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Sur quoi repose le monde
“ Je crois que la plus belle chose que l’on puisse dire à quelqu’un, c’est "Regarde". Et la position la plus tendre, ce n’est pas une longue étreinte, mais deux personnes se tenant côte à côte, regardant ensemble le monde. ”
Regarder le monde, c’est regarder les êtres aussi bien que les lieux. Non seulement pour mieux les comprendre et mieux les préserver, mais surtout parce qu’il s’agit de l’un des besoins les plus fondamentaux de l’espèce humaine. Nous n’avons pas seulement besoin du milieu naturel pour notre survie, nous dépendons affectivement de lui. Nous sommes tous liés à lui de mille manières insoupçonnées.
Après le merveilleux Petit traité de philosophie naturelle, Kathleen Dean Moore partage, non sans humour, ses méditations sur la beauté du monde.
Regarder le monde, c’est regarder les êtres aussi bien que les lieux. Non seulement pour mieux les comprendre et mieux les préserver, mais surtout parce qu’il s’agit de l’un des besoins les plus fondamentaux de l’espèce humaine. Nous n’avons pas seulement besoin du milieu naturel pour notre survie, nous dépendons affectivement de lui. Nous sommes tous liés à lui de mille manières insoupçonnées.
Après le merveilleux Petit traité de philosophie naturelle, Kathleen Dean Moore partage, non sans humour, ses méditations sur la beauté du monde.
304 pages, Hardcover
First published April 30, 2004
25 people are currently reading
860 people want to read
About the author
Kathleen Dean Moore
41 books159 followersEnvironmental philosopher Kathleen Dean Moore writes about moral, spiritual, and cultural relationships to the natural world. In 2000 she founded the Spring Creek Project at Oregon State, which brings together the practical wisdom of the environmental sciences, the clarity of philosophy, and the emotive power of the written word to re-imagine humankind’s relation to the natural world. In addition to her philosophical writing for professional journals, Moore is the author of several books of nature essays, including Wild Comfort: The Solace of Nature; Riverwalking; and The Pine Island Paradox, winner of the Oregon Book Award.
A graduate of Wooster College (1969), Moore earned her M.A. (1972) and Ph.D. (1977) from the University of Colorado, Boulder, in the philosophy of law, with a focus on the nature of forgiveness and reconciliation. At Oregon State, she teaches environmental ethics, the philosophy of nature, and a variety of courses for OSU’s new master’s program in environmental leadership. She is also co-author of a new Environmental Humanities Initiative, which integrates science and humanities to provide leadership for complex times.
A graduate of Wooster College (1969), Moore earned her M.A. (1972) and Ph.D. (1977) from the University of Colorado, Boulder, in the philosophy of law, with a focus on the nature of forgiveness and reconciliation. At Oregon State, she teaches environmental ethics, the philosophy of nature, and a variety of courses for OSU’s new master’s program in environmental leadership. She is also co-author of a new Environmental Humanities Initiative, which integrates science and humanities to provide leadership for complex times.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 39 reviews
May 31, 2019
I absolutely loved this read! Every sentence was crafted with care and made me think about dualities in my own life. I loved how beautifully the book was written. Moore’s words moved me!
December 25, 2023
"Aimer quelqu'un ou aimer un lieu, c'est accepter d'être moralement responsable de son bien-être."
"Quand les gens apprennent à regarder, ils commencent à voir, à voir vraiment. Quand ils commencent à voir, ils commencent à se sentir concernés. Et se sentir concerné, c'est l'entrée dans le monde moral."
"Quand les gens apprennent à regarder, ils commencent à voir, à voir vraiment. Quand ils commencent à voir, ils commencent à se sentir concernés. Et se sentir concerné, c'est l'entrée dans le monde moral."
May 3, 2024
Très ennuyeux... Peut-être dû à la traduction...
January 14, 2017
I've now read two books by Kathleen Dean Moore. Both center around the same themes of the power of the natural world to help us see the world in a different way. Yet even though this book covered similar ground to the one I read earlier this year, I never once felt it was repetitive or boring. Every word Moore writes is lyrical and beautiful and true. She's quickly become one of my favorite writers.
