A Dialogue with Professor Berque *– from the standpoint of ethics (including environmental ethics)
SHINAGAWA, Tetsuhiko
My given task is to attempt a dialogue with Professor Berque’s mesology (mésologie)
from the standpoint of ethics (including environmental ethics). In order to clarify
issues, I will at first make a sketch of mesology, then focus on problematic ofcontemporary ethics, and at last discuss how mesology is located in the problematicand what questions and criticism can be posed to mesology.
I is the manuscript for the symposium on October 30. 2004. II is added on and after
the symposium.
I

1.

A sketch of mesology
Professor Berque’s mesology is an ontological analysis of human existence. If man

abstracts it from its reference to Plato, Aristotle, and Nishida, man can locate it in thevein of phenomenology. Whereas human beings are under the condition of milieu, theyexpress themselves in milieu. This point is a mesological explication of Heidegger ’s
concept of thrown projection (geworfener Entwurf). By the way, Heidegger expressed
the cooperative being of humans with the term “Being-with (Mitsein)” in his Being andTime (Sein und Zeit) . But it has not amount to a full and positive explication of thisfeature. It was the reason that his argument depended upon the concept ofBeing-towards-death (Sein zum Tode), which no one can exchange with any other one.
In the beginning of Milieu (Fudo) , Watsuji set out to explain the concept of milieu,
describing how human beings resist to natural violence and labor positively on nature
at once. His conclusion is that milieu is no other than the cooperative being of humans.
Thus he criticized Heidegger ’s analysis appealing only to temporality as one-sided (1).
Professor Berque undertakes this conception of Watsuji. But he also points out that
Watsuji confused his personal experience with one of inhabitants in the milieu (2). It
would be possible for Professor Berque as geographer to bring a much fitter analysis ofmilieu from the viewpoint of inhabitants. As he repeats, man cannot create milieu from* This article was published in International Symposium Modernity in milieux andtechnique Report , pp. 285-299, Kansai University, March 2005. The symposium washeld on October 29-30 2004 in Kansai University in Japan. The theme of the first halfof it was “Historicity of Technique and Body” (Panelists: Augustine Berque, Michel
Tibon-Cornillot, Andrew Feenberg, Mark Larrimore, and Souzaburo Tsunetoshi), thetheme of the second half was “Conversations with Augustine Berque” (Panelists:
Augustine Berque, Tsutomu Nakazawa, Tetsuhiko Shinagawa, Hruo Noma, and Hideki
Mine)nothing. Husserl’s concept of horizon and Heidegger ’s concept of thrownness(Geworfenheit) led to this awareness of human finitude. However, it is significant inthis context that Professor Berque absorbed Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy into his
mesology: Merleau-Ponty described living body as homogeneous to nature. Thisappropriation enabled to exclude an interpretation that all senses of milieu derivefrom subject (3). Such a misinterpretation could occur, if man appealed only to theconcept of existence. Thus Berque’s mesology has learned to give a coherent
explanation of the process of humanization from animal belonging to nature or
ecosystem to human being with technique and symbol: homo sapiens appeared,
acquired the capacity to change things artificially, and became finally human. In thiscontext, milieu is reinterpreted as medial body (corps médial) (4). The concept of
milieu essentially rejects the dichotomy between nature and culture. However thetheory of milieu tends to be taken for a cultural interpretation of nature or forclassification of special milieus. Setting the concept of living body on the ground,
Berque’s mesology can sweep away such an interpretation, deepen its consideration
about the natural basis of human beings and sharpen the knowledge that milieu isessential to the existential structure of them in general.

