PL 377 - Philosophy of Nature

(3.00 cr.)

Prerequisite: PL 201 and one additional PL 200-level course. Examines the changing view of nature from the period of the early modern philosophers of nature, Newton and Bacon, through the Cartesian mechanization of nature adopted and extended by Enlightenment scientists and its rejection by Goethe and Schelling, who defended an organic and holistic view of nature. The basic opposition between the idea of nature as no more than mere natural resources to be exploited for human profit and nature as both alive and the source of all life is shown to be indispensable for understanding contemporary approaches to environmental ethics as well as the looming threat of a global ecological crisis.

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