American Conservation Philosophy and its Critique

1. 01_02.ppt American Conservation Philosophy and its Critique Professor Bob Sandmeyerdr.sandmeyer@gmail.com

2. Introductions Professor Bob Sandmeyer • Assistant Professor of Philosophy • Environmental and Sustainability Studies Faculty Specialization I: Edmund Husserl Phenomenological Movement 19th & 20th Century German Philosophy Specialization II: Philosophy of Ecology Environmental Philosophy Sustainability Studies

3. Introductions Professor Bob Sandmeyer • Assistant Professor of Philosophy • Environmental and Sustainability Studies Faculty Specialization I: Edmund Husserl Phenomenological Movement 19th & 20th Century German Philosophy Specialization II: Philosophy of Ecology Environmental Philosophy Sustainability Studies

4. Introductions Professor Sandmeyer • Assistant Professor of Philosophy • Environmental and Sustainability Studies Faculty Contact Information Email: dr.sandmeyer@gmail.comWeChat ID: bobsand

5. Introductions You?? • Name (you would like to be called) • Interest in conservation philosophy?

6. Course Web Page https://www.uky.edu/~rsand1/ • Syllabus • Reading Questions • Federal Lands Systems • Handouts • Important Links

7. Course Syllabus https://www.uky.edu/~rsand1/ • Syllabus • Unit One: Historical Background • Unit Two: Conservation Philosophies • Unit Three: US Public Lands Agencies & Critical Responses

8. Course Syllabus https://www.uky.edu/~rsand1/ • Syllabus • Unit One: Historical Background • Unit Two: Conservation Philosophies • Unit Three: US Public Lands Agencies & Critical Responses • Reading Assignments • Two readings per day • Two reading questions per assignment

9. Course Syllabus https://www.uky.edu/~rsand1/ • In-class Presentations • See Handouts page

10. Course Syllabus https://www.uky.edu/~rsand1/ • End of Unit Examinations • One exam per unit = 3 exams • “Take Home” • See Handouts page • Questions posted on Thursday • Answers emailed to me by Friday at noon (12:00pm)

11. Unit One: Historical Background Modern Philosophy & the Rise of Reason • Advent of rational control of nature and of mankind • The modern scientific worldview: representatives • Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) – Italian natural philosopher • Francis Bacon (1561–1626) – British politician and natural philosopher • René Descartes (1596-1650) – French mathematician and philosopher • John Locke (1632-1704) – British political philosopher • Isaac Newton (1642 –1727) – British natural philosopher

12. Unit One: Historical Background Francis Bacon (1561–1626) • Important Writings • Novum Organum(1620) - New Logic • InstauratioMagna (The Great Instauration) – The Great Renewal • unpublished during his lifetime • Statement of Anthropocentric Worldview • "the empire of man over things is founded on the arts and sciences alone, for nature is only to be commanded by obeying her" Anthropocentrism

13. Unit One: Historical Background Francis Bacon (1561–1626) • Anthropocentric metaphysical worldview • The earth made for mankind • Metaphysics: theory of being or reality • Materialist theory of reality • complete reduction of all events to matter and motion

14. Unit One: Historical Background Francis Bacon (1561–1626) • Epistemology (theory of knowledge) • demand for a “new organon” or new tool of human knowledge • strictly empirical method of experimentation • "the real and legitimate goal of the sciences is the endowment of human life with new inventions and riches” • He mentions three such discoveries that have shaped the human condition universally • Printing (in literature) • Gunpowder (in warfare) • The Compass (in navigation) • shows civilized man to be a god to men

15. Unit One: Historical Background John Locke (1632-1704) • Important Writings • Two Treatises of Government (1689) • “Of Property” reading • An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690) • Resource Conception of Nature • Problem of the Value in/of Nature

16. Unit One: Historical Background John Locke (1632-1704) • Important Writings • Two Treatises of Government (1689) • “Of Property” reading • An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690) • Resource Conception of Nature • Problem of the Value in/of Nature

17. Unit One: Historical Background John Locke (1632-1704) • Labor Theory of Value • “It is labor, then, which put the greatest part of value upon land, without which it would scarcely be worth anything…" • "every man has property in his own person" (1/9) • Concept of private domain • nature + something is his own • Labor removes things from the original common state in nature

18. Unit One: Historical Background John Locke (1632-1704) • 9/10ths rule • • "of the products useful to the life of man nine tenths are the effects of labor (6/9) • Sustainability thesis • "every man should have as much as he could make use of" (4) • Spoilage thesis • Invention of money • Alters the sustainability thesis

19. Unit One: Historical Background René Descartes (1596-1650) • Important Writings • Discourse on the Method (1637) • Principles of Philosophy (1641) • Meditations on First Philosophy (1641) • Le Monde (The World)­ – published posthumously

20. Unit One: Historical Background René Descartes (1596-1650) • Concept of Substance • Univocal concept • God • Equivocal concept • Created Substances • Mind (res cogitans) • Matter (res extensa)

21. Unit One: Historical Background René Descartes (1596-1650) • Universal Mechanistic Theory of the Physical World • Dualist metaphysics • cogito ergo sum (I think, therefore I am) • Certainty of mind • Fundamental Problem • soul is of a nature which has no relation to extension

22. Unit One: Historical Background René Descartes (1596-1650) • Beast – Machine Theory • Animals like soulless moving machines, i.e., automata • Lacking in mind • Brutes have not less reason than man, they have none at all • two certain tests animals are not rational • Language • Signifies thought • Creative response to problems • Reason – a universal tool or instrument I do not deny the life of any animal, making it consist solely in the warmth of the heart."