2. Contemporary problematic of ethics
If ethics is literally taken for a study of ethos, ontological analysis of human being
belongs to ethics. But ethics as normative science indicates specific norms to us. Norms
and values are given to us not only by ethics. But religion, school education, mass
media, or even personal belief could also preach ‘an ethic’ (5). The distinguishingfeature of ethics from the rest consists in its keen reflection on the foundation of norms.
Therefore ethics considers why such and such norms are claimed and what procedurethey have followed to be adopted. No single ontology or metaphysics is dominant in ourcontemporary society. Thus one concern of contemporary ethics is how man canmediate different values or conflicting claims for interests and, as its premise, how
man can ensure the chances for every claim to speak out. What is the object ethicallyrespected? Who or what has interests? How much should we respect which ofconflicting claims because of what right they have? Generally speaking, we can list up
the following ideas as especially relevant to the contemporary ethics or, more roughly
speaking, the modern ethics since Kant: justice (every being should be treated proper
to it), right (the beings of the same entitlement can require equal treatment), anduniversalizability (which is symbolized by these ideas).
Although there is variety of scope according to different kinds of environmental ‘ethic’,
one of novelty of environmental ethics consists in the enlargement of what should be
ethically respected: unborn and becoming generations, sentient animals, plants, andecosystems including lifeless things (5). But how can justice and right be applied tothem? Very this point tells us the difficulty of foundation of any environmental ‘ethic’ ,while it is a metaethical charm of environmental ethics to ask again about the sense ofjustice and right.
The traditional position, which respects ethically only human beings, is called
anthropocentrism. There are two alternatives: while one takes short-run economic
interest for human interest (the strong anthropocentrism), the other envisages
long-run interest which man can derive from the symbiosis between human beings andnature (the weak anthropocentrism) (6). In the latter case the interests of future
generations should be also considered. Now how could man distribute among
generations? Some of values would be shared among generations. But it still remains
an enigma how man can determine the fair portions among generations: while weassociate the concept of distribution or “sharing” with the spatial relation, we musthere distribute or share in the temporal relation, where what we should distributeoccurs and disappears. When we pay attention to, for example, the use of available
fossil fuels or irreversible greenhouse effect, what standard and what calculation could
determine the “just” portion for each generation?
“We should protect environment for the sake of the nature or ecosystem. Humanbeings are only member of it. They have no privilege against other members.” I callthis party non-anthropocentrism. The proponents of non-anthropocentrism often referto right of nature. But every right is accompanied with the fair portion that should
belong to the right owners. Thus the entitlement of right leads to the problem of
distributional justice. Now how could the proponents of non-anthropocentrism
determine the just portion between nature and human beings? How could they speak of
distributional justice? Man can get harvest from nature through human labor. Then,
how much has human labor contributed to the harvest? And how much has nature
done? This is the problem that Locke encountered, when he thought about the relation
between labor and property. Like Locke, I think, we must be hampered by the
incommensurability of value between human beings and nature (7). There is notranscendent place over which man could overlook both domains of human beings aswell as nature: therefore man cannot apply the same concept of right to them. If the
proponents of non-anthropocentrism argued that human beings could stand on such aplace, it would make the status of human beings incoherent, partly obtaining such atranscendent ability and partly being no more than a member of the whole nature (8).
Man can go another way than the foundation on justice. It was the case in Jonas’
principle of responsibility. Mankind is most responsible for the occurrence ofcontemporary ecological crisis. Mankind might be most evil, because it has threatened
and will continue to threaten its future generations as well as the rest of nature.
Nevertheless mankind has responsibility that it should continue to be. It is the reason
that the entities capable to feel themselves responsible must be ethically required

above all. Thus Jonas is attacked by an authentically philosophical question: “Should
mankind continue to be?” He does not evade it. Nor does he seek shelter in egoism of
human beings. But he finds an affirmative answer in ethical thinking, relying upon theimage of human beings as ‘the entities that feel themselves responsible’. I think that
his logic appeals to performative inconsistency: if man gave a negative answer for thequestion “should mankind continue to be?” and mankind disappeared, then no entity
could longer consider the ethical question “should/ should not” and the question itself
would be nonsense. This inconsistency may not be committed so that the affirmative
answer must be given (9).
However Jonas is criticized by the proponents of discourse ethics (10). At first theircriticism focuses on Jonas’ ontology, which undertakes Aristotelian philosophy ofnature that is alien to modern thought. But the objection is not only to the contents ofthis ontology. From the viewpoint of discourse ethics, it is in the light of justice thateach claim for values or ontology should be mediated and conflicting interests should
be coordinated: Commitment to any specific ontology would not ensure the mediationand coordination. It would be, according to discourse ethics, possible only by discourse,
i.e. community of communication. The concept of community of communication derives
from the kingdom of purposes i.e. community of persons in the Kantian sense and issophisticated by the concept of intersubjectivity and a linguistic turn, which belong to
the philosophy in the twentieth century. Each specific value and ontology or any
interest in certain domains (law, politics, economy, and aesthetics etc.) is no other than
one of many opinions which shall be discussed through discourse. This opposition
between Jonas and discourse ethics illustrates the dominant situation of contemporary
ethics: although we are compelled to reflect radically on being of humans (for example,
because of ecological crisis) or on the values in the modern society, we cannot but pickup even such a reflection (as Jonas did) as one of many opinions in the midst of
conflicting interests in various domains of law, politics, and economy etc., so long as we
live

