be happy in schools, their teachers should also be happy, this paper tries to explore a way in which the obviously intimate but seemingly conflicting connections between students’ and teachers’ happiness can be understood from the viewpoint of Stanley Cavell’s reading of J. S. Mill. Mill’s conceptions of desire and pleasure are examined as a means of liberating the above connection from existing prioritization: that is, teachers’ or students’ happiness comes (...) first. The pursuit of happiness for both teachers and students is discussed, in the hopes of illuminating alternative images of teacher education. (shrink)

This article has an overall aim as follows: to develop an alternative understanding to a narrow view of education, and in particular teacher training—preparatory and continuing—in terms of economy, as well as the competencies needed for the teaching profession. It takes the view that such an alternative is or could be found in the ideas put forward by Paul Standish, where poetry, or a more poetic understanding of education, is necessary—particularly in regards to teacher training.

Drawing on themes found in James Marshall's writings on Nietzsche, the arts and the self, this paper explores the nature of influence in the arts and its relevance to education. It considers what Harold Bloom has called the ‘anxiety of influence’ and amplifies this in terms of broader questions concerning Emersonian self‐reliance. The particular twist these matters take in the lives of adolescents presents special problems for education in the arts—not least in view of the dangers of self‐deception, affectation and (...) pretentiousness—and raises in turn questions about the relation between high art and popular art. These matters connect also with questions concerning the kinds of vocabularies and ways of thought into which young people need to be initiated if they are to develop creatively and authentically. (shrink)

In his essay 'The Scandal of Skepticism', Stanley Cavell discusses aspects of the work of Emmanuel Levinas with a view to understanding how 'philosophical and religious ambitions so apparently different' as his own and those of Levinas can have led to 'phenomenological coincidences so precise'. The present paper explores themes of scepticism and alterity as these emerge in the work of these two increasingly influential philosophers. It shows education to be a sustained preoccupation in their work, crucially related to these (...) guiding themes. In the process it seeks to dispel certain assumptions regarding poststructuralism, on the one hand, and the religious implications of Levinas's thought, on the other. This lays the way for an account of the criticality of human being, of the significance of this for community, and of the demands this makes on education. (shrink)

In recent years, there has been an increased emphasis on learning outside the classroom (LOtC) in places such as in museums and art galleries, in forests, and by natural water courses; this has bec...

One of the major themes of discussion in the art and especially the literature of the 18th and 19th centuries was the body rather than the soul. In the beginning this seemed to be the case mostly because of the natural processes related to the transforming events of maturation and death of the human body and mind. However, towards the end of the 18th century and well into the 19th century, a certain shift took place from the common perspective on (...) the body to a rather scientific literary approach. Our attempt is to notice and make the necessary connections between the concepts of nature (both human and external/physical nature) and the innovative technologies implemented in the then society, with a later reference to the new accidental and commercial facets of death felt as destruction of nature especially in the work of the American Romantic writers Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau. Being aware that they are highly spoken of in view of their transcendentalism as a particular philosophy dealing with the bond between man and nature, we will slowly come to terms with this type of concerns and connect them to the conflicting reality of industrialization as a sudden and repressive phenomenon within the society of men. Finally our point is that this very phenomenon caused the two writers to make a historical detour and use their formation as naturalist thinkers in order to make sense of their century’s deaths and diseases. This is to say that even from a Romantic perspective, the concern for the body is surprisingly concrete, while these writers’ transcendentalist concerns for the soul are prolix though without substance. (shrink)

“It is this distancing of personal relationships, combined with their replacement by written contractual terms and conditions, which make the discussion of ethics within a corporate institutionalised context highly limited and problematic.’ The challenge is to find means of personalising modern corporations so as to encourage ethical behaviour. Atul K. Shah PhD ACA gained his doctorate from the London School of Economics and is Lecturer in the Department of Accounting and Financial Management, at the University of Essex, Wivenhoe Park, Colchester (...) CO4 3SQ; e‐mail [email protected]. This article was conceived while he was Visiting Assistant Professor at the College of Business, University of Maryland, USA. The author wishes to thank Dan Ostas, Lee Preston and Stephen Loeb for helpful comments on earlier drafts. (shrink)

