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BTU Chair of General Ecology Epistemological Problems V 1

Epistemological Problems of Ecology:

Philosophy of Nature in the 19th and 20th Century

Udo Bröring Chair of General Ecology

Lecture Manuscript

Table of Contents

Introduction

The 19th century: Selected topics

Romanticism, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Schelling, Engels

History of science and ecology

The 20th century: Selected topics

Preliminaries

Philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead

Consequence of the doctrine of evolution: Constitution of modern biology

Holism and reductionism

Some remarks on scientific ecology and nature conservation

Outlook

References and some further readings

Introduction

We describe a changing of views in the philosophy of nature and general attitudes towards nature up to the beginning of the new age in the course of the 18th century. – At first, a pro-cess of de-mythologizing of world and nature (Hesiod) can be observed, followed by a second process of de-sacralization (secularization) of world and nature by the ionic philosophy of nature (Anaximandros, Anaximenes). Science was established by the prae-Socratics (Parmen-ides, Heraklitos) and the Socratics (Sokrates, Platon, Aristoteles). The Parmenides/Heraklitos-dichotomy was solved by Demokritos and Platon: disjunctive, discursive, analytical forming of terms, suppressing sensation and holistic perception: The concept of logos that is reason is advanced. The integration and synthesis on Indo-European and Jewish views and ideas, and the establishment of a specific Christian philosophy of nature (Augustinus, Boethius), which was close together with Platon´s ontology and (later) Aristoteles´ empiricism lead to the end of the era of the antique. In the medieval era syncretism is advanced by combining aspects of Platon’s and Aristoteles’ philosophy. Basic and central scientific concepts are developed.


During the renaissance we observe a progression of emancipation of the human individuum from guiding and overruling by institutions till the age of enlightenment. With the Critique of Pure Reason (1781) the philosopher Immanuel Kant reached a new stage, the transcendental idealism. In the course of the 19th century we observe a process of disintegration of different traditions of world views towards nature: The foundation of different approaches (romanti-cism, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Schelling, and Engels) and the establishment of science in a modern sense. – Philosophy of science, mainly represented by the philosophy of Schelling, is discredited in the course of time.

The world has changed: Revolutions in Europe

The political, social, cultural, scientific situation in Europe at the end of the 18th century has completely changed. Epoch-making changes in a small time window („beginning of the mod-ern age as a historical formation”, „Beginn der Neuzeit”) were the publication of „Critique of pure reason” (1781) by Kant for the field of philosophy and human mind in general; the French revolution (1789) for the field of the socio-political and socio-economic situation; and the Napoleonic realignment (since 1800) for the political map of Europe. Johann Sebastian Bach and Georg Friedrich Händel do not compose music any longer (they died 1750 and 1756, respectively), but Joseph Haydn and Ludwig van Beethoven. People did not wear peri-wigs any longer. The most significant historical reason for this development is the ongoing process of secularization and the emancipation of human reason.

At the end of the 18th century various political and social developments (which started already at the times of the renaissance) and a synthesis of different patterns of thought lead to the end of the age of enlightenment („Aufklärung”). A new scientific world view is provided which became the basis of our today’s scientific and philosophical thinking. One side-effect of this development is the final divergence of the philosophy of nature and science („Naturphiloso-phie” in the sense of Schelling versus „Naturwissenschaft”) in the course of the 19th century.

The 19th Century: Selected Topics

After overcoming the age of enlightenment the age of classicism and romanticism followed; especially the romanticism was of significant importance for the further development of na-ture concepts. During the 19th century some comprehensive philosophical drafts were elabo-rated. All-embracing conceptions were presented with which all the important questions in philosophy should be answered (consciousness of totality in the 19th century).

All post-Kantian approaches are concerned with the overcoming of the difference between ontological substance theory and transcendental epistemology which was opened by Kant with the Copernican change in philosophy (so Schelling), or with the elaboration of concep-tions under inclusion of the discrepancy between being and cognition (so Fichte, Hegel, Schopenhauer). Later, various programs of neo-Kantianism were advanced: Criticism (Joseph Vaihinger), “Marburger Schule” School (Hermann Cohen, Paul Natorp, Ernst Cassierer) and “Südwestdeutsche Schule” (“Badener Schule”: Wilhelm Windelband, Heinrich Rickert).

Subsequently, different scientific fields (chemistry, physics, and geography and others) were established, later ecology and biology as well.


Romanticism, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Schelling, Engels

Romantic conception on nature

Romanticism is a reaction to the one-sided glorification of reason in the age of enlightenment. It is both a reaction to the mechanistic world view and Kant’s mechanistic conception of na-ture-objectifying; Kant wanted to extort nature to give answers to scientific questions (in the manner of a judge). In the romantic period we see a revival of the old holistic approach (Em-pedokles). The Rousseau „Retour à la nature!” (Back to Nature!) is now gaining substance and it is the program for scientific research, nature interpretation, and nature experience.

For romanticism, nature is a unity, there is no separation between subject and nature „in it-self” (as assumed by Descartes, Hume, and Kant). This is a throwback to renaissance philoso-phy: Nature is a divine ego („world spirit” or „world-soul”). The romantic view of nature is thereby more or less consciously irrational („sentimental”). A characteristic attitude is the longing for naturalness, nature and nature mysticism. The focus is directed at transfiguration („Verklärung”). Mood, emotion and imagination play an important role. Romantic trends had strong influences on the contemporary and also recent consciousness, particularly in Central Europe and Germany. The irrational nature led to serious problems (see for example the fas-cist nature mysticism).

In connection with romantic tendencies different modes of experience of nature are dominant. Important is the difference between the „sentimentalistic and naive attitude towards nature”.

Sentimentalistic attitude towards nature: As a result of a cognitive process (reason) it is claimed that a direct, uninhibited, emotional, just romantic attitude of nature is preferable (note the contradiction!). Scientific analysis, experimentation, and systematic observation of nature are seen rather skeptically, it is better to devote moods and have emotions.