in

the

modernsociety,which

presupposes

multiplicity

ofvaluesanduniversalizability.

3. The ethical implications of mesology
So far as Professor Berque’s mesology is ontology of human existence, it is partially a
study of ethos, i.e. ethics. However, what norms could be derived from it and what
procedure could be prescribed to follow by it? Each milieu has its specific norms. A
concrete guiding principle is then indicated that “not to lose respect for the others …
the respect for the form of things around us should be required.”(11) I agree with thisaffirmation. It is sustained by a phenomenological analysis that shows milieu to be an
essential factor of human existence. However, at once, I cannot help asking how thisassertion would enable us to open the place to hold discourse with conflicting opinionsand how it could help to negotiate with the proponents of conflicting claims about
different interests (for example, economic interests by globalization).
It reminds me of another affirmation, which also is supported by a phenomenologicalanalysis. Held derives an ethical connotation from Husserl’s concepts of home-world
and world of strangers: “It [= a political cosequence] requires that all home-worlds be
departed from the interest that consists in the desire of cultural investment in one way
or another by other territories [Elle [= une consequence politique] requiert que tous
les mondes natals se départissent de cet intérêt qui consiste à vouloir, d’une manière
ou d’une autre, “investir” culturellement d’autres territories].” (12) When I read it, I
had to ask, “why and how much?”, although I agreed with this opinion: unless thereason and the extent are not explicitly dealt with, it might be interpreted as aprescription of mere reproduction of the own culture and tradition.
Likewise, what supports the requirement of protection of the own milieu? Suppose
use of car. It is said about it that “it is wrong because it opposes milieu (écoumène). It
is wrong because it deteriorates biosphere in the long run and has thousands people
injured, disabled and killed almost every day over the world.”(13). Does it mean that it
is wrong either because of destruction of ecosystem or because of murder of human
life? No. It would be properly interpreted from the viewpoint of mesology that it iswrong because it destroys the milieu. But this affirmation leads to claim for a special
form of life or life style. Under multiplicity of values, is it persuadable enough to reject
the conflicting opinions (for example, one referring to economic interests)? Or supposethat it would be mediated with economic interests and use of car would be permitted solong as it would be of a strong public nature. How could then the just portion of the use
be calculated? “What is important is not rationing, but reasoning.”(14) This claim
would be natural from the standpoint of mesology. However, then, the same criticism
must be posed to mesology as to Jonas by discourse ethics: could man derive a practicalsolution for conflict from mesology?
My point is not that mesology would abide by a relativistic claim to preserve our own
milieu. Milieu is open. Yes, indeed. If we move our bodies from the home-world to aworld of strangers, we might possibly be accustomed to the latter. Translated it into
the words of mesology, the moved animal body can start to build medial body again.
But if the openness does not only stand up in fact, but also is ethically required, whatis the reason? Watsuji said, “We must love our milieu, realizing the meaning of ourdestiny that we are born in our milieu. … We would be able to contribute to the cultureof mankind in terms of the specialty which other people could not obtain, if we sublate[= aufheben in Hegel’s sense] and take advantage of it.” (15) Watsuji’s logic suggests
the ideal of mankind that is brought only through the process which every people with
its own milieu sublates their specialties each other. Has Professor Berque such an idea
of mankind too? If it is the case, through what process of sublation is the ideal ofmankind built up?
We could maybe find a clue to it in the concept of city (cité, civitas). “A city should bethere under the law for all people.”(16) This place “must be characterized as chôra,
which is soaked into the widest being of humanity.”(17) If man could seek in mesology
the place, where everyone is respected as human being without connection with any
attribute (i.e. an equivalence of the kingdom of purposes or community of persons in
the Kantian sense or the community of communication in discourse ethics), the conceptof city would correspond to it or would be at least an approach to it.
But we must pay attention to the fact that a city is supported by “the quality ofmembers belonging to the same city” or “reciprocity of common bond.”(18) What createsand shapes this membership or common bond? What fosters the chôra correspondent tohumanity? Kant and discourse ethics could appeal to mere spiritual ideas such as
person or humanity. However it would be too abstract in mesology. How could mesology
explain the condition and the process, through which such a chôra might beconstructed?
Let us ask a concrete question. In some cities in US different races live in different
partitions. “It is no other than an instinctive rejection of membership on thenaturalistic (especially racial) base.”(19) Then what should sustain this membership?
Is it the identity of American society as multiethnic nation? Is it the Constitution of
the United States after all? From the viewpoint of mesology these reasons appear to be
too abstract, even if constitutions as cultural products belong to medial body. Now
suppose man refers to the idea of the form of city. By what criterion would wedistinguish good forms from bad ones? My point is not that the situation in some of thecity in US is justified. Ethically it might not be justified. It opposes to justice: theinhabitants in the crowded partitions suffer from more traffic accidents or moremiserable environmental factors such as air pollution, which are not only due to them.
But if man appeals to justice, it requires not only reasoning, but also rationing as tohow much should be imposed to whom.
Is not it possible for various conflicting claims or interests to happen even in thesame city or chôra? Suppose that the plan of the architect, who is introduced as “anexample of topos in sheer ignorance of chôra” (20), is accepted by some inhabitants, but
rejected by other inhabitants. What guidance would mesology give them? “The form ofcity is the medial body of partners. People who become partners speak to us in thecommon language.”(21) Then the architect is not a partner. But how about the
inhabitants willing to adopt his plan? Could city mediate these conflicting opinions? Or
would it carry out the function to exclude specific claims?
An appropriate size will be necessary for a city to keep its form and order. “A system,
which maintains population under the sustainable and human condition, is good.”(22)Now who with what entitlement would plan, restore, maintain and control “a good