This paper will critically reconsider the potential of Dewey’s pragmatist idea of security without foundation. There is some potential in his anti-foundationalism as a form of wisdom for living beyond the risk society. I shall argue that Deweyan critical thinking needs to be further reconstructed, and even to be destabilized, if it is to exercise its best possible power of transcendence. One way to do this is to open its boundaries towards the ‘East’, towards European poststructuralism as well as towards (...) East Asia, thereby destabilizing and transcending the limit of pragmatism. And I propose to do this through the mediation of Stanley Cavell’s rereading of Emerson’s and Thoreau’s American transcendentalism. (shrink)

The Kantian categorical imperative process of rational reflection and reasoned social discourse is theoretically capable of forming the moral environmental maxims applicable to business. This article argues that rational environmental discourse demands that business has an imperfect duty to develop relevant unbiased information, and perhaps to disseminate this information through participation in business-public coalitions. For the environmental problem, this “rationality” particularly concerns our obligations toward future generations and distant people while recognizing that they cannot participate in current discourse, and the (...) rules for gathering and assessing the evidence that should govern our environmental preservations and enhancements. Both these concerns demand certain scientific information requirements, as well as logical decision criteria that are perceived as stable across both overlapping generations, and affected peoples. The criteria for Rawls’ “considered moral judgments” are shown to apply to resolutions of these business-related ethical conundrums. In a way similar to Kant’s anthropological examinations of humanity’s antisocial behaviors, this article also examines various biases that inhibit this social reasoning. (shrink)

To view a work knowingly gives understanding but not hope Rorty, "The Necessity of Inspired Reading" I cannot count one. I know not the first letter of the alphabet. Thoreau, Walden.

In recent years restorative practice in schools has been heralded as a new paradigm for thinking about student behaviour. Its premise is to provide solutions to indiscipline, to restore relationships where there has been conflict or harm, and to give pupils a language with which to understand wrongdoing. This article offers a critique of practitioners’ use of scripts with which to facilitate the restorative conference, one of the key strategies of restorative practice. To do so I turn to J.L. Austin (...) and Stanley Cavell whose writing on performative and passionate utterance point to the educational importance of making room for freedom in speech and emotion, over performance. Indeed, it is through making room for negative emotion, or silence, as observed in Cavell’s reading of King Lear, that we can see an opening up of the possibilities present in restorative practice. (shrink)

La suposición de que una ética ambiental adecuada debe ser no-antropocéntrica es errónea. Hay dos formas de antropocentrismo: débil y fuerte, y el primero es suficiente para mantener una ética ambien¬tal. Sin embargo, la ética ambiental sí difiere de los sistemas éticos británicos y norteamericanos en la medida en que, para ser adecuada, debe ser no-individualista. La ética ambiental contiene dos niveles de decisión: el primero refiere a las decisiones usuales que afectan la equidad individual, el segundo no tiene esta (...) perspectiva individual. Este segundo nivel, llamado decisiones de asignación, no es reducible al primero y gobierna el uso de recursos a través del tiempo. El antropocentrismo débil provee una base para criticar las necesidades individuales de consumo y puede ser la base para juzgar entre estos niveles. Así, permite un fundamento adecuado para la ética ambiental sin necesidad de recurrir a los cuestionables compromisos ontológicos que adoptan los no-antropocentristas al atribuir valor intrínseco a la naturaleza. (shrink)

Since materially opulent lifestyles are a significant cause of environmental degradation, environmentalists often call for us to live more simply. This call is typically focused on consumption. But our environmental footprint is a function of our paid work as well as our purchases. Consequently, environmentalists should also urge us to work less. Defending this claim is the project of this paper. Reducing our economic productivity, I argue, can often be expected to make both the world and our characters better. And, (...) contrary to what some have suggested, working less than is normal needn’t involve unfairly free-riding on the productive efforts of others. (shrink)

