For Love of Matter: A Contemporary Panpsychism (Suny Series in Environmental Philosophy and Ethics)
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.81 (868 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 0791458083 |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 224 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2015-06-24 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
She is the author of The Ecological Self and editor of Ecology and Democracy.. Freya Mathews is Senior Lecturer of Philosophy at La Trobe University
The next stage of human development? This is the best book I have read in a long time, and by far the most important. Mathews writes poetically, and I found myself putting the book down after every few paragraphs, first to catch my breath, then to absorb yet another revelation with which I positively resonated--often to the point of exclaiming out loud and feeling the need to get up and walk around. I assure you that not many books move me so. The last line brought tears to my eyes.In For Love of Matter, Mathews attempts to overcome, in my view successfully, the central metaphysical conumdrum of Western philosophy: the Cartesian dua. Is dedifferentiating subjective and objective the way? Freya Mathews has provided us with a book that is beautifully expressed and thoroughly scholarly. It contains so many eloquent and lyrical passages that one is tempted to consider it in its corpus a poem rather than a philosophical tract. Nevertheless her depth of research and philosophical understanding would be enough to satisfy any philosopher. I particularly like her almost off-the-cuff remark about the need not to express one's spirituality on p. 186, note 6, so appropriate in this age of degradation of the spiritual.I would take exception, however, to her way of approaching the subjective-o. A Customer said excellent. This is a tightly argued, beautifully written work. I read it a month ago and have kept chewing it over and refering back to it ever since. A fascinating progression from Mathews' earlier book, The Ecological Self. I particularly like her use of the Eros and Psyche myth.
She suggests that to exist in a dialogical modality is to enter an expanded realm of eros in which the self and world are mutually kindled into a larger, more incandescent state of realization. She argues that any adequate philosophical response to the so-called environmental crisis cannot be encompassed within the minor discipline of environmental philosophy but must instead address the full range of existential questions.". Mathews explores the transformative effects of a substitution of the latter, panpsychist premise for the former, materialist one. In For Love of Matter Freya Mathews challenges basic assumptions of Western science, modern philosophy, and environmental philosophy, arguing that the environmental crisis is a symptom of a larger, metaphysical crisis. Western science rests on the premise that the world is an inert backdrop to human presence rather than a communicative presence in its own right, one capable of dialogical congress with us
The kind of materialist philosophy the author describes and attacks remains dominant and largely unquestioned. She questions it, in a philosophically informed and thought-provoking way." . "The most important thing about this book is that it is an attempt to develop, in a modern ecological and psychoanalytically sophisticated context, a new version of very ancient and often now disparaged views of the world