2/07/2025 Views of Nature in the West and Japan: The Philosophical Background of Modern Ecology
Category: Open lectures
The University of Warsaw, together with the Showa Women’s University, International Culture Institute, invites you to the open lecture:
Date: 2nd July 2025, 15.30-16.40 (JST); 10.30-11.40 (CET)
Speaker: Prof. Agnieszka KOZYRA (Chair of Japanese Studies, Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Warsaw)
Venue: Showa Women’s University campus, Tokyo (Bldg. 2, Room 4S22) & online
Language: Japanese
Registration: https://forms.gle/dbZKsQLGoNv4riMv7
This project has been supported by the Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange (NAWA) under the DIRECT TO EXPO 2025 programme – the International Academic Event at World Expo 2025 in Osaka, Kansai (BPI/OSA/2024/1/00020/DEC/01).
Views of Nature in the West and Japan: The Philosophical Background of Modern Ecology
The lecture will outline the relationship between humans and nature in different historical periods in Japan and the West. Individual views will be interpreted as examples of such trends in ecology as environmental realism (nature treated as an objectively given reality, with universal characteristics and usually opposed to culture), environmental instrumentalism (nature as a sphere subordinate to human activity and needs, mainly economic) and environmental idealism (nature seen as a source of timeless values that transcend its biological aspect and are part of the general system of culture and the worldview that dominates it). Particular attention will be paid to the lack of motivation for pro-ecological attitudes in traditional visions of the relationship between humans and nature in the context of the worldwide progressive degradation of the natural environment.
Prof. Agnieszka KOZYRA (Faculty of Oriental Studies UW, Chair of Japanese Studies, Member of Academia Europaea)
Research interests: Japanese philosophy (Nishida Kitarō’s philosophy of Absolute Nothingness and modern physics), intercultural communication, Japanese religions (views on nature in Shintō and Buddhism, Zen Buddhism and logic, new developments of Zen teaching and practice in the West)