Although Henry David Thoreau stands outside the Christian canon, his outlook on the relations among spirituality, ecology, and economy highlights how Christian theologians can develop a theological work ethic in our era of economic and ecological precarity. He can furthermore help theologians counter the pro-work bias in much Christian thought. In Walden, Thoreau shows that the best work is an ascetic practice that reveals and reaps the abundance of nature and connects the person to the immanent divine and thereby glimpsing (...) eternity. Thoreau thus offers the outline of a transformed theology of work even as he challenges Protestant vocationalism in the early industrial era. He is therefore a fitting if challenging guide for formulating a theology of the self as agent and product of work, at a moment when the postindustrial ideal of work that is both meaningful and remunerative seems ever more unattainable while the negative impact of our work on nonhuman nature is ever more apparent. (shrink)

Historically, philosophers, artists, and spiritual leaders have extolled the benefits of solitude; currently, advice on how to achieve solitude is the subject of many popular books and articles. Seldom, however, has solitude been studied by psychologists, who have focused instead on the negative experiences associated with being alone, particularly loneliness. Solitude, in contrast to loneliness, is often a positive state—one that may be sought rather than avoided. In this article, we examine some of the benefits that have been attributed to (...) solitude—namely, freedom, creativity, intimacy, and spirituality. In subsequent sections, we consider the environmental settings and personality characteristics conducive to solitude, how time spent alone is experienced differently across the life span, and the potential dangers related to the attractiveness of solitude. We conclude with a brief discussion of the theoretical and practical implications of solitude. (shrink)

The article discusses a sustainable educational approach for developing a moral value of peace by using a historical event, the bombing of Hiroshima. To make the case, the article uses the care theory of Nel Noddings to discuss the interpersonal aspects of peace education. The article asks how care theory handles tragedies like Hiroshima and it can contribute to a moral value of peace. The idea of caring is also examined, through Hiroshima, from a different angle, of the relationship between (...) nature and human beings. The political position of this article is to expand the idea of sustainability by creating values for peace using material related to the bombing. (shrink)

: In Section I, I provide a brief historical sketch of tragedy and its relationship to Socratic philosophy and comedy. II focuses on one aspect of tragedy, namely, its view that morality transcends natural limitations. This understanding of morality is with us still. III presents the central concerns of the world religions as evidence of a widespread feeling of alienation from the sacred and the wild, and contrasts world religions with indigenous spirituality. IV moves us away from the understanding of (...) philosophy as argument and counterargument and toward an ecosystemic, or wild, conception of philosophy as story in the mode of comedy. V offers a Buddhist understanding of tragic alienation that sees it as expressive of something deeply problematic about humans. This something is actualized throughout Western culture but seems to exist only as a potentiality in indigenous cultures. This is reason enough to take indigenous cultures and comedy seriously. VI brings us back to earth with a sketch of comedy in the lives of dear friends. VII sketches some of the attributes of functional communities that give support to comedy. I also point out a number of features of indigenous so-called worldviews that would greatly enhance the ability of comedy to displace tragedy in the West. VIII portrays picaresque comedy as exemplifying the lessons of comedy taught by wilderness. Examples from indigenous cultures of Africa and Gary Snyder's The Practice of the Wild underscore the importance of picaresque strategies and understandings of comedy. A look at Tom Birch's enigmatic statement, "wilderness treats us like human beings," setting it alongside some lines from Thoreau's Walden, rounds out my discussion of comedy. IX poses a challenge: Can we survive "The News" that pours in upon us from tragic seats of power? (shrink)

