There is No Nature

In: https://digitalcollections.saic.edu/islandora/object/islandora%3Athesis_39834

Abstract

Global warming has permanently altered our home; and we are responsible. As residents of the Anthropocene, it is no longer possible to perceive the earth as an assemblage of passive, nonhuman stuff that backgrounds human culture. Our current geological epoch arrived just as humans achieved force of nature status; and lucky us, it comes with a view called ecological awareness. But the view is stranger than we expected. Objects are active with material vibrancy and the harder we look for nature the harder it is to find. As ecology becomes a new moral compass to guide politics and social action it is important to look critically at how the concept of nature and the objects of nature shape discourse. The globalized entanglement of all contributing players makes global warming polemical at best, and paralyzing for most. Perhaps what is necessary to cut across the complexity is a fundamentally different philosophical framework with which to understand our place in the natural world. Maybe dismantling the notion of nature is the often overlooked first step towards curbing ecologically destructive human activity by opening up cracks in archaic notions of utility and dominion. Object Oriented Ontology (OOO) provides a framework to situate oneself between a mistrust of human capability and the imperative for radical change in the face of ecological disaster. Here, OOO is introduced through the Vibrant Materiality of Jane Bennett and Timothy Morton's Hyperobjects. The scale of ecological thought quickly escapes the small actions of individuals leaving them with the burning question, "What can we do?!" A possible departure point from the hard news of the Anthropocene and 000 is presented in a discussion of the production and exhibition of Charles Ray's sculpture Hinoki (2007) as a hyperobject, situated somewhere between anthropocentric action and OOO.