ABSTRACT
In this chapter, I address the relationship with other living species, both plant and animal, starting from our shared ideas of the city and home. I demonstrate how neither the city nor the home is adequate in representing the continuum between nature and culture.
From this perspective, the home cannot continue to function as a device for the exclusion and partition between the human species and other living species. Similarly, the city cannot be viewed as being limited to the sum of our buildings, disregarding, for instance, the parks and trees that inhabit it. I propose a brief digression on the origin of the concept of sustainability, claiming that an ecological mind naturally embraces environmentalist reflection concerning planet preservation. To merge sustainable thinking with responsible action, I suggest “reconnecting our thoughts with the flesh of the world”, elaborating on the work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty. I then mention the contributions of Environmental Humanities and introduce the debate on the Anthropocene. It is paradoxical that precisely at the moment when we witness such human supremacy – which leads geologists to speak of it as the driving force for planetary change (“Anthropocene epoch”) – humans must step aside and begin humbly to consider themselves a species among species. This involves taking into account the knowledge of other living forms. In the third paragraph, I consider different disciplinary perspectives on the plant world, from Stefano Mancuso’s plant neurobiology to Monica Gagliano’s theories of biological intelligence, from Emanuele Coccia and Byung-Chul Han’s plant philosophy to Eduardo Kohn’s anthropology. Forests, trees, and woods finally gain full citizenship in the world of living beings, demonstrating their ability to process and even memorise information. In the following paragraph, I address the question of animal cognition, referencing recent contributions from neuroscience: I mention Giorgio Vallortigara’s hypothesis that basic forms of cognitive processes do not necessarily require large brain masses. I argue that the sociological perspective can offer specific and decisive contributions to this debate, challenging the fallacious belief that consciousness is exclusively a human prerogative. This belief establishes the order of the possible and thinkable within which to articulate the form and organisation of daily social life. Believing that animal life is a form of life that possesses “no type of knowledge” greatly increases the likelihood that animals of all species will be subjected to inhuman and cruel treatment in farming industries. I therefore also address the issue of the ecology of the animal body and the invisibility of extreme violence practices in intensive farming. As a contrast (perhaps also because of the strong disgust this abuse provokes, an abuse we/us allow the animals I/we eat to be subjected to), I offer a digression on the song of cicadas and their ability to create an entire sound environment which has positive effects on the human soul. Lastly, I return to the long-standing question of cyborgs and their rights, drawing from Donna Haraway. I propose imagining new social ecosystems where boundaries between species and kinships can be radically rethought. In which traditional patriarchal thinking, toxic cultures of discrimination, sexism, racism, and speciesism could begin to evaporate definitively: how many and what kinds of assemblages of inert and living matter will still be necessary to maintain the ruthless supremacy of one species over all others?