In Section I, I provide a brief historical sketch of tragedy and its relationship to Socratic philosophy and comedy. II focuses on one aspect of tragedy, namely, its view that morality transcends natural limitations. This understanding of morality is with us still. III presents the central concerns of the world religions as evidence of a widespread feeling of alienation from the sacred and the wild, and contrasts world religions with indigenous spirituality. IV moves us away from the understanding of philosophy (...) as argument and counterargument and toward an ecosystemic, or wild, conception of philosophy as story in the mode of comedy. V offers a Buddhist understanding of tragic alienation that sees it as expressive of something deeply problematic about humans. This something is actualized throughout Western culture but seems to exist only as a potentiality in indigenous cultures. This is reason enough to take indigenous cultures and comedy seriously. VI brings us back to earth with a sketch of comedy in the lives of dear friends. VII sketches some of the attributes of functional communities that give support to comedy. I also point out a number of features of indigenous so-called worldviews that would greatly enhance the ability of comedy to displace tragedy in the West. VIII portrays picaresque comedy as exemplifying the lessons of comedy taught by wilderness. Examples from indigenous cultures of Africa and Gary Snyder's The Practice of the Wild underscore the importance of picaresque strategies and understandings of comedy. A look at Tom Birch's enigmatic statement, "wilderness treats us like human beings," setting it alongside some lines from Thoreau's Walden, rounds out my discussion of comedy. IX poses a challenge: Can we survive "The News" that pours in upon us from tragic seats of power? (shrink)

In the UK, as elsewhere in the world, the global financial crisis has focused attention on the cost of public services and the need to reduce expenditure, not least in respect of higher education. This, however, raises a set of prior questions: What kind of society do we want? What is important to democratic society? What kind of higher education is desirable? The article takes Alasdair MacIntyre's critique of what he calls liberal capitalist society as a starting point for considering (...) questions concerning the kind of higher education that would be valuable and relevant to a healthy democratic society. His thesis is outlined and the implications of this for the university set out. The article examines MacIntyre's notion of community, which he elaborates in relation to medieval religious worldviews, and argues that whilst his conceptualisation is more intellectually and educationally coherent than some others, it is ultimately too restrictive. The article argues instead for a recognition, within education, of what is uncommon. This may open greater possibilities for keeping alive the serious questions that we must constantly attend to, beyond and within our communities, secular or religious. (shrink)

In this essay, I apply the Kantian interpretation of enlightenment as radical enlightenment to the enterprise of philosophy within the context of our contemporary world-situation, and try to answer this very hard quest ion: “As radically enlightened Kantian philosophers confronted by the double-whammy consisting of what I call The Hyper-State, together with the 2020-2021 COVID-19 pandemic, what should we dare to think and do?” The very hard problem posed by this very har d question is what I’ll call The New (...) Conflict of the Faculties. By way of a direct answer to this very hard question and by way of an effective solution to this very hard problem, I provide seven recommendations. (shrink)

The idea of self-reliance is important not only because it is often taken to be definitive of the ethics of democratic individualism, but because its greatest theorists have been uncommonly forthright about a problem that, though familiar to ordinary civic experience, frequently gets ignored: that self-reliant individuality is a basis for not fully supporting otherwise endorsed social justice causes. This article turns to Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau and Bob Dylan who are unusual for so honestly reflecting upon this (...) problem and who, because of the differences in the way they conceptualize it, are instructive for civic ethics. I demonstrate that Emerson and Thoreau imbue their self-reliant withdrawal from social action with a self-satisfaction that is lacking for Dylan, who is much readier to acknowledge the moral costs of self-reliance. This acknowledgement does not invalidate self-reliance but alters its epistemological, ethical and political features, providing a variant of self-reliance more suitable to contemporary conditions. (shrink)

