Jay
Odenbaugh
Climbing at Smith
Rock
It is very necessary these days to apologize for being concerned with philosophy in any form whatever.... In my opinion, the greatest scandal of philosophy is that, while all around us the world of nature perishes - and not the world of nature alone - philosophers continue to talk, sometimes cleverly and sometimes not, about the question of whether this world exists. --Karl R. Popper
I am a member of the Department of
Philosophy and the Environmental Studies Program at Lewis and Clark College. My main areas of research are in the philosophy of environmental sciences (especially ecology) and
environmental ethics though I have an interest in ethics more generally.
Much of my research has focused on foundational issues in the science of ecology especially the
role of modeling.
Ecological populations, communities, and ecosystems are
highly complex and our ability to experiment on these
systems is extraodinarily limited. Models used to represent
these systems are often highly idealized. How are models to
be evaluated if they are so difficult to experimentally
test? How can models be explanatory if they are literally
false? Here is a recent piece on models in biology.
I am also concerned with how theories and
models are used in environmental decision-making. Since environmental
systems are so complex, there is a great deal of uncertainty
surrounding their protection. If models used in
conservation biology, climatology, and environmental economics are highly
idealized, then what are their shortcomings and how do these limitations
affect policy issues? I believe it is crucial to understand
the purposes of modeling in the environmental sciences if we are to reasonably
assess political decisions based on this theoretical
research. Many critics of the environmental sciences hold very simplistic views about the nature of science. So, I am currently working on a book tentatively entitled On the Contrary: A Philosophical Examination of the Environmental Sciences and their Critics examining these issues (and many others) especially in ecology, climatology, and environmental economics. Here is a short summary of the project and a paper describing some of the controversies I find interesting.
Since everyone seems to have a blog, I have my own blog. Here is the link: http://www.jodenbaugh.blogspot.com/
My dog Evie in the Canadian Rockies
Jay
Odenbaugh
Department of Philosophy
Lewis & Clark College
0615 SW Palatine Hill Road
Portland, OR 97219-7899503-768-7377
(office)
503-768-7359 (fax)
Updated on
3/27/2008
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