The subject of this thesis revolves around the Western view of nature and its social
origins. The author advances the subject through a comparison of two ancient texts:
Hesiods Works and Days and the Old Testament book of Proverbs. He concludes that
the Western view of nature gestated in agricultural societies of small-farmers who saw
themselves as being both part of and separate from the natural world. Their ability to
control nature being limited, they saw civilization as fulfilling a limited agricultural role
in the cosmos, as being different but part of and not controlling the whole.
In the last chapter, the author moves to discussing the forces at play within the Western
view of nature that have resulted in the environmental situation of the twenty-first
century. The author advances that a view of the physical realm as secondary, or degraded
vis-à-vis the realm of the intellect entered Christianity through Platonic philosophy, and
therefore is not original to the Western view of nature. Furthermore, he contends that the
original interaction of Western man with nature was through physical work, and that both
Platonic philosophy and modern science have influenced this original relationship.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LSU/oai:etd.lsu.edu:etd-01172008-144900 |
| Date | 23 January 2008 |
| Creators | Manning, Ernest Nathan |
| Contributors | Alexandre Leupin, Bainard Cowan, Greg Stone |
| Publisher | LSU |
| Source Sets | Louisiana State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.lsu.edu/docs/available/etd-01172008-144900/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached herein a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to LSU or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below and in appropriate University policies, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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