Larry R. Churchill
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- February 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780190080891
- eISBN:
- 9780190080907
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190080891.003.0009
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Moral Philosophy
The skills and concepts presented in previous chapters are here illustrated for their relevance for the problem of global warming, a calamity whose full effects will occur beyond the lifespan of many ...
More
The skills and concepts presented in previous chapters are here illustrated for their relevance for the problem of global warming, a calamity whose full effects will occur beyond the lifespan of many readers. This is arguably the most urgent ethical problem we now face. Five debilitating features of our current thinking are described: our focus on the present; political ineptness; the idea that humans are the crown of the creation; consumerism; and our mechanistic view of nature, including our own physical bodies. It is argued that the way forward is not through correcting our concepts but recognizing our grounding in Earth and embracing it. This kind of love of Earth and other life forms is related to but distinguished from that of scientists such as E. O. Wilson and Stephen J. Gould.Less
The skills and concepts presented in previous chapters are here illustrated for their relevance for the problem of global warming, a calamity whose full effects will occur beyond the lifespan of many readers. This is arguably the most urgent ethical problem we now face. Five debilitating features of our current thinking are described: our focus on the present; political ineptness; the idea that humans are the crown of the creation; consumerism; and our mechanistic view of nature, including our own physical bodies. It is argued that the way forward is not through correcting our concepts but recognizing our grounding in Earth and embracing it. This kind of love of Earth and other life forms is related to but distinguished from that of scientists such as E. O. Wilson and Stephen J. Gould.
Georges Vigarello
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- November 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780231159760
- eISBN:
- 9780231535304
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231159760.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Social History
This book maps the evolution of Western ideas about fat and fat people from the Middle Ages to the present, paying particular attention to the role of science, fashion, fitness crazes, and public ...
More
This book maps the evolution of Western ideas about fat and fat people from the Middle Ages to the present, paying particular attention to the role of science, fashion, fitness crazes, and public health campaigns in shaping these views. While hefty bodies were once a sign of power, today those who struggle to lose weight are considered poor in character and weak in mind. The book traces the eventual equation of fatness with infirmity and the way we have come to define ourselves and others in terms of body type. The text begins with the medieval artists and intellectuals who treated heavy bodies as symbols of force and prosperity. It then follows the shift during the Renaissance and early modern period to courtly, medical, and religious codes that increasingly favored moderation and discouraged excess. Scientific advances in the eighteenth century also brought greater knowledge of food and the body’s processes, recasting fatness as the “relaxed” antithesis of health. The body-as-mechanism metaphor intensified in the early nineteenth century, with the chemistry revolution and heightened attention to food-as-fuel, which turned the body into a kind of furnace or engine. During this period, social attitudes toward fat became conflicted, with the bourgeois male belly operating as a sign of prestige but also as a symbol of greed and exploitation, while the overweight female was admired only if she was working class. The book concludes with the fitness and body-conscious movements of the twentieth century and the proliferation of personal confessions about obesity, which tied fat more closely to notions of personality, politics, taste, and class.Less
This book maps the evolution of Western ideas about fat and fat people from the Middle Ages to the present, paying particular attention to the role of science, fashion, fitness crazes, and public health campaigns in shaping these views. While hefty bodies were once a sign of power, today those who struggle to lose weight are considered poor in character and weak in mind. The book traces the eventual equation of fatness with infirmity and the way we have come to define ourselves and others in terms of body type. The text begins with the medieval artists and intellectuals who treated heavy bodies as symbols of force and prosperity. It then follows the shift during the Renaissance and early modern period to courtly, medical, and religious codes that increasingly favored moderation and discouraged excess. Scientific advances in the eighteenth century also brought greater knowledge of food and the body’s processes, recasting fatness as the “relaxed” antithesis of health. The body-as-mechanism metaphor intensified in the early nineteenth century, with the chemistry revolution and heightened attention to food-as-fuel, which turned the body into a kind of furnace or engine. During this period, social attitudes toward fat became conflicted, with the bourgeois male belly operating as a sign of prestige but also as a symbol of greed and exploitation, while the overweight female was admired only if she was working class. The book concludes with the fitness and body-conscious movements of the twentieth century and the proliferation of personal confessions about obesity, which tied fat more closely to notions of personality, politics, taste, and class.
