On June 4, journalist Sanne Bloemink will interview René ten Bos, current Denker des Vaderlands ('National Thinker').
NOTE: the interview will be in Dutch
“We moeten accepteren dat we als levende wezens niets anders zijn dan dit ‘salinon’ (verstoring, beweging, deining), want alleen zo kunnen we gemoedsrust – wat de epicuristen ‘ataraxia’ noemden – vinden. De wereld is turbulentie, maar wij zijn het zelf ook. (…) Er is geen scheiding tussen poëzie, wetenschap en ethiek. Dat besef je pas als je begrijpt dat je niet anders bent dan de wereld.”
– Uit Water: een geofilosofische geschiedenis
We asked René to pick his favorite quote, and he chose this quote from his book: ‘Water: a geophilosophical history‘, which got nominated for the ECI-literature prize. His last book, Dwalen in het Antropoceen (Wandering in the Anthropocene), appeared in 2017. Besides being the National Thinker, he is philosophy professor at Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen.
In the interview Sanne and René are going to talk about his views on morals in relation to humans and nature. What does it mean to be a human in the Anthropocene? What is right and wrong? Is there a moral that goes beyond humans? Is the Anthropocene a tipping point in the evolution of DNA? And of course they are going to talk about his new book: Wandering in the Anthropocene. What is the Anthropocene and in which ways it requires a new way of thinking about i.e. interactions and networks? How is this thinking going to affect science? What is his view on beech trees as a legal person? Is it possible to give ownership back to the tree? Or maybe the concept of ownership needs to be changed in the era of the Anthropocene.
Do you want to know more about him and his books? Visit his website here.
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