Naive attitude towards nature: This attitude that is characterized by a simple, direct relation-ship to nature, not in a disjunctive, separating, but in a conjunctive manner. This view of na-ture stresses feeling and phantasy, without previously justified rationally. It is more open for scientific analysis, experimentation, and systematic observation, although it also devotes moods.

„Great approaches” of the 19th century

The main „great approaches” with important implications to the philosophy of nature are:

Phenomenology and attitude towards history of human thought by Hegel „The World as Intension and Representation” (1819) by Schopenhauer. Philosophy of nature by Schelling Philosophy based on the historical und dialectical materialism; Engels advanced a spe-

cial philosophy of nature in the framework of the dialectical materialism.

All the advanced „great approaches” are faced with the philosophy of Kant (transcendental idealism), and all approaches have a certain relation to the Critique of Pure Reason, either rejecting certain parts, or agree, but there is never ignorance.


Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel: Phaenomenology, dialectics and historization of science and knowledge

The philosophy of nature advanced by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) is com-posed of different components: Phaenomenology, dialectics and historization of science.

Phaenomenology: Human consciousness is absolutely free for itself, this term represents the key concept in Hegel‘s philosophy. Outside the human sphere nature is only present as ob-served nature. The consciousness itself has come to the certainty of being the entire reality.

Dialectics: For the philosophy of nature there is a specific form of the dialectic that shows an inner nature of nature. Nature permanently produces theses and antitheses, but the emerged units do not remain stable, but immediately produces new antitheses and remains undeveloped (Schelling adds some further aspects which lead to the concept of substance). Human mind can figure out somewhat stable units (later, Engels will replace mind in this context with so-cial practice).

Historization: With Hegel the development of historization of science and knowledge comes to a conclusion. Everything must be interpreted in the context of time and the social stage of development. Even nature and our ideas of nature always develop. – Consequences of this historization are evidently that our thinking is not without any preconditions. Our perception and our thinking are predetermined by centuries-old traditions that resonate sustainably. Thinking and perceiving are closely related to the time and the historical background. Human thought is historical. What is true and what is wrong, what is real and what is artificial, is of-ten decided actualistically by a certain historic community. Perspectives and world views have experienced many changes. In order to explain our specific point of views, it requires the examination of the historical development of perspectives.

This is in order to determine whether there have been aberrations, which remain in our minds, or whether historical perspectives are fading over time, which can be quickly recovered as a basis for some redefinition of philosophy. Roots of our understanding are social and cultural conditions and scientific and philosophical drafts that prevail (in most cases with notable time delay) and enter simpified the common consciousness.

The presupposition of the time-bound character of perception and thinking was not always self-evident: first, Augustine included historical development seriously into his concepts. Endpoint of the development of this kind of historicism is the philosophy of history by Hegel.

A particularly difficult epistemological problem is the reconstruction of the history ideas and concepts.

1. Opinion: Different scientific traditions and opinions are fundamentally incompatible (Kuhn). Therefore, there is no scientific progress in the sense that a cumulative increase of knowledge or understanding is possible.

2. Opinion: Cumulative scientific progress is possible (positivism, Popper). Paradigms in the Kuhnian sense are compatible under certain conditions (word-object analysis, theory, network analysis, semantic and syntactic analysis of theories and hypotheses).


Arthur Schopenhauer: The world as intension and representation

Arthur Schopenhauer (1789-1860) revised the idealism in his famous „The world as intension and representation” (Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, 1819). His comprehensive philo-sophical draft is based on Kant‘s transcendentalism and Platon's ontology.

He starts with a broad explanation of the „Axiom of the Sufficient Reason” („Satz vom zurei-chenden Grunde”): „Nihil est sine ratione cur potius sit, quam non sit” (Christian Wolff [On-tologia][verbatim translation: Nothing is without any reason, why it is rather, than it is not.] [wörtlich: Nichts ist ohne Grund, warum es eher ist, als dass es nicht ist”]). Each variant of materialism is rejected because materialism extents the principles of sufficient reason to the perceiving subject itself, which, according to Schopenhauer, is impossible. Idealism is estab-lished consistently.

Crucial for Schopenhauer's metaphysics and new to the philosophy of nature is: In order to develop his entire philosophical system, he starts his considerations with the body of the knowledge aspiring subject. Our own body, guided by motives and stimuli, becomes the ob-ject for the knowledge aspiring subject and is used to characterize the metaphysical intension („will”), which subsequently is associated with Kant's „thing in itself” and Platon's „ideas”.

This derivation and formulation of his own epistemology (the world as idea), ontology (the world as intension), aesthetics (the world as idea) and ethics (the world as intension) is elabo-rated in the four books of Schopenhauer's main work „The world as intension and representa-tion” (1819).

Schelling's philosophy of nature: The concept of the self-consistent nature

Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling (1775-1854) tries to overcome the difference between ontological substance theory and transcendental epistemology applying the dialectic method, and, by this, bring together epistemology and ontology and, subsequently, human mind and reality.

We realize nature only by application of the concept of a nature consisting of itself; the rea-soning subject is part of this nature in which we really live and which is the basis of our moral acting simultaneously. We meet nature consisting of itself in any type of organization, par-ticularly in the organism. Each organization is based on a concept, however, the concept is in its own and cannot be separated from it: the organization organizes itself.

According to Schelling, the certainty of existence of the „I am” must be stated: The ego be-comes a being and precedes all thought and imagination. We ourselves, with our mind and reason are included in the overall reality.

Constitutive for nature are three potencies („Potenzen”): Matter, light, and organism. Matter is most important. The difference between ontological substance theory and transcendental epis-temology can be cleared by a reversal of the argumentation as to the reconstruction of matter: Matter is no longer taken as a given product, but taken as a process of active formation within an overall process. By this, it is essentially a problem of understanding the process of becom-ing real, the constitution of reality.