This paper explores the aesthetics of miniaturization in Statius’ Silvae 2.7, in relation to Statius’ unexpected decision to write a tribute to the dead epic poet Lucan in hendecasyllables. The choice of a meter associated with irreverence, ephemerality, speed, and fun has been variously justified as expressing the poet’s ambivalent mood—mourning and celebration combined—or encapsulating his subject’s brief life. This paper builds on these explanations from a different angle. The epitome of miniature, playful poetry in the Silvae is the pseudo-Virgilian (...) Culex, mentioned first in Statius’ opening preface as a model for his collection and then in the tribute to Lucan as a yardstick for the young poet’s precocity. This is no casual coincidence. Statius’ résumé of baby Lucan’s future career uses techniques of retrospective prophecy similar to those with which the Culex-poet anticipates and absorbs Virgil’s entire oeuvre. Other clues suggest that Statius is engaging with the faked juvenile work more than sporadically, writing the equivalent for Lucan in the smallest meter imaginable while aiming to surpass both Virgil and Lucan as a poet of speed and synoptic vision. (shrink)

In this paper I consider one aspect of how student writing is supported in the university. I focus on the use of the 'writing frame', questioning its status as a vehicle for facilitating student voice, and in the process questioning how that notion is itself understood. I illustrate this by using examples from the story of the 1944 Hollywood film Gaslight and show that apparent means of facilitating voice can actually contribute to a state of voicelessness. The paper considers what (...) recovery of voice entails and the role of the 'voice coach' both in the film, and in the classroom. Drawing on the work of Stanley Cavell, his readings of Gaslight and of the American writers Thoreau and Emerson, I explore the themes of crisis and transformation in relation to the self and society. Thoreau's notion of the father tongue and his metaphor of the axe are considered in relation to the concept of voice and are shown to be suggestive of a mature relationship to language and of an Emersonian self-reliance that is denied by the mere technical skill and mastery learning of some current approaches to academic writing. (shrink)

In this paper, I consider the tutorial conversation in Higher Education. To focus the discussion I use the scenario of a tutorial conversation between a lecturer and a student. I begin by suggesting that the increasing emphasis placed on student satisfaction in certain Higher Education Institutions tends to focus the tutorial conversation towards a form of settlement that I then consider in light of Thoreau's Walden. To explore what other conversation might be possible, I turn to the philosophical writing of (...) Martin Buber. I discuss his ‘life of dialogue’ in relation to the distinction he draws between I and Thou and between I and It and to how Nancy Vansieleghem and Jan Masschelein analyse this in relation to the 2002 film, Le Fils. With reference to the film adaptation of Alan Bennett's The History Boys, I suggest a different starting point for the tutorial conversation. I conclude that the tutorial discussion, seen as an invitation to speak, and as a form of exposition and dialogue, is the possibility of the opening up of a new dimension of thinking and acting. This is the invitation to a conversation in education that is itself truly educative. (shrink)

This paper begins with a discussion of Stanley Cavell’s philosophy of language learning. Young people learn more than the meaning of words when acquiring language: they learn about (the quality of) our form of life. If we—as early childhood educators—see language teaching as something like handing some inert thing to a child, then we unduly limit the possibilities of education for that child. Cavell argues that we must become poets if we are to be the type of representatives of language (...) that education calls for. In the final section of the paper I discuss the work of Lucy Sprague Mitchell, someone who developed an approach to language teaching that overlaps in interesting ways with Cavell’s approach in The Claim of Reason. (shrink)

In pursuit of sustainable living, ethics researchers as well as consumers themselves have challenged the status quo of consumption as an institution. Fueled by global economic, environmental, and societal concerns, responsible consumption has become an integral part of the sustainability and consumption ethics literature. One movement toward sustainability consists of confining living space into a smaller ecological footprint. Although motivations for such a lifestyle have been examined, little research has investigated the process of how members of the tiny house movement (...) reconfigure learned consumption practices. This study investigates tiny house dwellers’ transformational experiences through the theoretical lens of contemporary institutional change. Qualitative analysis reveals that these challengers of the status quo face significant normative, regulatory, and cognitive hurdles. However, by engaging in sensemaking, validation, and change agency practices, tiny house dwellers have attempted to legitimize a new way of sustainable living that can be in conflict with existing institutions. Implications and future research are discussed in terms of how examining institutional change processes can be a vital part of ethics and sustainability research. Implications are also provided for how marketing organizations can consider modifying their market offerings to capitalize on this segment of society. (shrink)

