Eric Higgs
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- August 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780262017534
- eISBN:
- 9780262301541
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262017534.003.0005
- Subject:
- Environmental Science, Climate
This chapter suggests that historical fidelity or historicity is a new virtue appropriate to a rapidly changing nature, and also discusses the concept of ecological restoration and the emergence of ...
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This chapter suggests that historical fidelity or historicity is a new virtue appropriate to a rapidly changing nature, and also discusses the concept of ecological restoration and the emergence of hybrid and novel ecosystems.Less
This chapter suggests that historical fidelity or historicity is a new virtue appropriate to a rapidly changing nature, and also discusses the concept of ecological restoration and the emergence of hybrid and novel ecosystems.
Allen Thompson and Jeremy Bendik-Keymer (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- August 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780262017534
- eISBN:
- 9780262301541
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262017534.001.0001
- Subject:
- Environmental Science, Climate
Predictions about global climate change have produced both stark scenarios of environmental catastrophe and purportedly pragmatic ideas about adaptation. This book takes a different perspective, ...
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Predictions about global climate change have produced both stark scenarios of environmental catastrophe and purportedly pragmatic ideas about adaptation. This book takes a different perspective, exploring the idea that the challenge of adapting to global climate change is fundamentally an ethical one, that it is not simply a matter of adapting our infrastructures and economies to mitigate damage but rather of adapting ourselves to realities of a new global climate. The challenge is to restore our conception of humanity—to understand human flourishing in new ways—in an age in which humanity shapes the basic conditions of the global environment. In the face of what we have unintentionally done to Earth’s ecology, who shall we become? The contributors examine ways that new realities will require us to revisit and adjust the practice of ecological restoration; the place of ecology in our conception of justice; the form and substance of traditional virtues and vices; and the organizations, scale, and underlying metaphors of important institutions. Topics discussed include historical fidelity in ecological restoration; the application of capability theory to ecology; the questionable ethics of geoengineering; and the cognitive transformation required if we are to “think like a planet.”Less
Predictions about global climate change have produced both stark scenarios of environmental catastrophe and purportedly pragmatic ideas about adaptation. This book takes a different perspective, exploring the idea that the challenge of adapting to global climate change is fundamentally an ethical one, that it is not simply a matter of adapting our infrastructures and economies to mitigate damage but rather of adapting ourselves to realities of a new global climate. The challenge is to restore our conception of humanity—to understand human flourishing in new ways—in an age in which humanity shapes the basic conditions of the global environment. In the face of what we have unintentionally done to Earth’s ecology, who shall we become? The contributors examine ways that new realities will require us to revisit and adjust the practice of ecological restoration; the place of ecology in our conception of justice; the form and substance of traditional virtues and vices; and the organizations, scale, and underlying metaphors of important institutions. Topics discussed include historical fidelity in ecological restoration; the application of capability theory to ecology; the questionable ethics of geoengineering; and the cognitive transformation required if we are to “think like a planet.”
Marion Hourdequin and David G. Havlick
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- November 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780190240318
- eISBN:
- 9780190240349
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780190240318.003.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, General
This chapter introduces the concept of layered landscapes and describes the challenges and opportunities these landscapes raise for ecological restoration. In particular, it is argued that the ...
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This chapter introduces the concept of layered landscapes and describes the challenges and opportunities these landscapes raise for ecological restoration. In particular, it is argued that the concept of layered landscapes can help to mediate debates in restoration between historicists, who hold to the traditional goal of using a site’s natural, predisturbance condition to set restoration targets (classic “historical fidelity”), and futurists, who argue that in a world where the human and natural are deeply intertwined, traditional restoration goals no longer make sense. The approach to layered landscape restoration recommended here suggests that while we cannot typically restore all landscape layers simultaneously, restoration need not be rigidly bound to the recreation of a single, historic layer, to the exclusion of all others. By taking account of both social and environmental histories, restoration of layered landscapes can accommodate dynamism in socio-ecological systems, while recognizing the past and its multi-faceted significance.Less
This chapter introduces the concept of layered landscapes and describes the challenges and opportunities these landscapes raise for ecological restoration. In particular, it is argued that the concept of layered landscapes can help to mediate debates in restoration between historicists, who hold to the traditional goal of using a site’s natural, predisturbance condition to set restoration targets (classic “historical fidelity”), and futurists, who argue that in a world where the human and natural are deeply intertwined, traditional restoration goals no longer make sense. The approach to layered landscape restoration recommended here suggests that while we cannot typically restore all landscape layers simultaneously, restoration need not be rigidly bound to the recreation of a single, historic layer, to the exclusion of all others. By taking account of both social and environmental histories, restoration of layered landscapes can accommodate dynamism in socio-ecological systems, while recognizing the past and its multi-faceted significance.