Thus, for Schelling nature is originally assumed to be productive. Developments are taken as dynamic sequences (for Kant as a purpose of organization). In the philosophy of identity, phi-losophy becomes genetic because it makes all the necessary sequences of our representations arising in front of our perception.

There is no difference between experience and speculation. The system of nature is the system of our mind simultaneously. Nature is the visible mind, and mind is the visible nature. Nature has reality out of itself, and it is its own product. It is a form itself, an organized and self-organizing totality. Nature is a free creation and the process of creation has its origin in the free forces that lie ahead of matter. The freedom in this context is the original forming process („Gestaltungsprozess”), where organic and anorganic phases are included in a totality. The authority which recognizes the natural processes (mind and reason) is always thought implic-itly and realizes itself as part of the overall natural forming process. The subject-object dual-ism is to be lifted with this conception. – Maybe, this aspect is the most important aspect of Schelling's natural philosophy for today, even though the program is rather difficult to endure.

Schelling's philosophy is motivated not technically but rather practically: his question is how nature must be thought of, on the one hand in order to understand it scientifically, on the other hand in order to understand humans as moral and spiritual beings. By this, his approach is aimed at self-knowledge of man as the authoritative instance. The modern, atomistic and dis-junctive thinking is criticized, and it is the idea of absolute indivisible whole („Idee des ab-solut theillosen Ganzen”) which is stressed. This idea is coincident with the idea of God.

According to Schelling, nature is a priori, that means that every singularity in it is determined by the whole that is the idea of nature in general. However, if nature is a priori, it must be possible to realize it as a priori. Schelling comes to substance metaphysics, after passing through the transcendental philosophy. After the „I am” is constituted, he asks about the real constitutional process, in which nature is understood as an acting unit. Schelling developed the concept of a current nature by itself. According to this conception, nature is productivity, but not exclusively, because otherwise there would be only an infinitely rapid, formless evolv-ing. Thus, there must be an inhibitory effect, and it must be assumed that there is a basic du-plicity: Nature is regarded not only as pure subject, but also as a self-object.

A third element is necessary because otherwise the two tendencies would cancel each other, and again a product cannot be fixed. A third factor is considered: the permanent renewing and unifying synthesis of duplicity to products, which is a permanent reproduction. The product must be thought of as destroyed and reproduced in every moment, and we really do not see the existence of the product, but the permanent reproduction.

Friedrich Engels and the dialectic materialism

Within the conception of the dialectic materialism several approaches on philosophy of nature were elaborated. In the 19th century, this was done mainly by Friedrich Engels (1820-1895).

First, the Copernican change in philosophy (Kant) was realized. The effects on the philosophy of nature are supposed to be not significant, because within the program of dialectical materi-alism gaining knowledge is of minor importance compared to social praxis. Subsequently,


Materialism is updated consistently and all idealistic tendencies (objective and subjective ide-alism) are rejected.

The controversy is endless, and probably not yet complete, whether Engels put Hegel only „from head to feet”, or whether he improperly overstressed Hegel’s carefully applied dialecti-cal method.

Neo-Kantianism

Wilhelm Windelband (1848-1915): Based on Kantian epistemology (Critique of Judgment: „philosophy is the critical science of the universal values” [„Philosophie ist die Wissenschaft von den allgemeingültigen Werten”]) he separated idiographic and nomothetic fields of sci-ence.

Idiographic: yield for reasons for singularity and individuality, often descriptive. Nomothetic: yield for laws in nature (explanation of cause-effect processes).

Heinrich Rickert (1863-1934): Based on Windelband’s concept and classification of scientific approaches, and on the work of Wilhelm Dilthey (1833-1911) cultural sciences („humanities”, „Kulturwissenschaften”, „Geisteswissenschaften”) and science („Naturwissenschaften”) are separated. A system of values is constructed which is based on the distinction between the world of objects and the world of values. Both are combined in realization of meaning, which emerges, „inasmuch as we are valuating subjects, which are freely commending on values” (see Rickert 1926, translation UB).

Nomothetic means „in a generalizing manner”, ideographic means „in an individualizing manner” (specifying). According to Rickert, the „nomothetic” can be defined only by starting from an aspect of value, by which subsequently the individuality in its singular meaning is appreciated.

History of Science and Ecology (19th Century)

Several preconditions lead to a certain development of scientific thinking and to the biological revolution during the 19th century, however, this process was completed during the 20th centu-ry with the formulation of the synthetic theory of evolution (STE) by Ernst Mayr and Theodo-sius Dobzhansky. – Simultaneously, ecology as a scientific discipline was advanced.

Preconditions for the biological revolution

The biological revolution took place in the course of the 19th century. It leads to a scientific earthquake and a strong polarization, particularly to a fundamental realignment as to the status of mankind in the world. Here, the ideas of an evolutionary process from Darwin and Wallace are of special importance. It became clear that all living beings are adapted to concrete condi-tions and they evolve; thus, they change the environmental conditions. By this, they also have to modify themselves, otherwise they cannot survive in a developing environment. Humans are part of this process and do not occupy an exceptional position as to biological properties.

Actually, it was a new idea that biological species are not invariable objects, but originates (evolves). Today, this basic doctrine is not seriously doubted within the scientific community.

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Preconditions for the Biological Revolution in the 18th and 19th Century

Some particular preconditions for the development of life sciences are of course Hume’s em-piricism, Kant‘s concept of causality and process, as well as his concept of teleology, Goe-the’s natural history research and his concept of morphology, the historicism of the 19th centu-ry, the scientific research of the late 18th and the first half of the 19th century, the rejection of Platonic and Aristotelian Philosophy, and of course, the declarative statement: „Pure religion is based on belief” (D. Hume)6 , which was somewhat symptomatic.

Precondition for the elaboration of the doctrine of evolution was the development of a new world view: the realization of the importance of observation, experiment and experience (em-pireia). This was in strong contrast with the Platonic concept of the type and certain parts of the Aristotelian empiricism.

