Overview
- Challenges readers to consider how an individual can influence the survival of the human species and the planet
- Offers an ambitious broad digest of research from two-dozen disciplines
- Incorporates the realms of ecology, evolution, ethics, conservation biology, geopolitics, anthropology, comparative religions, the neurosciences, psychology and philosophy
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Table of contents (8 chapters)
Keywords
About this book
If there are to be cultures of transformation dedicated to seeing us all through the Sixth Extinction Spasm, the Anthropocene, inflicting as little biological havoc as possible, what might such orientations—a collective, widespread biophilia, or reverence for nature—look like? In this powerful work, with a combination of data and direct observation, the authors invite readers to explore how such transformations might resonate throughout the human community; in what ways a person might overcome the seemingly insurmountable environmental tumult our species has unleashed; the clear and salient motives, ethics, aspirations and pragmatic idealism he/she might mirror and embrace in order to effect a profound difference—at the individual level—for all of life and life’s myriad habitats. Chapters illuminate an ambitiously broad digest of research from two-dozen disciplines. Those include ecodynamics, biosemiotics, neural plasticity, anthropology, paleontology and the history of science, among others. All converge upon a set of ethics-based scenarios for mitigating ecological damage to ourselves and other life forms.
This highly readable and tightly woven treatise speaks to scientists, students and all those who are concerned about ethical activism and the future of the biosphere.
Michael Charles Tobias and Jane Gray Morrison are ecological philosophers and animal liberation activists who have worked for decades to help enrich our understanding of ecosystem dynamics and humanity’s ambiguous presence amid that great orchestra that is nature.
Authors and Affiliations
About the authors
Jane Gray Morrison, Executive Vice President of the Dancing Star Foundation for 18 years, has written and co-edited dozens of books, including Sanctuary: Global Oases of Innocence (www.sanctuary-thebook.org), Donkey: The Mystique of Equus Asinus (Council Oak Books), Why Life Matters (Springer) and Anthrozoology (Springer). In addition, Morrison has written, produced and/or directed numerous major film documentaries and docudramas that have been broadcast throughout the world. Among them are the ten-hour series, “Voice of the Planet” (TBS), “A Parliament of Souls” (PBS), “No Vacancy” (PBS), “A Day in the Life of Ireland” (PBS), “Mad Cowboy” (PBS) and “Hotspots” (www.hotspots-thefilm.com, PBS). A Goodwill Ambassador to Ecuador’s Yasuní National Park and early advocate for an Antarctic World Park (“Antarctica: The Last Continent” [PBS]), Ms. Morrison has worked to save endangered species and habitat on every continent. Those efforts have included the creationand management of one of the most successful mainland island scientific reserves in the Southern Hemisphere, on Stewart Island, New Zealand.
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: The Theoretical Individual
Book Subtitle: Imagination, Ethics and the Future of Humanity
Authors: Michael Charles Tobias, Jane Gray Morrison
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71443-1
Publisher: Springer Cham
eBook Packages: Earth and Environmental Science, Earth and Environmental Science (R0)
Copyright Information: Michael Charles Tobias and Jane Gray Morrison 2018
Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-319-71442-4Published: 12 January 2018
Softcover ISBN: 978-3-319-89073-9Published: 06 June 2019
eBook ISBN: 978-3-319-71443-1Published: 03 January 2018
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: XV, 138
Topics: Popular Science in Nature and Environment, Popular Science in Philosophy, Popular Life Sciences, Conservation Biology/Ecology, Environmental Philosophy, Philosophy of Nature