Research Catalog

Title

The myth of human supremacy / Derrick Jensen.

Author

Jensen, Derrick, 1960-

Publication

New York, NY : Seven Stories Press, [2016]

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

349 pages; 23 cm

Summary

• "In this impassioned polemic, radical environmental philosopher Derrick Jensen debunks the near-universal belief in a hierarchy of nature and the superiority of humans. Vast and underappreciated complexities of nonhuman life are explored in detail--from the cultures of pigs and prairie dogs, to the creative use of tools by elephants and fish, to the acumen of caterpillars and fungi. The paralysis of the scientific establishment on moral and ethical issues is confronted and a radical new framework for assessing the intelligence and sentience of nonhuman life is put forth. Jensen attacks mainstream environmental journalism, which too often limits discussions to how ecological changes affect humans or the economy--with little or no regard for nonhuman life. With his signature compassionate logic, he argues that when we separate ourselves from the rest of nature, we in fact orient ourselves against nature, taking an unjust and, in the long run, impossible position. Jensen expresses profound disdain for the human industrial complex and its ecological excesses, contending that it is based on the systematic exploitation of the earth. Page by page, Jensen, who has been called the philosopher-poet of the environmental movement, demonstrates his deep appreciation of the natural world in all its intimacy, and sounds an urgent call for its liberation from human domination"--
• "One of America's leading and most passionate environmentalists dismantles the myth of human superiority. In this impassioned polemic, radical environmental philosopher Derrick Jensen debunks the near-universal belief in a hierarchy of nature and the superiority of humans. Vast and underappreciated complexities of nonhuman life are explored in detail--from the cultures of pigs and prairie dogs, to the creative use of tools by elephants and fish, to the acumen of caterpillars and fungi. The paralysis of the scientific establishment on moral and ethical issues is confronted and a radical new framework for assessing the intelligence and sentience of nonhuman life is put forth. Jensen attacks mainstream environmental journalism, which too often limits discussions to how ecological changes affect humans or the economy--with little or no regard for nonhuman life. With his signature compassionate logic, he argues that when we separate ourselves from the rest of nature, we in fact orient ourselves against nature, taking an unjust and, in the long run, impossible position. Jensen expresses profound disdain for the human industrial complex and its ecological excesses, contending that it is based on the systematic exploitation of the earth. Page by page, Jensen, who has been called the philosopher-poet of the environmental movement, demonstrates his deep appreciation of the natural world in all its intimacy, and sounds an urgent call for its liberation from human domination"--

Subjects

• Nature > Effect of human beings on
• Human geography
• Environmentalism
• Environmental ethics
• NATURE > Ecology
• NATURE > Environmental Conservation & Protection

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

Introduction: Human supremacism -- The great chain of being -- Language -- Primary perception and biocommunication -- Complexity and its opposite -- Value -free science -- wonder -- Narcissism -- Regret -- The seamlessness of supremacism -- Authoritarian technics -- Beauty -- Conquest -- The dictatorship pf the machine -- The divine right of machines -- Agriculture -- Facing reality -- The sociopocene -- Earth-hating madness -- Self-awareness -- "Rebooting the world" or the destruction of all that is.

ISBN

• 9781609806781
• 1609806786
• 9781609806798 (canceled/invalid)

LCCN

^^2015046725

OCLC

• 914290213
• SCSB-10626832

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library