Platonic (and Neo-Platonic) as well as Aristotelian philosophy were congealed in the middle ages in the form of syncretism to an ultimate truth, which was in contradiction to any further development. It was of fundamental importance that the principles of this philosophy eroded more and more, and this was associated with the secularization of science and the suppression of the influence of the churches and other authorities. This process extended over several hundred years.

The Platonic idea (εἶδος [eîdos]) of something is „ideal” which means that it is temporally and spatially invariant per definitionem, and thus unchangeable and unextended. For us, ideas are represented by types, in the sense of ideal conceptions, which are realized as real objects more or less appropriately. According to Platon the idea, the type is veritably exclusively, not the thing, the object which is realized in space and time; Platon (and Parmenides) located the real-ized object in the field of the „Doxa” (opinion, which inhere illusion)7: The abstraction is true, not the realized object which is an object in space and time. Therefore, the true idea is not to be detected by our senses, not by experience at all.

Additionally, parts of the Aristotelian empiricism had to be rejected as well: at first, some alleged knowledge which was taken for granted just because it was stated by Aristoteles (stars are holes in the firmament), secondly, and more important, the Aristotelian (cosmic) concept of teleology. Aristotle felt compelled to explain the apparent usefulness in the field of the an-imate by introducing a „final cause” (causa finalis, sometimes misunderstood as a „divine plan of salvation”): An intended purpose is considered to be the course of a process, and this is in contradiction with the principle of causality. – In biology, explanations are given using the principle of causality, not by recourse to a special purpose or final cause.

The contrast between rationalism and empiricism was repealed by the „Critique of Pure Rea-son” (1781) accompanied by an earthquake in philosophy (Moses Mendelssohn: „crushing down everything”, „alles zermalmend”). – A new concept of teleology is available (see Kant 1790 [Critique of Judgment]).

6 Hume (1748) [An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding]: p. 9, see also Kühn, op. cit.: especially p. 301ff. 7 The „Theory of Ideas“ is part of Platon‘s „unwritten doctrine“, it is advanced and assumed to be known espe-cially in the dialogues Parmenides and Politeia.

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Within this typology the Aristotelian concept of teleology is a type of causality („causa fi-nalis”), and by this recognized with the determining power of judgment. Kant transfers the teleology into the area of the reflective power of judgment; in this sense teleology is a regula-tive idea: The judgment is focused on an assumed objective purposiveness. A teleological judgment of nature must be carried out, if the properties of an object cannot be explained by a natural mechanism.10

The teleological power of judgment applies the „as if” (wie wenn, als ob), and not the „be-cause” („darum”): „The concept of an objective purposiveness of nature is a critical principle of reason for the reflecting power of judgment.” (Kant, KU, § 75, transl. UB)11

Early „Biologists”

Scientific investigations of some „early biologists” also provided necessary preconditions for the development of biology. Pierre-Luis Moreau de Maupertuis (1698-1759) was a French mathematician, astronomist and philosopher. He advanced theories of inheritance, origin of species by macro-mutation and cross-breeding. Of special importance were the famous Swe-dish scientist Carl von Linné (1707-1778) who wrote encyclopedias, („Species Plantarum” and „Systema Naturae”) and founded modern nomenclature and taxonomy. George de Buffon (1707-1788) was a French scientist who also wrote encyclopedias, and described the diversity of animal forms and fossils („L'Histoire naturelle, 4. Part: Histoire générale des animaux).

The French botanist and zoologist Jean-Baptiste Monet Chevalier de Lamarck (1744-1829) was the first evolutionary biologist, he described the inheritance of acquired properties. The discussion of evolutionary biology started with Georges de Cuvier (1769-1832) and Étienne Geoffrey de Saint-Hillarie (1772–1844): Cuvier introduced the catastrophism and rejected the gradualism (continual progression of evolution) while Saint-Hilaire insisted on evolution pro-cesses which lead to new species in the past by macro-mutation.

Example: Goethe’s contribution to the development of science.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) worked intensively on anatomy, physiology, and botany for decades. He was always searching for general patterns to which singularities can be deduced. He studied the design of types.

The term „Morphologie” (morphology) was introduced by Goethe: „The form (gestalt) is movable, a becoming, and a passing away. The tenet of the form is the tenet of change.” Mor-phology is the tenet of gestalt.12 Goethe wanted to find basic types for the variety of plants, according to his approach all shapes evolve from such types. This is the basic idea of the „Metamorphosis of Plants”: the individual development („Metamorphosis”) is a superior („meta”) process (suffix „- osis”), shape („morph”) is the result.

10 see Kant (1790) [KJ], and also the chapter „Teleology“ in Sattler (1986) [Biophilosophy] with many interest-ing references. 11 „Der Begriff einer objektiven Zweckmäßigkeit der Natur ist ein kritisches Prinzip der Vernunft für die reflek-tierende Urteilskraft.” (Kant, KU, § 75). 12 „Die Gestalt ist ein Bewegliches, ein Werdendes, ein Vergehendes. Gestaltlehre ist Verwandlungslehre“ (Goe-the 1949ff. Die Schriften zur Naturwissenschaft. Leopoldina-Ausgabe. Leipzig: I. 10, p. 128. (translation UB), see also Boyle (1999): 562ff.


Historicism

In many fields of science, philosophy and history it was recognized that explanation and un-derstanding is only possible by including aspects of historical reconstruction of the develop-ment. Biological objects could be realized as something that came into being, that developed, and that cannot be explained exhaustively in terms of a static unit.

The biological revolution: Charles Darwin, Alfred Russel Wallace and the doctrine of evolution

„There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been origi-nally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning end-less forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.” (Darwin 1859 [Origin of Species] last sentence)

Charles Darwin (1809-1882) and Alfred Russel Wallace (1823–1913) are the founders of the doctrine of evolution. Darwin’s approach is presented in his famous „On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life” (1859), Wallace’s approach in his „On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely from the Original Type” (1858), the printed version of the „Ternate Essays”.