system”?
The proponents of discourse ethics will reply to these questions, saying “throughdiscourse.” If mesology accepts this answer, it would approve that it is no other than“one of many kinds of ontology”.
However mesology seems to conceive a different intention. As explained in 1,
mesology belongs to the vein of phenomenology. But Ecoumène: Introduction à l’étude

des milieux humains is written with the intention that “I would like to show thisobjective actuality of explication of existence beyond phenomenology.”(23) Here it isdeclared that mesology can be in relation to natural sciences and social sciences. In
fact, we read the report that shows the possibility of coexistence between consumers
and farmers (therefore also rural paysage): we can find in it a social scientificachievement, which is supported not only by reasoning but also by rationing. (24) But
the connection of mesology with social sciences appears to remain a possibility that has
not yet fully explicated. As described in 2, the dominant trend of contemporary ethics
adopts multiplicity of values and universalizability as criterions in evaluating ethicaltheories. I have attempted to consider the ethical implications of mesology on thesecriterions. The focus, then, is on the idea of city and “we” that forms the city. About“we” it is said as follows.
-- Who is the “we”?
-- I shall reply to this question, saying “only in your conscience.”(26)Is not this foundation, however, too personal and existential without relevance tointersubjectivity?
II.
1. A supplement to the manuscript
I would like to add a very short comment to make sure the issues.
I believe that Professor Larrimore’s critique for Watsuji at p. 100 (the summary)would be also true for mesology. Transforming Professor Larrimore’s words, man could
say, “Mesology is presented as a form of communitarianism. But there is much else tomesology.” What does the “much” mean? Thus the concept of ‘city’ would be focused on.
For the concept of ‘city’ could possibly break the communitarian relativism. Could theconcept of ‘city’ itself, however, be communitarian? It is the problem that I focus on.
Mesology as ethics cannot but go along a narrow path. On the one side there isliberalism. As Professor Feenberg pointed out at p. 73 (the summary), “a democratictransformation from below” is necessary to overcome the contemporary situation.
Liberalism is essential to democracy. But at once liberalism would lead to mere
allowance of new technology, for example, “a liberal eugenics”, which Habermas
criticizes. On the other side there is communitarianism. It could possibly become mere
regionalism, at worst ethnocentrism. Mesology as ethics must integrate the openness

