Thesis (M.C.S.)--Regent College, Vancouver, BC, 2001. / Abstract and vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves [108]-119).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Columbia University, 1942. / Published also as Columbia university Germanic studies, ed. by R.H. Fife. New ser., no. 13. Vita. Bibliography: p. 161-172.

I develop a novel metaphysical theory of the modal structure of the physical world, which has important consequences for debates regarding laws of nature, scientific explanation, the nature of physical properties, and the applicability of mathematics to science. The theory holds that modal properties of the physical world metaphysically depend on properties of mathematical structures. I show that the relation of metaphysical dependence is naturalistically acceptable by offering examples of non-causal scientific explanation that tacitly make use of such a notion. My view offers a non-Humean understanding of nomological necessity, a unification of the epistemology of modality with the epistemology of mathematics, and an explanation of the success of mathematics in predicting and explaining empirical phenomena. / text

published_or_final_version / Chinese / Master / Master of Arts

Despite the wide-spread acceptance of evolution within the science community, much of the public still holds reservations about evolution as a valid scientific explanation. This is due in part to questions regarding the very nature of a theory, which has been cited by many researchers as an obstacle to accepting evolution. The specific use of semi-structured interviews and research into how students view other nature of science terminology (fact, hypothesis, and law) in relation to theory may provide further insight into how use of the terms can frame attitudes towards evolution. This study qualitatively describes how four college-aged students (science, philosophy, education, and business) interpret basic science terminology and compare scientific explanations in their assessment of evolution. While discussing the terms, students were encouraged to raise other issues that aided them in the construction of their epistemological beliefs about science. The aim was to provide interviewees with the opportunity to speak openly about what they understood regarding nature of science and evolution rather than presuming a shared coherence in the use of the terms. The semi-structured interview format revealed students’ conceptions (or misconceptions) of the nature of science, relative degrees of certainty for the terms, and underlying biases. The results suggest the specific use of interviews can provide a credible and informative account of how students use basic science terminology. A mixed use of the terms can still lead to a favorable disposition towards evolution when students possess a positive attitude towards science, acknowledge the tentative nature of science as a strength rather than a limitation, and practice reflective reasoning. Conclusions made in the study also suggest that an explicit discussion about fact, theory, law, and hypothesis in the science classroom may actually play less of a critical role than previously thought in opening the door to learning content of which many people consider to be controversial. More concentration should be placed on how knowledge is generated and how to reflectively approach a scientific problem. / text

In recent years, much ofthe political debate in the West, East aud South has focused on the decentralization of responsibilities from the state to private enterprises and NGOs. But what potential is there for local communities to create their own govenlance structures able to deal with issues up till recently seen as the responsibility of the state? In this thesis, answer to this question is sought by analyzing two case studies from the semi-arid Coimbatore-region in South India from an institutionai perspective. One case concerns the efforts to involve farmers in irrigation water management in the Lower Bhavani Project, while the other focuses on the pressure on textile industrialists in Tirupur city to collectively treat their polluted effluent water. In both cases, the new distribution ofresponsibilities required that groups ofwater users would succeed in establishing new entities for collective action among themselves strong enough to prevent free-riding on a massive scale. Overcoming three main obstacles proved crucial in this process; meeting coordination costs, re-defining the notion of free-riding among resource users, and meeting motivation costs. Factors both within and outsicte the loeal community affected the degree ofsuccess. The distribution and lise of economic, moral and physical power between various actors and the interconnectedness between local and external institutions proved crucial for the establishrnent oflocal govemance stmctures. Moreover, the historical relation between the respective user group and the state has to a large extent affected the goals and strategies oflocal entities of eolleetive action. Clearly, resource management problems at localleve1 can not be solved by simply decentralizing responsibilities from the state to groups ofresource users. Rather, the state could playan important role by initiating, supporting and directing slich local entities of collective action.

No description available.

In the last 30 years, Iran has experienced mounting environmental problems, such as air and water pollution, that are perceived as in need of redress. In order to address and confront these problems, Iran has recently adopted the language and framework of ecological science. Subsequently, the prestige of science in the country has been growing through extensive applications of ecological science at various levels of Iranian society. Viewing this development as a socio-cultural process of modernity in Iran, this dissertation addresses two major issues: First, it investigates the discursive historical conditions of Iran in which modern science, including ecological science, has been developed and practiced since the nineteenth century. Second, it explores the cultural dimensions of environmentalism in Iran through examining its reception by Iranian environmentalists, researchers, and non-expert citizens in Tehran and their attitudes toward it. The analyses of the genealogies of science in Iran show that modern science has provided Iranians with a conceptual framework through which to govern the objects that state authorities, with accuracy and efficiency, wish to identify, analyze, and organize. I argue that the "population" has been a prominent object in the governance of Iran in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and that, more recently, "the environment" has become such an object. Scientific knowledge and management have played a vital role in establishing these mechanisms of governance, thereby the status of science is kept intact in Iran. Drawing on thirteen months of fieldwork in Tehran, I also examine the recent development of environmentalism in urban Iran through changing conceptions of "nature." With Iran's utilization of ecological science, a new conception of nature is recently introduced to society: a scientific formulation of nature. I demonstrate how this notion of nature has become influential along with growing environmental discourses in Iran, and yet, argue that another conception of nature--relating to Iranian nationhood--also makes a key contribution to Iranian environmentalism. In particular, I engage the anthropological perspectives of "materiality" and "heteroglossia" to highlight this point.

No description available.

Human society comes in contact with the physical environment in two ways: Through economic appropriation of physical resources and through the symbolic appropriation of nature. The two 'ways' interact via the various interpreters of nature, who as they define nature create cognitive means for the appropriation of physical resources. / Using the theory of social networks of power the thesis examines the above interplay of economic appropriation and symbolic manipulation of the physical environment from the Stone Age to the Hellenistic times in a series of civilisations in Eurasia. It reasons that as we move from the Stone Age to pristine civilisations we encounter two phenomena: first, a process of variation in nature's interpretation due to social stratification. Second, interpretation of nature becomes the subject matter of elite groups, the literati, firmly attached to political elites. Yet, with the advent of the Axial Age nature's interpreters become increasingly autonomous and use metaphors of nature as means to reflect on political and social issues of the day. In turn, as we can see in the case of ancient Greece, various political elites start to use particular readings of nature to consolidate their ideological position vis-a-vis their rivals. Thus, Axial Age ideologies about nature move from passive interpreters of what exists to dynamic advocates of what should exist. / Thus, the wisdom of the major schools of political ecology is contested in four major issues: First, there has never been a single reading of nature, but many co-existing in geographical and social proximity. Secondly, there is no specific time when nature lost its sacredness. Instead, we detect a steady withdrawal of the divine from the physical environment starting with the emergence of reflecting thinking. Thirdly, the development of nature's symbolic attributes lies not only in its relationship to politics, but also on the internal dynamics, strength and weakness, of the discourse in itself as well as on the organisational capabilities of particular schools of thought. Lastly, economic exploitation as such does not depend on specific readings of nature. Rather, it depends on technological advances, the nexus of political and ideological social networks of power.