Famous keywords are „natural selection” and „struggle for life”. Species as units are variable. They developed in long time periods, there is a natural relationship. Living beings, species, are not the result of a cosmic teleological principle („causa finalis”) which was introduced by Aristoteles in order to explain the ontogenetic development. The principle of the „natural se-lection” holds, basic patterns, i.e. species, vary, the environment decides, which variants can reproduce and survive. Within a long process species evolve. The importance of competition was intensively discussed: Wallace claimed competition among different species to be the most important factor (interspecific competition), while Darwin focused on the competition among all individuals (intraspecific competition). Wallace saw the driving force in the bio-geographic and environmental pressure, which forces the species to adapt to certain environ-mental conditions.13

The spirit of time and some scientific preconditions had to lead necessarily to a theory on the driving forces of evolution: The formulation of the theory of evolution was in the air. Darwin and Wallace executed it.

Darwin’s important contribution was the clear recognition of the importance of „natural selec-tion” for the process of evolution, of the importance of comparing empirical observation, which he carried out intensively, and analyzed the results with greatest care and caution, as well as the recognition that teleological explanation (purposiveness) cannot be given at all, particularly not in biology. Explanations are only possible by relating cause and effect (cau-salism). However, very often it is noticed that the symmetric analogy between explanation and prediction doesn’t hold in biology.

13 Kutschera (2003) and Mayr (2002) [Die Entwicklung der biologischen Gedankenwelt], see also: Futuyma (2006) [Evolution] and Freeman & Herron (2007).


Short account of the history of ecology

Important steps in the history of ecology are in brief: Early history (since Theophrastus: bota-ny and zoology), age of enlightenment (since Linnaeus‘ time: systematics, nomenclature), from Alexander von Humboldt and Jean-Baptiste de Lamarck to Darwin (biogeography, doc-trines of evolution), second half of the 19th century (Ernst Haeckel and Eugeniusz Warming: scientific ecology). Subsequently, various approaches have been advanced during the 20th century: Various directions of vegetation science (Clements, Gleason, Braun-Blanquet), Ger-man holists and related approaches (Thienemann, Friedrich), Systems ecology (Tansley, E.P. Odum), new ecology contrary to history of nature, individualistic concept of ecology, modern critism of ecology (Peters), and a new synthesis.

The Presocratists Thales and Anaximandros advanced the ionic philosophy of nature. It was based on speculation derived from general observation. Empedokles wrote on nutrition of plants through pores in the leaves, and Demokritos on the principle of natural selection; Hera-klitos stated that „everything flows”. Hippokrates described environmental impacts on hu-mans and founded the concept of human health, Pythagoras saw harmony in nature every-where, and Herodot wrote travel reports including aspects of natural history.

Platon, strongly influenced by Pythagoras founded the idea of prevision ecology; he also saw harmony among all animals and humans. Aristoteles started the research of animal „ecology”: he observed the occurrence and the behavior of birds, annual effects on reproduction, animal geography, hibernation and migration, color change, feeding habit, and symbiosis. Theophras-tos is the founder of botany and plant „ecology”: he observed the development of plants out of seeds, carried out germination experiments, and studied the impact of abiotic environmental factors and other items.

General innovations in medieval ages were:

Education system of Charles the Great (Karl der Große) during the 9th century, (foun-dation of a university, 1089, Bologna), invention of an effective plough

Leonardo Pisano alias Leonardo Fibonacci (~1170-1240): How many rabbits can be produced from one pair in one year?

Frederick II Holy Roman Emperor (1194-1250): Observation of nature Francisco d Assisi (1181-1226): Canticle of the Sun Pietro d‘ Crescenzi (~1230 – ~1329): The Book of Rural Benefits (~1309) (Botanical

properties of plants and horticultural techniques, agriculture of cereals, Vine and wine production, arboriculture, horticulture, management of meadows and woodland, bee keeping, monthly calendar of tasks etc.)

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519): progress in landscapes painting, landscape in the low-lands of the Arno without humans

Herbal books by various authors (1520-1540): detailed description including infor-mation where the plants occur

K. Gesner (1516-1565): 1555 ascending of the Pilatus (Switzerland), description of al-titudinal zones

B. Varenius (1622-1650): Geographia generalis: vegetation typology (Palmetum, Quercetum)


John Graunt (1620-1674): founder of demography, statistics of birth and death for the first time (1662)

John Ray (1627-1705): founder of English botany and adherent of physico-theology (The wisdom of GOD as manifested in the Creation, 1691)

William Derham (1657-1735): natural history of animals (equilibrium) Joseph Pitton de Tournefort (1656-1708): ascending of the Ararat (Turkey), descrip-

tion of mountain vegetation

Due to this variety of research and speculation scientist in the 19th century had a broad basis for further empirical approaches.

The 20th Century: Selected Topics

Preliminaries

Modern notions and conceptions of „philosophy of nature” are very diverse. Research in this field is poor since the philosophy of nature (now almost synonymous with Schelling's philos-ophy of nature) is generally discredited. Philosophy of nature is more likely carried out in other fields of research: Landscape ecology, environmental law, environmental ethics, socio-logy and others.

However, rather from the social scientific and political spheres, some sort of ecophilosophy is advanced; it includes various currents of eco-fundamentalism like the „deep ecology” to „ecology” in a popular sense of the word. On the other hand, especially in the Anglo-American sphere some special sorts of biophilosophy, sometimes with quasi-religious conno-tations are advanced. Important is the „evolutionary epistemology” („evolutionäre Erkenntnis-theorie”) since the 1970s.

For long time, philosophy of nature was discredited and was not taken seriously. This is due to the separation of science and philosophy in the course of the 19th century, the effects of romantic aberrations, and improper intervention of nature philosophy in the field of science. However, philosophy of nature could be advanced as competing enterprises with science, a speculative advance before science, and in order to provide reasons or superelevation of sci-ence. Today, the situation is different; many different approaches are advanced in different fields.

