Geo-Logic

Seeks to redraw the boundaries between the fields of geology and environmental philosophy.

Using a unified vision of geology, consisting of equal parts geo-poetry, geo-politics, geo-theology, and geo-science, Geo-Logic redraws the boundaries between philosophy and the earth sciences. Although each discipline makes crucial contributions to contemporary environmental concerns, neither will fulfill its potential until it transforms itself by engaging the other. This book offers examples of how to relate environmental philosophy to science, public policy, and real world problems, and shows what is epistemologically distinctive about scientific work and how to respond to the cultural dynamics that are pulling these issues into the public sphere. Frodeman advocates humanizing the earth sciences and bringing philosophy into the field.

“One may or may not go along with Frodeman’s view that the purely experimental approach to Earth science will be directly responsible for environmental calamity. But there can be no doubt that even the basic idea and significance of the time scale of earth history … is extremely poorly grasped by most of the scientific community, let alone the public … a thought-provoking set text for beginning graduate students in physical geography.” — Progress in Physical Geography

"I like the author's original thinking, his clear laying out of an alternative epistemology on the basis of geology as a field science, his insightful, important, and novel analysis of scientific methodology and objectivity, and the integration of these issues with questions of policy. The combination of theoretical analysis and practical case study makes it a book hard to put down and easy to keep reading. This book breaks the traditional model of ivory tower theorizing in philosophy and instead presents a philosophical analysis of real world issues." — Patricia Glazebrook, author of Heidegger’s Philosophy of Science

"This is an engagingly written book with fresh insights that will be found important not only to earth scientists, but also to anyone wishing to rethink the role of the humanities in the future, especially in their relation to the natural sciences." — Bruce V. Foltz, author of Inhabiting the Earth: Heidegger, Environmental Ethics, and the Metaphysics of Nature

Robert Frodeman, a philosopher with a background in the earth sciences, has worked for the U. S. Geological Survey for many years. He was the 2001–2002 Hennebach Visiting Professor in the Humanities at the Colorado School of Mines and is currently Research Scientist at the Center for Science and Technology Policy at the University of Colorado, where he is also the Director of the Global Climate Change and Society Program. He is the editor of Earth Matters: The Earth Sciences, Philosophy, and the Claims of Community.