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In social sciences, approaches to hard sciences tend to present these as naturalist, i.e. anchored to the belief in a coherent and closed universe in which natural laws operate. This idea of an objectivist science has been the dialogical opposite pole of social sciences, particularly the qualitative ones. Considering naturalist science ethnographically, asks the question whether this idea is grounded in the actual practices of scientists or not and what alternative ways of engaging with science emerge from them. To do this, I will try to understand what the relation between worms and their environment is. From ecotoxicologists studying the effect of toxic compounds on the soil, to curators taking care of specimens in museum collections, to ecologists teaching amateurs how to recognize different species, a number of scientists are everyday working with earthworms. In these scientific contexts, which animate Western naturalist science, what a worm is and how it relates with its environment come into being in many complicated ways. As we will follow these practices, what 'naturalist science' is will multiply and emerge oftentimes as incoherent. Still, some of the practices of scientists also take care of holding together these incoherences. From these multiple naturalisms, their gaps, and the work put into holding them together, a different way to engage with science takes shape, one that is not (overly) critical, but attempts to 'take science seriously'.
Science as Culture, 2013
Earthworms and soil combine in an ecotoxicological experiment in the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. To determine the effects of a toxic compound produced by genetically modified broccoli, ecotoxicologists use the earthworm in a standardized test to understand the conditions of the soil. In the experiment a variety of elements are brought together and associated in a stable network, but the worm and the soil do not only associate; rather, the worm emerges entangled in different kinds of relations with the soil, both as bioindicator and as bioturbator. Eating provides a good tool to analyze these relations: keeping close to the tangible materialities of the lab practices, eating highlights the complex, asymmetrical relationality of worm and soil. This pushes the understanding of association that circulates in social theory, bringing back its original critical stance towards given notions of liberal, autonomous agents with renewed empirical strength. Thus eating not only frames worms that emerge from the practices of ecotoxicologists as bioindicators and as bioturbators, but it also offers a different language for what has been called the ‘politics of nature’, or how to bring nature into politics without accepting it as a given. In responding to the question on how to live with our planet, eating reminds us that we would do well to start from practices instead of agency in framing our ‘politics of nature’.
1995
As an alternative to recent misreadings of boundary politics, a more responsible, outsider pedagogy needs to be cultivated
The SAGE Handbook of Nature, 2018
The thesis explores what living together can offer in rethinking political theory and in creating a space in which "politics" is not just a matter between people, but also with nature. These lessons about living together emerge from fieldwork around practices in which worms are central. Thus, the work focuses on ecologists who, in turn, examine worms; and worms amateurs who learn to collect and identify them in the field. Composting, and the waste-eating of earthworms are also experimented with. The "living together " that worms unearth is about eating and being eaten - a set of relations and practices that has so far been neglected by political theory with its emphasis on agreement.
This article uses the case study of ethnobiological classification to develop a positive and a negative thesis about the state of natural kind debates. On the one hand, I argue that current accounts of natural kinds can be integrated in a multidimensional framework that advances understanding of classificatory practices in ethnobiology. On the other hand, I argue that such a multidimensional framework does not leave any substantial work for the notion " natural kind " and that attempts to formulate a general account of naturalness have become an obstacle to understanding classificatory practices. In the case of ethnobiology, different accounts of natural kinds pick out different relevant subsets of ethnotaxa but there is nothing to be learnt from the question which subset should qualify as the set of natural kinds.
Biology & Philosophy, 2018
Current debates about the integration of traditional and academic ecological knowledge (TEK and AEK) struggle with a dilemma of division and assimilation. On the one hand, the emphasis on differences between traditional and academic perspectives has been criticized as creating an artificial divide that brands TEK as " non-scientific " and contributes to its marginalization. On the other hand, there has been increased concern about inadequate assimilation of Indigenous and other traditional perspectives into scientific practices that disregards the holistic nature and values of TEK. The aim of this article is to develop a practice-based account of the epistemic relations between TEK and AEK that avoids both horns of the dilemma. While relations between TEK and AEK are often described in terms of the " holistic " nature of the former and the " mechanistic " character of the latter, we argue that a simple holism–mechanism divide misrepresents the epistemic resources of both TEK and AEK. Based on the literature on mechanistic explanations in philosophy of science, we argue that holders of TEK are perfectly capable of identifying mechanisms that underlie ecological phenomena while AEK often relies on non-mechanistic strategies of dealing with ecological complexity. Instead of generic characterizations of knowledge systems as either mechanistic or holistic, we propose to approach epis-temic relations between knowledge systems by analyzing their (partly mechanistic and partly holistic) heuristics in practice.
Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment, 2003
Amigos dos Museos de Galicia, 2022
مجلة کلية التربية (أسيوط), 2021
Mario Góngora revisitado, 2023
Austin Journal of Analytical and Pharmaceutical Chemistry, 2015
Revista Electrónica de Investigação e Desenvolvimento, 2020
The American Interest, 2013
Journal of Universal History Studies (JUHIS), 2024
Chemischer Informationsdienst, 1972
Anatomia Histologia Embryologia, 2016
The Journal of Wildlife Management, 2018
Management Science Letters, 2021
Toxicology, 2011
Blessed Marine Automation
Journal of Nuclear Materials, 2013