January 13, 2004

clearing away place

Though environmentalists in Tasmania continue to talk about place as a wilderness occupied by particular ecological bodies, place talk has been replaced by space talk.

What were once places have become submerged into space.

Descartes states the reduction well in his Principles of Philosophy:


"When we say that a thing is in a given place, all we mean is that it occupies such a position relative to other things."

Place is reduced to position. Space is an order of positions. And then reduced to point.

Space triumphs over place.

Space then acquires a void like character.

We need to find a way of getting back to place.

Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at January 13, 2004 11:15 PM | TrackBack
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