De Paul Eco Conference Liveblog 3

Manson's index of irreversibility

Joan Jasak, Temple University, “Thermodynamic Irreversibility and Ecological Restoration: Faking Nature”
Katz and Elliot
returning things to their original condition; reversing
Eliot criticizes mining company idea that nature is reversible
but in his thought experiment he imagines that it is possible

which properties are restorable? species dynamics (yes for Elliot)? history?
non-relational aspects that replicate the properties before humans
a restored environment can restore ecological function, like the broken leg
natural means “not subject to the substitution problem” which “arises as a result of human interaction in the environment”
“there is nothing problematic about substitutions that result from natural evolutionary processes”

temporal: recouping a loss
“restore” means...?

Neil Manson’s Irreversibility Index
criticism and clarificaiton of restoration because it’s used normatively
Thermodynamic irreversibility is universal and so it has no normative value
“Unfortunately, many of those who write about or think about environmental problems either use ‘irreversible’ in none of the above three senses, or use it equivocally, or use it in some vague and confused sense that is a mish-mash of the above three senses. This is unacceptable if the notion of irreversibility is going to figure into any serious academic or policy discussion.”

medical reversibility requires only the re-acquirement of functional capacity

economic reversibility: decision making; the degree to which the effects of a poor decision can be corrected
the Bamiyan Buddha destruction; loss of capacity to capitalize an object
reversible decisions are easier to manage

the notion of a pre-degraded state is a medical-style definition
replacing natural with anthropogenic
since this is ontological for them they would require a reversal of entropy
naturalness is invariably lost in the restoration process

what do scholars mean when they use the term “restore”

implications: it’s logically inconsistent to use thermodynamic irreversibility
“human restoration projects are unethical because they are irreversible” is the argument

so we could change the sense of restoration to functional model in which the human identity doesn’t affect the restoration
identity of restorer changes the ontology of the environment (which means humans are different from nature)
opposition to “anthropocentric values” so that “nature is not permitted to be free”
Katz reproaches humans but gives them almost divine power to change ontology

response by Rohan Sikri, DePaul University
Arne Naess wants to outline and explicit about undermining norms
Joan has done a cogent critique of restoration
but of greater interest are the implications of this critique, labyrinthine ones...
risks of this standard: what does the context of restoration tell us about our love of wisdom
a functional standard of restoration doesn’t suffer from the substitution problem
no categorical distinction between restorer’s identity and the restoree’s one
identity comes to be subordinated to the functional working of an ecosystem
not an original hierarchical ordering of terms
horizontal axis instead, “coextensiveness”
ontological shift is significant: if the functional ecosystem only is collaborative, then it appears as if the question of ontology is enfeebled
Stanley Cavell on skepticism: a similar juncture
identity is not something “being-so” but being SO; the world is to be accepted in the way that the presence of other minds is, not to be known but acknowledged
knowledge is always preceded by practical acknowledgements; pragmatism
biocentrism and anthropocentrism as mirror reflections of an obsession with difference:
Joan’s citation of Charles Dyke
polemics against monotheistic roots: hypostatization of idealizations vs. pagan science: “when I’m trying to pull a weed I don’t give a shit what it is” (”Natural Speech”)
deep disquiet re technology; i dont’ want to “not give a shit” about concepts

Liam: Katz and Elliot don’t want to interrupt restoration with the critique. One thing that emerges from Joan’s use of the language is that there is a sharp division between restoration scholars and restoration do-ers and restoration scientists
there is a certain incautiousness about using the term “restoration” to describe the process; at first it was “synthetic ecology” and it sounded too clinical
restoration scholars are very interested in the notion of restoring
lots of definitions of philosophy
ecologists have not spent a lot of time with philosophers

question: restoration about the embarrassment with an aesthetic sense; it could be a sublimation
we can’t make the argument that we want it to look nice or we’d be pilloried
the whole ethical argument as a ruse for that

answer: aesthetics is fundamental to this line of argument: Elliot makes an analogy to the art forgery; Katz, nature isn’t even an artifact