of liberalism and the tradition which communitarianism claims. I think that ‘city’would be the place for this integration.
2. Comments for further discussion
Professor Berque answered that he agreed basically with the ideas of Shinagawa
about ‘city’.
However he gave the following refutes or explanations.
(i) Shinagawa’s last critique about the meaning of “consciousness” is due tomisinterpretation by translation. The original expression in French is “for intérieur”.
The origin of the word “for” was “agora” in Greek and “forum” in Latin. Thus “forintérieur” means “agora inside”. No Japanese expression corresponds to it so that man
cannot but translating it into the Japanese word “Ryoushin”. But the meaning of“Ryoushin (conscience)” is different from one of “for intérieur”. Berque asserts herethat there are various opinions inside city and various comments from outside so thatconflicts occur among them. However one decides oneself ultimately. This is a basic
principle of democracy. Therefore he acknowledges intersubjectivity.
(ii) One of Shinagawa’s questions refers to an architect, who is introduced as “anexample of topos in sheer ignorance of chôra”. The plan of this architect is accepted bysome inhabitants, but rejected by other inhabitants. What guidance would mesology
give them? Professor Berque’s answer is that mesology has to abide by the more
universal criteria. The more universal criteria lie in nature. Then the architecture
against law of nature is not good. There are many problems, but we have to consider
the base of nature at first. Secondly mesology finds it desirable that the architecture is
not against the history of society of the place.
(iii) How is a chôra constructed? Berque thinks that it is constructed by the social
history which we learn from social sciences. In social history there are various stages
or milieus. For example, the existence of nation, culture or life style is historical. So
the base of mesology is above all history.
(iv) How does man sublate specialties or singularities of various milieus? Berque’s
basic idea is that it requires some universal frame of reference, criteria, or base.
Indeed the universal itself is the absolute being so that we cannot grasp it as a whole,
but there are many ways to grasp or predicate what is universal. The way of naturalsciences is more universal. When we explain in terms of the relation between S(subject) and P (predicate), S is relatively close to nature, universality, and necessity.
On the contrary, P is relatively close to specialty, singularity, and contingency. Culture,
which is on the side of P, is indeed a universal condition for human beings, but under it
there is the more common base, namely nature, which is common to our species, i.e.
mankind. Thus the relations between S and P construct a kind of hierarchy. However S
cannot be considered without P in the world of humans. So long as humans exist, P is