January 16, 2018
A beautiful book that often explores the contradiction of simultaneously loving the world while recognizing that your every footprint is impactful, often to the environment's detriment. In spite of this acknowledged contradiction, Kathleen Dean Moore celebrates the vitality that experiencing wild and natural places near and far gives us. This book is a reminder of why we search out wild places, and why we must work hard to protect them.
June 24, 2022
L'auteure relate des expériences et des pensées disparates sur les liens entre les gens et les lieux sauvages. Mélange de philosophie, de récits de voyage et de consternation face à la déconnexion des citadins et la disparition de sites enchanteurs.
October 22, 2019
To love - a person and a place - means this: One. To want to be near it, physically. Number two. To want to know everything about it - its story, its moods, what it looks like by moonlight. Number three. To rejoice in the fact of it. Number four. To fear its loss, and grieve for its injuries. Five. To protect it - fiercely, mindlessly, futilely, and maybe tragically, but to be helpless to do otherwise. Six. To be transformed by its presence - lifter, lighter on your feet, transparent, open to everything beautiful and new. Number seven. To want to be joined with it, taken in by it, lost in it. Number eight. To want the best for it. Number nine. Desperately.
When we wall ourselves off from the natural world’s wild sources of comfort and belonging, don’t we feel a sense of self-destructive restlessness, like a single moth in a jar?
I believe the most loving thing you can say to a person is “Look.” And the most loving stance is not a close embrace, but two people standing side by side, looking out together at the world. When people learn to look, they begin to see, really see. When they begin to see, they begin to care. And caring is the portal into the mortal world.
This is the saddest, most self-destructive mistake of all our sad and self-destructive mistakes, to think that humans can degrade their habitats and not degrade themselves. Counter evidence engulfs us - in epidemics of asthma in smoky cities, in lead poisoned children, in Tlingit stories about the lost salmon, in broken families and dysfunctional cities, in landslides and vacant streams. “You could cut off my hand, and I would still live,” Powhatan-Ren’pe writer Jack Forbes told me. “You could take out my eyes, and I would still live. Cut off my ears, my nose, cut off my legs, and I could still live. But take away the air, and I die. Take away the sun, and I die. Take away the plants and the animals, and I die. So why would I think my body is more a part of me than the sun and the earth?”
We were looking at a week, at least. That’s a long time when it’s pouring down rain and the whiskey’s run out.
A mouse was crushed, we say. The forest was cut. The birds were poisoned. An opossum was run over. A good time was had by all. So nobody’s acting here, only being acted upon. A human being walks by and mice keel over, trees sever themselves cleanly at the knees and plop into the dirt, birds plummet from the sky, and opossums pop into the air, dissolve into fluids, and distribute themselves randomly over the asphalt. The passive voice, the sentence where the causal agent has gone missing. The facts are bad enough, but the grammar is terrifying. Species go extinct, we say. But the fact of the matter is that species don’t always go extinct, the way bananas go bad, or bombs go astray, or elderly uncles go crazy or go about their business. Human decisions sometimes drive animals to extinction. Human decisions extinguish entires species. Extinguish: to cause to cease burning. All the little sparking lives. Shit happens, we say. And sometimes it does. But the fact of the matter is that sometimes, shit doesn’t just happen. Sometimes, human beings deliberately create the conditions under which shit is more likely to occur.
Don’t all parents want the world for their children? Fellow parents, tell me, wouldn’t we do anything for them? To give them big houses, we will cut ancient forests. To give them the perfect fruit, we will poison their food with pesticides. To give them the latest technologies, we will reduce entire valleys to toxic dumps. To give them the best education, we will invest in companies that profit from death. To keep them safe, we will deny them the right to their privacy, to travel unimpeded, to peacefully assemble. And to give them peace, we will kill other peoples’ children or send them to be killed, and amass enough weapons to kill the children again, kill them twenty times if necessary.
I want to live in a house where I can watch coyotes out the window, a small glass and cedar house reflected in bright water that smells of juniper and melting snow. A place so remote I can’t see a light from any other house, and so near the stars that the constellations disappear in clouds of starlight. A place where pine siskins whisper me awake in the morning and chickadees land on my hand. During the working day, the place will sing in my ear and I will write down its words and wisdom, longhand.