I have used practice as method to investigate the creative potential of portable projectors, and theoretical approaches to reflect on: 1. the perception of the environment and its textures, 2. the sense of place-making and being while in motion, 3. the portability and collective mediation of the environment, and 4. the collaborative process of participation. These four themes emerged from the four video walks I developed during the research: The Surface Inside (2011), I-Walk (2012), Walk-itch (2013), and (wh)ere land (2014). (...) To delve into the philosophical nuances and practical outcomes, I have paired the four video walks with the four themes. This research approach resembles the design process, where practice develops in the action of reflection (Sch¨on,1983). The thesis and portfolio are the result of an iterative practice-reflection process which is based on the thread metaphor. The experience of being and walking in the environment is proprioceptive (J. J. Gibson, 1986) and can only be partially conveyed through audiovisual records. People experience the complex texture of the environment in motion (i.e. accretion of surfaces). While moving, they thread their own paths into the environment (Ingold, 2007) and establish links with the environment, technology and others. As they move, people experience the texturality of the surfaces they encounter. Video records captured with visual apparatuses (Flusser, 2000) are a fraction of the points of observation a person may have adopted while walking in and experiencing the environment. These records are likely to be created with PEDs, shared in digital environments and accessed on digital screens. When these records are experienced on digital screens, the texture of the environment is reduced to a flat surface. PEDs, with their digital screens, are carried around everyday and enable people to communicate with others, to collect and share audiovisual material, and to experience hybrid environments where tangible and digital realms converge (Coyne, 2010). Audiovisuals can be accessed anywhere and are no longer dependent on the architectures that hosted them in the past. Yet, PEDs may also isolate people from their immediate surroundings and favour introspective engagement with audiovisual content, digital others and digital environments (Turkle, 2011). The size of PEDs limits the number of people that can engage with the content at only one time. Pocketsize devices tend to be used individually, and their audiovisual content played through digital screens and headphones which foster cocoon-like engagement. Through the four video walks, I investigate how portable projectors may be used to challenge this inward looking mode of experiencing audiovisuals on flat digital screens, and to devise participatory events where people thread their paths in the environment, and project and engage with audiovisuals together. In the video walks, I invite people to move with projections and explore mediated public environments. Instead of sitting in front of fixed projections or looking at digital screens, people experience and share visuals while walking and projecting them in the environment. Portable projectors are starting to be embedded in mobile phones and other portable electronic devices (PEDs), and this presents new challenges and opportunities to creative practitioners. Thus, I study the affordances of portable projectors and develop artworks where participants walk, project visuals and explore textures in the environment collectively. (shrink)

What should be the primary aims of education? How might these aims be realized? These are foundational questions which Plato raised long ago in his Republic. The first of these questions is a normative, and profoundly philosophical, one which provides guidance to the whole endeavor of education. The second of these questions is a pedagogical one which informs educators as to how their work can be best conducted. In this work I endeavor to answer these interlocking educational questions. I follow (...) most closely in the footsteps of John Dewey. I believe that Dewey had it right when, decades ago, he argued that education ought to be concerned with the cultivation of good judgment. But here a difficulty arises. For "good judgment" is a complex philosophical concept which spills over into considerations of thinking, knowing, deciding, and acting. Despite the efforts of philosophers such as Aristotle, Kant, and Dewey, there is a lack of agreement about the precise meaning of good judgment. Before moving into matters of education, then, I first endeavor to vanquish this lack of conceptual clarity. What is good judgment? What are its elements? Can it, for that matter, even be cultivated? Having gotten clear on what good judgment is, I turn to matters of education. First, I argue that a vital task of education is the cultivation of good judgment. I then turn to the practical matter of how one might go about cultivating good judgment. The community of inquiry approach employed by The Philosophy for Children Program, I contend, is an effective pedagogical means through which to cultivate good judgment. (shrink)