also a universal condition. Therefore we must respect every culture. This is a muchcomplicated argument. But when we have to make choice between alternatives, wemust prefer the one which is on the side of S to the one which is on the side of P. Thus
murder is most evil, because it denies life. Similarly the practice of cutting women’s
clitoris in some parts of the world is universally not good, even if it is a cultural custom.
The reason is that it does harms to animal bodies of humans.
Professor Feenberg gave me a critical comment. Although Shinagawa evaluates
Berque’s theory in the light of multiplicity of values and universalizability, themultiplicity of values is not a criterion, but a fact. Nor is universalizability a criterion,
but a mere procedural rule which requires that man should recognize the opponents asright holders. The poverty of Habarmas lies in his identification of procedure with
criteria. More concrete thought such as Berque’s can make a larger contribution
toward contemporary concrete issues. We could not deal with them without ontology.
We should address to ontology, although it is the object to be discussed.
My answer for this comment is thus. My starting point is the understanding that welive in the poor times: it is because we acknowledge the multiplicity of values andcannot maintain special values or a single ontology that the procedural ethicalthinking such as Habermas is dominant. I evaluate mesology because of its challenges
to this contemporary situation. But thorough the prism of the contemporary situation
mesology appears to be a kind of communitarianism. This is my point. However I agreewith Professor Feenberg, when he said that the interpretation of mesology as
communitarianism would prevent us from appreciating correctly the relation of it tonature. Naturally I would not like to give too a narrow interpretation. The issue could
be formulated as follows: it is universal that human beings live in milieu and haverelation to nature. It is a merit of Berque’s mesology to point it out. But if mesology
claims the significance of a special milieu in a concrete situation, would it tend to be
involved with communitarianism? It is the reason that I emphasize the role of open
place for discussion in the idea of ‘city’.
I am very much obliged for Professor Berque’s answers,

which make myunderstanding of mesology go further. At last I add the issue that we could not deal
with because of a shortage of time in the symposium.
In the base of mesology, as the answers (ii) and (iii) prove, we find deep confidence inthe nature common to human beings as species and social history as well as naturaland social sciences, which could give us objective knowledge about them. The strengthof this confidence was beyond my expectation. We have often experienced that so-called
scientific knowledge were proved to be soaked by ideology. Could we be so confident ofobjectivity of sciences? Indeed only science can prove the influence of ideology. So I donot challenge to the confidence itself. My point is rather the following question. Would
we be unable to treat evenly opinions of scientists and lay persons, if we are muchconfident of scientific knowledge? How would the discussion in ‘city’ be influenced
then? In some cases citizens can decide from the larger scope on the base of
information from scientists. In other cases a guideline against citizens might beendorsed by scientists. In any case it is a problem how scientists should participate in
the discussion in ‘city’.
I focus on this problem, because a similar problem is attacked in applied ethics, which
deal with concrete issues in our social life: what role should moral philosopher playthere? I think that the place where issues occur is a kind of ‘commons’. It is not
territory of moral philosophers. So they should not play a role as moral experts whogive a special answer or guideline for the problem at stake. Instead they should
coordinate various opinions of citizens and scientists of many fields. This is my opinion
that I has contrived in the face of challenges of metaethics in the first half of the 20 th
century, especially, of emotivism, which cast a doubt whether evaluative judgments canbuild up a science (26). Although emotivism and the enthusiasm about metaethics werealready out of date, the problem remains nevertheless what role scientists should playin our society. How about the mesologists?
The process of sublation was given in the answer (iv). My interpretation of ‘city’ as acommunity of discourse is somehow abstract. In fact ‘city’ would range from literally acity (or a partition of city or village) to prefecture, region, nation, and internationalsociety. If ‘city’ as open community of discourse is correspondent to the process ofsublation, it would construct a kind of hierarchy. I hope that mesology will go further
to integrate social science such as politics and economics etc., because political andeconomical factors might exert influence at various stages of such a ‘city’.
Note(1) WATSUJI, Tetsuro, Milieu , Iwanami, 1979, pp.13-19(2) BERQUE, Augustin, Ecoumène: Introduction à l’étude des milieux humains , translatede by
NAKAYAMA Gen, Chikuma, 2002, p.221(3) Hans Jonas wrote about Heidegger ’s concept of thrown projection as follows. “What is the throw
without the thrower, and without a beyond whence it started? Rather should the existentialist saythat the human being [Menschenwesen] -- conscious, caring, and feeling self [fühlendes Selbst] -has been “thrown up” by nature.“ (JONAS, Hans, Das Prinzip Leben , Suhrkamp, 1997, S.371,( The