A jay fussed around in the garden, over in the bark dust next to the grape arbor. He had something in his beak, something dark and round, but I couldn’t make it out, and I couldn’t go into the house for binoculars without scaring him, so there you have it. He took an eye and pointed it to the ground. Then he pointed his other eye to the ground. I think it would be awful to have to consult both eyes, to let each one draw its own conclusions and then debate. Yes. No. There’s enough uncertainty in my life already: I don’t need my eyes to act like jerks, each insisting on its own point of view.
Sometimes I think I see a miracle, and then I realize that it’s just the everyday working of the world. Warm moist air encounters cold air and turns to shards of ice. Light catches the crystal planes. Tundra swans fly in to feed. Geese cry out. The lake reflects the sky. That’s the real miracle: that it’s no miracle at all, just Earth, sailing on in the dark.
Two decades ago, NASA scientists sent a spacecraft past Saturn, past Neptune, past Pluto, knowing that it would take a hard swing around the solar system and then wing into space and never stop, ever - unless beings from another place netted it and took it home. What message should the satellite carry to help space-faring strangers understand who we are? The scientists made a phonograph record - a twelve-inch copper disk in an aluminum jacket. They tucked a cartridge and a needle into the satellite and drew a picture of how a record player works. Then they loaded the record with music: Bach and Beethoven and “Johnny B. Goode.” African drums and Navajo night chants. Pan pies, bagpipes, The Magic Flute. “Go Johnny, Go,” Sing with all the sons of glory, Joy Joy Sisters and Brothers, all tucked there in the satellite like an egg to be hatched, a seed to germinate, flying through dark space long after we have reduced out civilization to stones.
All the same, I know what is means to sing standing up, and I try to remember what I have to do to live my life like music. Taut and attentive, to hum with the energy of the world outside my door - the sloshing tides and grieving parents and rising winds. Standing with strangers, to listen to their voices and tune myself to what is beautiful in them, and true. And sometimes, to walk to the very edge of my life and stand on the rim with my hair blowing back and my voice raised in celebration - the “Ode to Joy,” barreling past Saturn. A physicist will tell you what you already know. That harmony has the power to shake the world. Sing one clear note, and the same tone will hum in the window glass, in the electric wires, in the neighbor’s piano, in the pine needles, and the air will be changed forever.
When we wall ourselves off from the natural world’s wild sources of comfort and belonging, don’t we feel a sense of self-destructive restlessness, like a single moth in a jar?
I believe the most loving thing you can say to a person is “Look.” And the most loving stance is not a close embrace, but two people standing side by side, looking out together at the world. When people learn to look, they begin to see, really see. When they begin to see, they begin to care. And caring is the portal into the mortal world.
This is the saddest, most self-destructive mistake of all our sad and self-destructive mistakes, to think that humans can degrade their habitats and not degrade themselves. Counter evidence engulfs us - in epidemics of asthma in smoky cities, in lead poisoned children, in Tlingit stories about the lost salmon, in broken families and dysfunctional cities, in landslides and vacant streams. “You could cut off my hand, and I would still live,” Powhatan-Ren’pe writer Jack Forbes told me. “You could take out my eyes, and I would still live. Cut off my ears, my nose, cut off my legs, and I could still live. But take away the air, and I die. Take away the sun, and I die. Take away the plants and the animals, and I die. So why would I think my body is more a part of me than the sun and the earth?”
We were looking at a week, at least. That’s a long time when it’s pouring down rain and the whiskey’s run out.
A mouse was crushed, we say. The forest was cut. The birds were poisoned. An opossum was run over. A good time was had by all. So nobody’s acting here, only being acted upon. A human being walks by and mice keel over, trees sever themselves cleanly at the knees and plop into the dirt, birds plummet from the sky, and opossums pop into the air, dissolve into fluids, and distribute themselves randomly over the asphalt. The passive voice, the sentence where the causal agent has gone missing. The facts are bad enough, but the grammar is terrifying. Species go extinct, we say. But the fact of the matter is that species don’t always go extinct, the way bananas go bad, or bombs go astray, or elderly uncles go crazy or go about their business. Human decisions sometimes drive animals to extinction. Human decisions extinguish entires species. Extinguish: to cause to cease burning. All the little sparking lives. Shit happens, we say. And sometimes it does. But the fact of the matter is that sometimes, shit doesn’t just happen. Sometimes, human beings deliberately create the conditions under which shit is more likely to occur.
