Word and Nature: Conceptually engineering nature in naturalism, and the activity of self-knowledge

Abstract

The meaning of nature that we have in naturalism is not the best possible one, and its shortcoming has partly to do with our understanding of naturalism itself and the commitments that we set thereby. This kind of naturalistic doctrine results in a philosophy that fails to perform its task of mediating between the scientific and literary cultures, as proposed by C.P. Snow (1959). Therefore, I aim to illustrate the shortcomings of conventional naturalism and its understanding of the meaning of nature, and to provide an ameliorative account of nature in a reformed naturalism. This reformed naturalism will provide us with a version philosophy possessing a better meaning of nature. As a result this kind of reformed naturalist philosophy will be able to mediate between the two cultures, resulting in an overall activity of critical self-knowledge. My primary methodology for revising “nature” is externalist framework for conceptual engineering proposed by Cappelen (2018), with some minor critical revisions. Other than a reformed version of naturalism, and a better meaning of nature, my project will also produce a series of strategies for better understanding the term nature in general.