Biophilosophical Approaches most often have some characteristics in common:

Romantic or romanticizing understanding of nature, essentialism, and enthusiasm for nature

An absolute value is assigned to species, populations, ecosystems, or similar units (in-dependent from human observer)

An unity of nature and the environment is related to the ecosystem concept (key words are self-regulation, material cycle, biological equilibrium)

The focus is on collective and individual consciousness in order to have impact on the political discussion and decision

Either large-scale or global or focus on individual objects (fish in the river, rhinos in the landscape, certain toads in wetlands).


Philosophy of nature: Alfred North Whitehead

Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) advanced a considerably broad and in many aspects really new philosophy of nature. Most important for his conceptions are Platon‘s philosophy, the work of Leibniz and the English empirists (Locke, Hume, Berkeley). However, an exami-nation of the German idealism (Kant) is missing. His philosophy of nature is expressed in his mean work „Process and Reality”.

Important aspects of his philosophy of nature are the presentation of a table of categories as an open system, his theory of prehension, and his concepts of nature as process-determined events.

Whitehead developed a table of categories as an open system (as opposed to Kantian catego-ries), which is used to fix the reality. The first category is the all-important: the real world is a process and the process is the process of real singularities. Whitehead's concept of nature is essentially a concept of relations and processes. Here, the concept of substance is practically replaced by a concept of process. The key concept is that of the organism as a correlate of the constitutive system of relations. Another important moment in Whitehead's concept is the creativity. Nature produces the „future” and reveals her creative force that is needed to allow nature to be a process. Thus, „time” is produced in nature, because the procedural nature of the events makes the time frame.

Human consciousness does not occur exclusively as an intellectual „mind”, experience is be-fore consciousness. Prehension is the generic term for various forms of experience including sensation, and feeling. The problem of consciousness is transformed into an ontological framework, in particular feelings receive an ontological status. The question of consciousness is a question of receiving specific sensations, and by this the relational structure that consti-tutes a real individual.

Consequence of the Doctrine of Evolution: Constitution of Modern Biology

„Biology is a science like physics and chemistry, and yet it is different in many respects from these so-called exact sciences. Their special status is due to the fact that living beings distinguishes a double causality: On the one hand, the laws of physics hold true, however, the peculiarities of living beings, such as evolution and adaptation are opened up for explanation only through a historical analysis. By this, biology links natural sciences and humanities in a unique way, so that it plays a key role for philosophy.” (Mayr, E. 2002 [Die Entwicklung der biologi-schen Gedankenwelt. Berlin], translation UB)

Since the thirties of the 20th century, the synthetic theory of evolution merged the hitherto separate advanced approaches in the fields of genetics and evolutionary research.*) The „STE” was mainly developed by Theodosius Dobzhansky (1900-1975) and Ernst Mayr (1904-2006)14. The main theses of the general approach are still undisputed.

14 Dobzhanski (1937) [Genetics and the origin of species]. – See also Mayr (2002) [Die Entwicklung der biologi-schen Gedankenwelt].


Accordingly, evolutionary factors are mechanisms of generation, selection, and stabilization of variants: Generation of variants by mutation and recombination, selection of variants by genetic drift and selection, and stabilization of variants by pre- and post-zygotic isolation. The result of the more or less long-termed processes is adaptation of the organism in its phenotype to the environment: Thus, adaptations are properties of organisms that have evolved through natural selection in evolutionary time.

By the synthetic theory of evolution biology as life sciences could be constituted. Biology was established as a coherent, separated scientific discipline based on Darwin’s approach which was a precondition. The constitutional principle of life is the combination of the concepts of inheritance (disclosure, retention, stability) and evolution (development, change).

Mayr stated (Mayr (2002) [Die Autonomie der Biologie]) that biological objects are partly independent from physical or chemical laws in nature, because certain properties of certain species do not evolve due to general laws but rather from singular historical events. Thus, in biology you are dealing rather with conceptions than with laws. In this sense, there are auto-nomous phenomena in biology; biology is a science of historical reconstruction.

The Baden school of neo-Kantianism developed the concept of idiographic versus nomothetic sciences. While idiographic approaches seek to explain a singular unit as an individual, nomo-thetic approaches seek to generalize results of scientific research to general laws. It is there-fore a methodological dualism (description and explanation of single units as individuals, i.e. specifying versus generalization). The biology is the only discipline which includes both.

Based on Darwin’s doctrine of evolution Darwinism and biologism is advanced in various ways. Darwinism is based on the assumption of natural selection; Darwin's doctrine of evolu-tion was, however, repeatedly extended beyond its original scope, some with the well-known disastrous consequences:

Culture Darwinism: The development of human cultures is explained with the principles of selection and struggle for existence. This is in order to explain higher developed levels in hu-man societies. Another approach is social Darwinism: The biological determinism is used to describe the development of human societies.

Popularizations and vulgarizations of evolutionary concepts also led to hubris in different va-rieties. Biologism is a form of social Darwinism; it is assumed that the struggle for existence exclusively determines the internal structure of human communities (war of all against all) and also the relation to other communities (war among communities, states and nations). The biologism is widespread in racist ideologies.

Darwin's approach on evolution also leads to a revolution in anthropology. Through the de-velopment of evolutionary biology, Darwin showed that man has the same general character-istics as other living beings: an amoeba is much more similar to a human being than an amoe-ba to a stone. Man is therefore scientifically not the result of a special divine act of creation.

Psychological approaches advanced by Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920) and later by Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), Alfred Adler (1870-1937), Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961) and others, and philosophical approaches advanced by Arthur Schopenhauer (1789-1860) and Friedrich Nie-tzsche (1844-1900) lead to modern philosophical anthropology. Most important were Arnold


Gehlen (1904-1976), Helmuth Plessner (1892-1985), and Max Scheler (1874-1928). Another direction was the empirical anthropology advanced by Günter Osche (1926-2009) and others.

After the development of a universal idea of life, it must be assumed that the empirical find-ings in the field of general biology are transferable or applicable to humans. The human being was deprived of his speciality. This led to an emotional branding, all results of biological re-search directly affects human beings themselves, without mediation of philosophy or theolo-gy. The secularization has reached its endpoint.