Don’t all parents want the world for their children? Fellow parents, tell me, wouldn’t we do anything for them? To give them big houses, we will cut ancient forests. To give them the perfect fruit, we will poison their food with pesticides. To give them the latest technologies, we will reduce entire valleys to toxic dumps. To give them the best education, we will invest in companies that profit from death. To keep them safe, we will deny them the right to their privacy, to travel unimpeded, to peacefully assemble. And to give them peace, we will kill other peoples’ children or send them to be killed, and amass enough weapons to kill the children again, kill them twenty times if necessary.
I want to live in a house where I can watch coyotes out the window, a small glass and cedar house reflected in bright water that smells of juniper and melting snow. A place so remote I can’t see a light from any other house, and so near the stars that the constellations disappear in clouds of starlight. A place where pine siskins whisper me awake in the morning and chickadees land on my hand. During the working day, the place will sing in my ear and I will write down its words and wisdom, longhand.
A jay fussed around in the garden, over in the bark dust next to the grape arbor. He had something in his beak, something dark and round, but I couldn’t make it out, and I couldn’t go into the house for binoculars without scaring him, so there you have it. He took an eye and pointed it to the ground. Then he pointed his other eye to the ground. I think it would be awful to have to consult both eyes, to let each one draw its own conclusions and then debate. Yes. No. There’s enough uncertainty in my life already: I don’t need my eyes to act like jerks, each insisting on its own point of view.
Sometimes I think I see a miracle, and then I realize that it’s just the everyday working of the world. Warm moist air encounters cold air and turns to shards of ice. Light catches the crystal planes. Tundra swans fly in to feed. Geese cry out. The lake reflects the sky. That’s the real miracle: that it’s no miracle at all, just Earth, sailing on in the dark.
Two decades ago, NASA scientists sent a spacecraft past Saturn, past Neptune, past Pluto, knowing that it would take a hard swing around the solar system and then wing into space and never stop, ever - unless beings from another place netted it and took it home. What message should the satellite carry to help space-faring strangers understand who we are? The scientists made a phonograph record - a twelve-inch copper disk in an aluminum jacket. They tucked a cartridge and a needle into the satellite and drew a picture of how a record player works. Then they loaded the record with music: Bach and Beethoven and “Johnny B. Goode.” African drums and Navajo night chants. Pan pies, bagpipes, The Magic Flute. “Go Johnny, Go,” Sing with all the sons of glory, Joy Joy Sisters and Brothers, all tucked there in the satellite like an egg to be hatched, a seed to germinate, flying through dark space long after we have reduced out civilization to stones.
All the same, I know what is means to sing standing up, and I try to remember what I have to do to live my life like music. Taut and attentive, to hum with the energy of the world outside my door - the sloshing tides and grieving parents and rising winds. Standing with strangers, to listen to their voices and tune myself to what is beautiful in them, and true. And sometimes, to walk to the very edge of my life and stand on the rim with my hair blowing back and my voice raised in celebration - the “Ode to Joy,” barreling past Saturn. A physicist will tell you what you already know. That harmony has the power to shake the world. Sing one clear note, and the same tone will hum in the window glass, in the electric wires, in the neighbor’s piano, in the pine needles, and the air will be changed forever.
December 5, 2018
I love when I find a new-to-me writer who instantly earns a spot on my favorite author list and in my heart.
Moore, a naturalist and philosopher, returns each year to a remote island in Alaska. As she reflects on the this place she loves, she blends the lines between nature and humanity. I could write a similar account (although not nearly as eloquently) about the Mississippi River Delta or Lake Norfork, my happy place.
This book will connect you back to the natural world and remind you of your continued ecological citizenship. At least, it did for me.
