列維納斯il y a與元素概念的生態含義初探

Abstract

本文擬在生態現象學 (eco-phenomenology) 的視域中，探索法國哲學家列維納斯 (Emmanuel Levinas) 早期作品的生態含義，此一探索的目的在於刻畫「自然他者」所由現身的概念背景。我們將以《從存在到存在者》(Existence and Existents) 中的 il y a 概念和《整體與無限》(Totality and Infinity) 中的元素 (elemental) 概念為焦點，首先描述它們在文本脈絡中的含義，接著透過學者對列維納斯所作彼此各異的詮釋來論述這兩個概念的自然向度，最後試圖獲得一個整合的架構。本文試圖說明：一種基於列維納斯哲學的生態思考，必須奠基於自然對人類的陌生性，復以此建立起自然與人類的連續性，只有在此般建立起來的連續性的基礎上，我們才能進而確立自然的倫理地位。列維納斯的他者倫理學有助於此一「基於陌生性的連續性」的思路，但要如何從那缺乏直接的自然關切的文本中去獲得這樣的助益，則有待於一個帶有環境倫理學意識的詮釋性解讀，本文即進行此一解讀的初步嘗試，並最終集焦於一種具有生態意涵的主體概念的提出，以此作為自然他者現身的背景

his article attempts to explore possible ecological significations of Emmanuel Levinas’s early works within the horizon of eco-phenomenology, in order to characterize the conceptual background from which the natural other emerges. We will focus on the concept of il y a in Existence and Existents and the concept of elemental in Totality and Infinity, and clarify the natural dimension of these two concepts in terms of a kind of environmental concern. My opinion is that if we want to obtain nature’s philosophical foundation, we should construct continuity between human and nature by way of ecological meaning of nature’s strangeness to human, and Levinas’s early works could provide such strangeness of nature when we expand his discourse about il y a and elemental into a kind of phenomenology of the natural other. Finally we attempt to argue that a passive and mediated “natural self” is the background from which the natural other emerges.