An important effect was that subsequently humans always attempted to find properties of them that animals do not have in common with man (differentiation from animals) and which makes man to be something special: Self-consciousness? Historical consciousness? Tool use? Mind? Judgment? Individual creativity? Warlike behavior? Reason?

Consequences for theology

“Pure religion is based on belief.” Hume 1740 [A treatise on human nature. London]

„In principio creavit Deus caelum et terram.” (Nova Vulgata: Gen. 1.1)15

The developments shown lead to significant changes in the spiritual world in terms of the per-spective of the place of man in the world. In the field of theology new challenges and perspec-tives occurred, new problems and new opportunities. Some conflicts, of course, occurred be-tween religious belief and scientific rationality.16

Since the middle ages, the proceeding secularization was assessed to be degrading for man-kind by the theologians, and actually, the people often felt degraded. Therefore, they were always very skeptical about innovation.

The consciousness of the post-modern human is broken in some way, as he cannot bridge two needs any longer: The need for sanctity, spirituality and the longing for overall orientation beyond the visible world on the one hand, and the secular rationality as well as the knowledge based on purely secular science on the other hand. People react with individual self-constitution as they think best without a strict orientation at certain authorities. According to many social scientists (for example Arnold Gehlen) and philosophers (for example Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre) there is a characteristic reaction of post-modern man: fear (angst).

Evolutionary epistemology (Evolutionäre Erkenntnistheorie)

Within conception of the evolutionary epistemology it is assumed that the cognitive apparatus is a concrete result of evolutionary development: the faculty of getting knowledge is an adap-tation to a hypothesized real world, so that a survival of the human species was possible. The

15 Translations: At the very beginning, that is: originally, principally, according to the axiom or doctrine and the basic principle – God has created, that is: made, fabricated, generated heaven and earth, thus: everything. („Im Anfange, also am Anfang, oder auch: zuallererst, im Prinzip, dem Grundsatze und der allgemeinen Lehre nach hat Gott Himmel und Erde, also alles, geschaffen, erschaffen oder erzeugt.“) 16 The Roman Catholic Church set the "Kritik der reinen Vernunft" on the list of prohibited books (1827).


hypothetical realism shifts both the Kantian pure concepts of intuition (space and time) and the pure concepts of understanding (categories) out of the a priori status of transcendentality into an empirical sphere: these concepts are phylogenetically acquired by our mind. 17

By this, the evolutionary development of the sense organs (for the delineation of objects in space and time), the functions of the brain (e.g. the perception of causality) and the genesis of linguistic and cultural characteristics are essentially important.

The biological revolution: Summary

The foundation of scientific conceptions of a general evolutionary development of all life by Darwin marked a turning point in the scientific world view both in the fields of humanities and in the field of sciences. The formulation of a general theory of evolution was only possi-ble within a certain intellectual and scientific climate that is an output of the age of the en-lightenment and is characterized by the complete separation of religion and science, the sup-pression of the Platonic idea and the Aristotelian final cause in favor of a new concept of pro-cess and a new concept of teleology, so that causality and by this observation, experiment and experience gain a special role in scientific research.

After merging Darwin’s approach with the genetics, the synthetic theory of evolution was developed. By this uniform principles of life become clear. Based on this knowledge, modern biology as a scientific discipline could be established, which also includes humanistic aspects. Since man is part of all the animate, results of biological research always concern the people themselves - hence his special concernment!

Some theses for further discussion

Biology must remain at least partly oriented ideographically, this means that the objec-tives of scientific research must focus on the explanation of a singular individuality. Why is a unit as it is?

As biological objects have a high degree of individuality, beyond the complete genera-lization a historical perspective is necessary; a causal approach is necessary but not sufficient or exhaustive.

The philosophical discussion beyond the purely scientific approach is therefore some-times evident: o Life can sufficiently be explained in terms of its chemical and physical properties? o Is man completely to be explained in terms of his biological and, ultimately, his

chemical and physical properties? Teleology is a useful and necessary tool for setting up hypotheses, and for setting up a

historical perspective. The teleological point of view always remains an „as-if-assessment”.

17 see Vollmer (1975) [Evolutionäre Erkenntnistheorie], Sattler (1986) [Biophilosophy. Analytic and holistic approach]. Berlin), Wuketits (1983) [Biologische Erkenntnis]. - The approach was elaborated based on Kant‘s „Critique of Pure Reason” and Darwin‘s law of natural selection.


Holism and Reductionism

Holism is a philosophical attitude which was elaborated against positivism (empiricism: „Wiener Schule”, R. Carnap; critical rationalism: K.R. Popper, I. Lakatos, P. Feyerabend, T.S. Kuhn). During the first half of the 20th century is was established by P. Duhem, J.C. Smuts, and A. Meyer-Abich, later it was advanced in a modified form by Willard von Orman Quine and Hilary Putnam.

Most important is the basic assumption of this epistemological position that hypotheses can-not be confirmed, rejected or explained in detail without external auxiliary assumptions. You can (simplified) draw the following line: Parmenides – Empedokles – Monism – Nominalism – Romanticism – Holism. The conception is sentimental insofar as that with the help of ra-tionalism rationalism is opposed. – Including the functionalist tradition, in ecology, the organ-ismic concept of the community is developed.

Reductionism is the opposite attitude to holism, representing a more disjunctive view operat-ing with separating terms. You can (simplified) draw the line: Heraklitos – Demokritos – Sokrates – Realism – Materialism – Reductionism. The conception is naive, as it does not allow for holistic conceptions.

Most varieties of holism obscure too early the subject-object relationship (the Cartesian sub-ject-object dualism). The same applies to more modern approaches of similar provenance (Ilia Prigogine, Hermann Haken, etc.). In terms of ontology, the subject assigns itself at a very high level to the objective existence. However, the level of abstraction is so high that several im-portant questions of natural philosophy doesn’t make sense any longer. Within natural philos-ophy, however, the „Nature as it is by itself” is not interesting for us. Actually, it is necessary to maintain the duality of certain levels of knowledge as a heuristic principle and consistent „epistemologization” of science, particularly ecology and the concepts in ecology.

