Thesis (M.A.)--Oregon State University, 2008. / Printout. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 65-67). Also available on the World Wide Web.

"Die Untersuchung hat der Universität Mainz als Inaugural-Dissertation vorgelegen." / Includes bibliographical references (p. 101-107).

"Die Untersuchung hat der Universität Mainz als Inaugural-Dissertation vorgelegen." / Includes bibliographical references (p. 101-107).

Proefschrift--Utrecht. / "Stellingen" inserted. Published also as Philosophia critica; reeks van philosophische geschriften, v. 1.

This work is an account of meaning and value in the time of climate change. I use the findings and predictions of scientists to develop a philosophy of living that fits today's concerns. In essence the ideas put forward come from a single question: If humans can change the planet in such a way that it threatens the possibility of human life on Earth what does this mean for the place of humans on Earth? It is this question, which the every chapter hereafter works to answer. Establishing a philosophy of living and explaining a global ecological crisis is a lofty goal. I should warn you know that things are still plenty murky in the conclusion. This work does not attempt to solve all of the problems of climate change. Far from it, my actual goal is to study those problems and learn what they may teach us about our terrestrial home, and humanity in the time of climate change. The title, Nuestro Mundo is a reference to José Martí's seminal work "Nuestra America" (Our America). What you are about to read is an attempt to use the insights of that work to develop ways of thinking about the problems of climate change. In the 1890's Martí wrote to energize Cuba's war for independence. His prescription: throw off foreign ideals, examine what it is to be Cuban, and fight for what is Cuba. Today I write to inform and energize people to act for our planet. My prescription: throw off artificial ideals, examine what it is to be of the Earth, and fight for the planet's survival.

This thesis argues that Hegel’s views on subjectivity are deeply rooted in, and defined by, both language and time. Specifically, we claim that Hegel’s account of subjectivity is decisively characterized by fundamentally ontological conceptualizations of both language and time. What we conclude is that Hegel’s philosophy and its conceptualization of subjectivity is a robust attempt to reconcile the changing, finite, temporal modes of being with the classical philosophical expectation that philosophy arrive at truth, which is non-finite and ahistorical. By defining time as becoming and language as the medium for the rational expression and comprehension of being that is meaningful for us, we claim that Hegel’s approach to the being of subjectivity is developed through a thematic relation of language and time. Overall this thesis aims to make an original contribution to Hegel studies and his views on subjectivity, time, and language by arguing that comprehending subjectivity means grasping how it becomes. This thesis begins, then, with the idea that both being and time are becoming, and that this is at once a finite and non-finite notion. From there, we emphasize that what Nature becomes is us, human subjectivity, and that we apprehend this being that is meaningful for us as time and through language. In history, subjectivity becomes as the written embodiment of a particular people, and, in philosophy, subjectivity becomes linguistically according to an ahistorical, non-finite notion of becoming as the subject’s own self-determination; neither excludes the other because there is only the continual becoming of our making sense of the rational whole.

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My aim in this dissertation is to explain Hegel’s motivation for, and the doctrine of, the identity of the identity and difference of thought and being and argue that while thought and being differ, their nature is identical. This identity is used to explain Hegel’s claim that what is real is rational and what is rational is real. The aim of this dissertation is squarely placed within ontology, and my interest is in the structure of being as opposed to metaphysical contents. Within this structure, I argue, Hegel shows us the irreversible method of that which comes to be and ceases to be. This method (or nature) is a rational process of being itself, which, while its contents are forever changing, they do so from the same invariant identity of thought and being. As a matter of method, there is an increasing difficulty in assessing the merit of Hegel’s account of thought and being – obscuring what merit my interpretation may offer. The difficulty is a growing trend in combining Hegel’s work with specific Kantian ambitions where Hegel is forced into cognitive restrictions he does not have. As indebted as Hegel is to Kant, I argue that Hegel’s value lies in his break with Kant’s critical program. This break affords a new understanding of category theory apart from our subjective acts of understanding. With this new understanding, we can grasp the identity of thought and being through what I take to be a more promising account of cognition than what much of contemporary Hegel scholarship has offered by interpreting Hegel’s work as a completion of Kant’s. I sequence the chapters of this dissertation to trace Hegel’s increasing philosophic distance from Kant on those issues that interfere with understanding Hegel’s identity of thought and being. However, to demonstrate this distance and still progress to Hegel’s position apart from Kant, I limit my discussion of Kant to Hegel’s interpretation of Kant’s work and motivation. This limitation comes with the weakness that Kantian responses to Hegel exist but are not presented. However, this dissertation does not aim at defending Hegel’s interpretation of Kant but explains what Hegel has made of Kant’s texts to further Hegel’s arguments. Lastly, for what philosophic utility may be gained from this dissertation, Hegel offers the freedom for critical investigation regarding ontological and metaphysical matters without the presupposition of metaphysical commitments. This topic is treated at length in the last chapter of this dissertation. What is presented in this dissertation is a method by which no more is assumed than the inability to deny that thought exists, as such a denial presupposes thought, and then to trace the implications of the existence of thought according to what its occurrence signifies. Employing this method allows us to be metaphysically neutral and approach being as philosophically accessible. / Philosophy

Many bodies of modern scientific theory (such as both Newtonian and relativistic physics) have proven to be remarkably successful at predicting future observable phenomena. Some philosophers have seen this success as calling for deeper explanation: what is it about these theories that makes them so predictively reliable, when, presumably, not just any theory would enjoy such success? This question has often motivated philosophers (such as Richard Boyd) to adopt a realist stance towards scientific theories, wherein the entities and mechanisms postulated by a successful theory are understood as referring to real entities and mechanisms in the world. However, as Nicholas Rescher has argued, a close look at the concepts employed in scientific theorizing reveals that they are not of the right kind for such a realist explanation to work. His arguments show that at the root of the meaning of each key element of our standard scientific framework is a reference to mental functionings. This being so, an explanation such a Boyd's ceases to be viable, as an approximately accurate picture of the external world would presumably be free of reference to mental functioning. I thus attempt to provide a plausible explanation for the success of science bearing in mind that a straightforward correspondence between the world described by our theories and the world itself does not obtain. Such an explanation relies not only on the features of the external world that our theories might approximate, but also on the ability of mental processes to enrich this world, both in theorizing and in experience. / Master of Arts