At first glance, the matter seems straightforward: ‘biodiversity’ is a term from biology as a natural science, to which, on a reflexive meta-level, a ‘philosophy’ (possibly as part of the Environmental Humanities) is superimposed to produce analyses, reconstructions and, perhaps, syntheses. The particular nature – pun intended – of the concept of biodiversity suggests a different approach: Not the binary separation of the natural sciences and philosophy/humanities, with their separate constitution of objects and subsequent practical-political ‘application’, but rather the joint consideration of ‘biodiversity’ as a neologism that is both politically motivated and scientifically contextualized – in other words, an ‘epistemic-moral hybrid’. The talk concludes with ethical reflections on the material level – not to say ontologies – of biodiversity in the lifeworld, in order to think biodiversity dialectically – both precarious and threatened as well as rich and sustaining – and how to live that accordingly.
Location: WZU, Room 101 (Building U), Universitätsstr. 1a (innocube), 86159 Augsburg