Science is dealing with reality, philosophy of nature is dealing with truth and reality and the relation between truth and reality. Philosophy is dealing with ontology and metaphysics in-cluding aspects of moral and religious aspects. Science is dealing with reality, insofar it deals with epistemology, humanities and history of philosophy. Science cannot make any state-ments about the existence or the nature of things by themselves, or even about something that is outside of the perceiving subject. Thus, science is restricted to the world of observation and experience and apart from all ontology: it just refers only to the reality as we perceive it inter-subjectively.

In scientific ecology there are still two basic conceptions opposing: the organismic concep-tion of biological communities (after Frederic E. Clements) and the individualistic conception of biological communities (after Henry Allan Gleason) (table 1). Both of these systems of paradigms in ecology are no longer be maintained in the pure form. Recent approaches in-clude aspects of both these basic attitudes.

The organismic conception of communities can be assigned to holism; and the individualistic conception of communities can be assigned to reductionism.


Table 1: Basic statements of the organismic and individualistic conception of the community.

Organismic conception of the biotic community

Individualistic conception of the biotic community

Biotic communities and ecosystems are clearly limited units similar to organisms.

Biotic communities are not clearly limited units like organisms.

These „superorganisms" develop in certain direc-tions which are determined by initial conditions.

The development of biotic communities is not purely random and not determined.

The system regulates its compartments with a feedback control system (self-regulation, cyber-netic system).

There are no feedback control systems. The tem-poral interrelation of single processes of parts leads to the observed system behavior (self-organization, synergetic system).

There is a functional relationship among the parts of the whole system.

There is no functional relation among the differ-ent parts of the system, the parts are developed independently, organization and function are present only in special situations and temporarily.

The system is complex, characterized by various structures and various interactions.

The complexity of the system is a function of scale and the level of observation. Generally, for biotic communities the concepts of structure and function are rejected and replaced with the con-cepts of pattern and process.

As it is visible from the table some aspects are directly in contradiction and of course different research programs are defined. It is a remarkable fact that (more or less) hardboiled adherents of one of the positions do not communicate to each other at all: two different spheres, two different ecologies.

Scientific Ecology and Landscape Ecology

Ecology is a scientific discipline that works on an empirical basis and elaborates models of explanation, theories and hypotheses. In the field of general ecology different ecological tradi-tions and approaches are studied as to sustainable conceptions and ways of validation.

Objects of interest are natural history, the comparison of various ecological conceptions as well as the temporal and spatial distribution of organisms, populations and communities. The aim is the description, explanation and prediction of distribution and abundance of these ob-jects in space and time (pattern and process). Conceptions and research programs are available for application in the field of applied ecology and applications in the field of nature conserva-tion: Biosystematics (as a basis), population ecology, classification, community theory and cultural ecology.

Modern approaches towards the philosophy of nature advanced by worldwide approaches in various fields beside ecology: environmental ethics, environmental economy, economics of nature conservation, nature conservation law, environmental ecology, conservation manage-ment and others.


Outlook

Theses

1. Scientific research does not deal with ontological problems. Science focuses on reali-ty, however, the concept of reality has to be developed. Scientific conceptions have to be „epistemologized”.

2. However, it is clear that aesthetic properties and ethical implications must be taken in-to account. Thus, ontology enters the discussion through the back door as it constitutes the overall context.

Social preconditions for successful nature conservation

1. Constitutional state under the rule of law (Rechtsstaat): This offers the possibility to mediate and communicate competing claims and attitudes towards nature in an orderly fashion.

2. Prosperity and social market economy: In order to be able to care for all living beings it requires the physical and financial basis of one's own life care. Despite all the shortcom-ings the social market economy offers the best basis for effective conservation from all known economic systems.

3. Peace and human rights. As long as there is no peace among people and nations you cannot make peace with nature (Meyer-Abich).

References and Some Further Readings

References („classic”)

Darwin, C. 1859. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. London (dt. Die Entstehung der Arten durch natürliche Zuchtwahl. Üb. Von C.W: Neumann, Stuttgart 1963, Ausgabe 1981].

Goethe, J. W. Die Schriften zur Naturwissenschaft. Leopoldina-Ausgabe. Leipzig 1947ff.

Rickert, H. 1926. Kulturwissenschaft und Naturwissenschaft. 7. Aufl. Nachdruck, Stuttgart 1986.

Schopenhauer, A. 1819. Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung. Abgedruckt in: Hübscher, A. (Red.) 1976: Züricher Ausgabe. Band I – IV. Zürich.

Wallace, A.R. 1858. On the Tendency of Varieties to depart indefinitely from the Original Type. London.

Windelband, W. 1894. Geschichte und Naturwissenschaft. Straßburger Rektoratsrede (http://www.fh-augsburg.de/~harsch/germanica/Chronologie/19Jh/Windelband/win_rede.html).

Further Readings

Boyle, N. 1999. Goethe 1790 – 1803. London.

Dietzsch, S. 2004. Kant. Leipzig.


Dobzhanski, T. 1937. Genetics and the origin of species, New York.

Engelhardt, W. & Kuhn, D. 1989. Johann Wolfgang Goethe. In: Böhme, G. (Hrsg.): Klassiker der Naturphilosophie: Von den Vorsokratikern bis zur Kopenhagener Schule. München: 220-240.

Freemann, S., Herron, J.C. 2007. Evolutionary Analysis. 4th Edition. Pearson Prentice Hall. New York.

Futuyma, D.J. 2006. Evolution. Sinauer Associates, Sunderland, Massachusetts.

Ginsborg, H. 2005. Kant's Aesthetics and Teleology. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philoso-phy (Fall 2005 Edition). http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-aesthetics/

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