启蒙理性的自然哲学反思

Reflection on Natural Philosophy of Enlightenment Rationalism

作为一个古老而常新的哲学范畴,“自然”是理解人类文明历史演进的关键概念,人与自然关系亦构成了启蒙时代思想家们的共同理论背景。启蒙之初,“自然”实际上起到了点燃人类理性之光的辅助作用,帮助人类挣脱宗教蒙昧主义和封建专制主义的双重束缚。随着启蒙运动的深入,启蒙理性中的分析和计算精神被放大,工具理性大行其道,“自然”被科学技术“祛魅”的同时,沦为人类控制和征服的对象。不仅如此,启蒙理性的社会政治蔓延亦行之有效,社会成为一个科层官僚制的“机械铁笼”,人也异化为擅长功利谋划和理性算计的机器。现代社会并非如启蒙思想家们的美好设想,自然环境的满目疮痍和社会人文的本性迷失反而相互交织、日益呈现。人类需要第二次启蒙:生态启蒙,其逻辑原点和理论归宿点应是人性向自然本性的回归。

As an ancient and constantly renewed philosophical category, “nature” is a key concept for understanding the historical evolution of human civilization. The relationship between man and nature also constituted the common theoretical background of thinkers in the Age of Enlightenment. From the onset of enlightenment, “nature” actually played an auxiliary role in igniting the light of human rationalism, assisting human beings in breaking free from the double bondage of religious obscurantism and feudal despotism. With the deepening of the Enlightenment movement, the spirit of analysis and calculation in Enlightenment rationalism had been amplified, with instrumental rationality raised to prominence. While “nature” was “disenchanted” by science and technology, it had become the object of human control and conquest. In addition, the social and political spread of enlightenment rationalism was also effective, where society had become a bureaucratic “mechanical cage”, and people had also been alienated into machines adept at utilitarian scheming and rational calculation. Modern society is not as beautiful as the Enlightenment thinkers imagined. The devastation of the natural environment and the loss of social and humanistic nature are intertwined in their increasingly apparent representation. Human beings need a second enlightenment: ecological enlightenment, whose logical origin and theoretical destination should be the return of human nature to its natural elements.