Philosophical fables for ecological thinking : resisting environmental catastrophe within the Anthropocene (original) (raw)

2020, Kingston University

This central premise of this thesis is that philosophical fables can be used to address the challenges that have not been adequately accounted for in post-Kantian philosophy that have contributed to environmental precarity, which we only have a narrow window of opportunity to learn to appreciate and respond to. Demonstrating that fables may bring to philosophy the means to cultivate the wisdom that Immanuel Kant described as crucial for the development of judgement in the Critique of Pure Reason (1781), I argue that the philosophical fable marks an underutilised resource at our disposal, which requires both acknowledgment and defining. Philosophical fables, I argue, can act as 'go-carts of judgement', preventing us from entrenching damaging patterns that helped degree paved the way for us to find ourselves in a state of wholescale environmental crisis, through failing adequately to consider the multifarious effects of anthropogenic change. This work uses the theme of 'catastrophe', applied to ecological thinking and environmental crises, to examine and compare two thinker poets, Giacomo Leopardi and Donna Haraway, both of whom use fables to undertake philosophical critique. It will address a gap in scholarship, which has failed to adequately consider how fables might inform philosophy, as reflected in the lack of definition of the 'philosophical fable'. This is I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to those who have given me thoughtful feedback throughout my work, including students and staff at CRMEP's Annual Progression Seminars, and to my supervisor, Howard Caygill, whose generous support has been invaluable in facilitating my research, for which I will always be grateful. Special thanks to colleagues in the PostHuman Network and to participants, leaders and facilitators of the Leopardi Non-Fiction writing group in Recanati, and to those who have generously hosted me during research trips I could not otherwise have undertaken. Most importantly, immeasurable gratitude is due to my loved family and friends, who have always been ready to have faith in me. I am also grateful for the financial support I have received from the British Society of Aesthetics (BSA), the Society for Literature, Science, and the Arts (SLSA) and the British Society of Literature and Science (BSLS), which enabled my research to grow in unforeseen ways, and for generous practical advice and support from colleagues in the