Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Boxes
- Acknowledgments
- International praise for Environmental Literacy in Science and Society
- Preamble
- Overview: roadmap to environmental literacy
- I Invention of the environment: origins, transdisciplinarity, and theory of science perspectives
- 1 What knowledge about what environment?
- 2 From environmental literacy to transdisciplinarity
- 3 Basic epistemological assumptions
- II History of mind of biological knowledge
- III Contributions of psychology
- IV Contributions of sociology
- V Contributions of economics
- VI Contributions of industrial ecology
- VII Beyond disciplines and sciences
- VIII A framework for investigating human–environment systems (HES)
- IX Perspectives for environmental literacy
- Glossary
- References
- Index
3 - Basic epistemological assumptions
from I - Invention of the environment: origins, transdisciplinarity, and theory of science perspectives
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 August 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Boxes
- Acknowledgments
- International praise for Environmental Literacy in Science and Society
- Preamble
- Overview: roadmap to environmental literacy
- I Invention of the environment: origins, transdisciplinarity, and theory of science perspectives
- 1 What knowledge about what environment?
- 2 From environmental literacy to transdisciplinarity
- 3 Basic epistemological assumptions
- II History of mind of biological knowledge
- III Contributions of psychology
- IV Contributions of sociology
- V Contributions of economics
- VI Contributions of industrial ecology
- VII Beyond disciplines and sciences
- VIII A framework for investigating human–environment systems (HES)
- IX Perspectives for environmental literacy
- Glossary
- References
- Index
Summary
Chapter overview
The function of Chapter 3 is twofold. First, we introduce the epistemological assumptions underlying our exploration of the different disciplines that allow us to study environmental literacy. We assume that the social-epistemic and material–biophysical aspects of human systems and their environments can be viewed from a realist, objective perspective. At the same time, we assume that the realist view is compatible with a functional constructivist perspective.
Second, the chapter lays important groundwork that enables the reader to take in the generic framework for conducting research on human–environment systems (HES). Two complementarities are fundamental components of the blueprint that this book offers for coping with HES. First, the HES complementarity is based on the assumption that human and environmental systems are disjointed but inextricably coupled systems that cannot be well comprehended when considered singularly or disconnectedly. Second, the material–social complementarity, also called the material–biophysical versus social–epistemic or body versus mind complementarity, describes our assumptions about different types of processes within human systems. These complementarities are the building blocks of the HES framework put forward in Chapters 16–19.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Environmental Literacy in Science and SocietyFrom Knowledge to Decisions, pp. 29 - 42Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2011