Mechanistic reduction extends nature’s instrumentalisation to humans rather than ending dualism
Evidence
If these positions remove the basis for the total division between the human and non-human, they do so in a way which removes the basis for respect and moral consideration both for the human and for the non-human sphere. Such positions extend the instrumentalisation accorded a meaningless, passive and manipulable nature to the human, rather than resolving the dualism by extending the respect due to selfdirected beings to the non-human. — Val Plumwood, Feminism and the Mastery of Nature, 458
Categorization
- XREF: This is the key payoff of the earlier claim that denying dependence on nature sustains non-sustainable use - reductionism remakes humans as machines. — connects to: Materialism never resolves but only disguises nature dualism by a truncated reversal — Val Plumwood, Feminism and the Mastery of Nature, 452; Living without wild things divides humans into two fundamental kinds — Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac: With Other…, 2; Science and mechanization gave wild things their human value — Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac: With Other…, 4 (+9 more)
Broader Connections
- Controlling nature and controlling humans advance together within science
#corroborates(0.88) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 614 - Resolving nature dualism needs reconceiving humans as more natural and nature as more mindlike
#contradicts(0.85) — Val Plumwood, Feminism and the Mastery of Nature, 465 - Separating nature from value stripped humans of intrinsic worth too
#expands(0.82) — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 399 - The mechanistic worldview sanctioned domination of both nature and women
#exemplifies(0.80) — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 64 - Scientific quantification of nature parallels society’s reduction of humans to abstract labor power.
#expands(0.78) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 583