Phenomenon of L i fe , Northwestern University Press, 1966, p.233. I translated according to theGerman version. In the English version, “life” was written instead of “Menschenwesen” and“knowing self” instead of “fühlendes Selbst“) Jonas pointed out that spirit has been kept away fromnature by the ancient Gnosis, Cartesian dualism, and modern existentialism and that this division
is resulted in the ignorance of the status of human beings in nature and therefore norms. Jonasmaintained the continuity between nature and human beings in terms of evolution. From othercontext than Berque’s, he sought the status of human beings in the universe and found the special
feature of human beings in the ability of making symbol. As to the study of symbol, see “Homo
Pictor: Von der Freiheit des Bildens” in ibid. Professor Berque evaluates Jonas positively (BERQUE,
Augustin, Être huma i ns sur la terre, principe d’éthique d’écoumène , translated by SHINODA,
Katsuhide, Chikuma, 1996, p.117) and points out properly that Jonas distinguished the ethicaldimension from the ecological one (p.130, ibid.). But he declares that mesology goes further thanJonas, because Jonas’ scope remains the vision of mankind as such (p.118, ibid.). Frankly speaking,I cannot realize what it means. The reason is that the principle of responsibility does not only carefor human beings and that Jonas’ concept of mankind as such means permanent free beings capable
to be good or wrong. This image of them is contrary to the one described by utopianism.
(4) Berque, Ecoumène , op. cit., p.174(5) While ‘ethic’ illustrates the norms helpful to social life, ‘ethics’ means philosophical thinking
about it. Man can distinguish them in English, but there are no correspondent words in French andGermany. In Japan man also tends to confuse one with another. But I dare to adopt these different
words to keep the keen awareness of ethics for foundation of norms.
(6) NORTON, Bryan, “Environmental Ethics and Weak Anthropocentrism”, in Environmental

Ethics , vol.6, n.2(7) SHINAGAWA, Tetsuhiko, “Environment, Property and Ethic”, in Sh i sou, no. 923, Iwanami, 2001.
In this context I have criticized Serres’ concept of natural contract.
(8) Aldo Leopold's land ethic gets off this criticism. He took humans as ethical agents who intervenein the nature deliberately.
(9) SHINAGAWA, Tetsuhiko, “Nature, Environment and Human Being: Hans Jonas on t he Pr i ncip l eof Responsibility ”, in Arche , no.7, Kansai Philosophical Association, 1999.
(10) About the criticism of Jonas by discourse ethics, see APEL, Karl-Otto, Diskurs und

Verantwortung , Suhrkamp, 1997, APEL, Karl-Otto & NIQUET, Marcel, Diskursethik und
Diskursanthropologie , Alber, 2002, MÜLLER, Wolfgang Erich(Hrsg.), Hans Jonas – von derGnosisforschung zur Verantwortungsethik , Kohlhammer, 2003, BÖHLER, Dietrich(Hrsg.), Ethik
für die Zukunft -- Im Diskurs mit Hans Jonas , C.H.Beck, 1994
(11) BERQUE, Ecoumène , op. cit., p.406(12) HELD, Klaus, “Le monde natal, le monde ètranger, le monde un“, traduit par Raphaël Célis, inHusserl-Ausgabe und Husserl-Forschung , Hrsg. Samuel Ijsseling, Kluwer Academic Publishers,
1990, p.19. This ideas of home-world and world of strangers, which Husserl left in the posthumous
texts ( Husserliana Bd. XIII-XV), and the study of milieu can overlap each other in some respects.
Translated into the ideas of mesology, ‘home-world’ means the medial body, which is familiar to us,
while ‘world of strangers’ means the milieu, where we are compelled to feel that our measures are
rejected to apply there.
(13) BERQUE, Ecoumène , op. cit., p.382(14) ibid., p.420

(15) WATSUJI, Milieu , op. cit., p.144(16) BERQUE, Ecoumène , op. cit., p.379(17) ibid., p.380(18) ibid., p.377(19) ibid., p.394(20) ibid., p.406(21) ibid., p.407(22) ibid., p.389(23) ibid., p.22
(24) ibid., pp.384-388(25) ibid., p.376(26) SHINAGAWA Tetsuhiko, “The accountability of ethics: bioethics as a clue“, in the 50 th
Symposium of the Japanese Society for Ethics “The 20 th Century: Questions of Ethics”, The Reportsof the Conference in 1999 , Japanese Society for Ethics, 1999.