Philosophical notion of nature and the debate of Moral aspects of new technologie

• Authors: Zbigniew Liana
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

The paper deals with the problem of a language or terminology that would be appropriate for the interdisciplinary debate about moral issues related with the recent developments of science and technologies. In particular it deals with the appropriate terminology for the articulation of the idea (or intuitions) of normativity of nature. The evidence of historical changes undergone by the notion of nature is used to warrant the thesis, that the traditional notion of natural law, being originally in the Middle Ages only a variant of the notion of law of nature, has lost its original capacity to convey in the interdisciplinary context of dialogue of theology (or religion) with empirical sciences the idea of normative and moral aspects of nature created by God. On the other side it is shown, that this intellectual and emotional alienation of the concept of natural law from the contemporary culture does not need to lead to the disavowal of the idea of normativity of nature. The intuition of normativity is still present in the common experience of nature, what has changed is only the way of its articulation. Today a good candidate for these purposes seems to be the language of ecological values of nature, environmental equilibrium etc. It could provide a stable (and common) to some extent ground, based on the quite common experience of the value of nature, for interdisciplinary debates, where participants endorse different axiological perspectives. Finally, it is discussed, how this ecological (or similar) terminology of normativity of nature fits the fundamental contemporary epistemological idea: the intrinsically hypothetical, probable and conditioned character of every kind of an a posteriori knowledge.

• Publisher: Sciendo
• Journal: E-Theologos. Theological revue of Greek Catholic Theological Faculty
• Year: 2011
• Volume: 2
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 5-14

Dates

published

2011-04-01

online

2011-04-29

Contributors

author

Zbigniew Liana

• Pontifical University of John Paul II in Kraków

References

• ALAN OF LILLE: Magistri Alani enchiridion de planctu nature, N. M. Häring (ed.), "Studi Medievali" 19 (1978), fasc. 2, 831n.
• DESCARTES: Discourse on Method: and Meditations on First Philosophy, transl. D. A. Cress, Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Co. 1993, 3rd edn.
• GÖRMAN, U. - DREES, W. B. - MEISINGER, H. (eds.): Creative Creatures. Values and Ethical Issues in Theology, Science and Technology, T&T Clark: London-New York, 2005.
• HERSCHEL, J.: Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy
• KOYRÉ, A.: Mystiques, spirituels, alchimistes du XVIe sičcle allemand, Gallimard, 1971.
• LIANA, Z.: Okultyzm a nauka w okresie przedoświeceniowym [Science and the Occult in the Pre-Enlightenment Period], in: M. Heller, Z. Liana, J. Mączka, W Skoczny, Nauki przyrodnicze a teologia: konflikt i współistnienie [Science and Theology: Conflict and Coexistence], OBI-Biblos: Kraków-Tarnów 2001, 169-298.
• LIANA, Z.: Koncepcja Logosu i Natury w Szkole w Chartres [The Notions of Logos and Nature in the School of Chartres], OBI PAT-BRE: Kraków 1996, 217-232
• LIANA, Z.: Technology and the changing notion of nature, in: U. Görman, W. B. Drees, H. Meisinger (eds.), Creative Creatures. Values and Ethical Issues in Theology, Science and Technology, T&T Clark: London-New York, 2005, 34-44.

Identifiers

DOI

10.2478/v10154-011-0001-6