Favorite lines: I believe the most loving thing you can say to a person is “Look.” And the most loving stance is not a close embrace, but two people standing side by side, looking out together at the world. When people learn to look, they begin to see, really see. When they begin to see, they begin to care. And caring is the portal into the mortal world.
This book made me: want to write nature essays. I’ll be putting this author’s other books on my Christmas list.
Moore, a naturalist and philosopher, returns each year to a remote island in Alaska. As she reflects on the this place she loves, she blends the lines between nature and humanity. I could write a similar account (although not nearly as eloquently) about the Mississippi River Delta or Lake Norfork, my happy place.
This book will connect you back to the natural world and remind you of your continued ecological citizenship. At least, it did for me.
Favorite lines: I believe the most loving thing you can say to a person is “Look.” And the most loving stance is not a close embrace, but two people standing side by side, looking out together at the world. When people learn to look, they begin to see, really see. When they begin to see, they begin to care. And caring is the portal into the mortal world.
This book made me: want to write nature essays. I’ll be putting this author’s other books on my Christmas list.
June 3, 2019
I have to think of the author and Wendell Berry...both speak of simple nature and people's relation with it...they are deep thinkers who share staggeringly beautiful portions of nature with us as they observe and participate in and with nature.
My favorite portion of the book (how to choose!!!) was the chapter entitled "Where should I live, and what should I live for?"... it speaks to my list of what I want in my next house/condo/apartment...#1. Access to full sunsets. The rest is negotiable.
My favorite portion of the book (how to choose!!!) was the chapter entitled "Where should I live, and what should I live for?"... it speaks to my list of what I want in my next house/condo/apartment...#1. Access to full sunsets. The rest is negotiable.
March 25, 2019
What can I say about this book except read it? Let’s see, I can say that if you are a pessimist about where this world is headed, it might help you see some of the good left out there. If you are an adventurous soul, it might help you reimagine your adventures in new context, and if you hate philosophy as you learned it in school, this might show you the possibilities of what philosophy can be. Beautiful book written by a beautiful soul.
October 1, 2021
A lyrical meditation on humanity and their relationship with the world and each other. Moore's training in philosophy comes through in the strength and suppleness of her ideas, but her prose is a thousand times more accessible than anyone with a Ph.D. in philosophy ought to be. There are many profoundly beautiful and touching moments in this one -- a must-read for anyone with an interest in environmental ethics, and a good read for anyone breathing.
October 14, 2020
While this took me three years to read, I still really enjoyed it. Has magical descriptors that bring PNW flora and fauna to life. The most shocking thing I learned was about the powerful and sporadic weather of the western coast. Would recommend to anyone interested in ecology or the unique PNW environment.
September 22, 2019
Paradox
This was a paradox. Beautiful interesting nature writing at the start then turning depressing reflection near the end. I can't say it went to the end because I stopped reading it with one hundred pages left.
I was left sad and disappointed.
This was a paradox. Beautiful interesting nature writing at the start then turning depressing reflection near the end. I can't say it went to the end because I stopped reading it with one hundred pages left.
I was left sad and disappointed.
November 6, 2020
READ THIS!!!
The Pine Island Paradox could be summed up as: philosophy meets music meets the Pacific Northwest. This book was so surprisingly breathtaking and an absolute must-read for my fellow lovers of the natural world.
The Pine Island Paradox could be summed up as: philosophy meets music meets the Pacific Northwest. This book was so surprisingly breathtaking and an absolute must-read for my fellow lovers of the natural world.
April 17, 2021
I got this book waaaay back in 2005 and moved it from house to house without reading it. Perhaps it was waiting until I too lived in the Pacific Northwest and could relate on a deeper level. Beautiful writing with just enough philosophy to make you think but not so much to overwhelm.
March 19, 2019
A wonderful book of essays where a woman is one with the wilderness. Her writing is like poetry. Her love for and comfort in the natural world is inspiring.
October 18, 2019
What stood out about this book of "nature writing" was the skill with which the author weaved her personal family dynamics and history into her experiences with the natural world.
my-library
February 17, 2020[read for school]
July 24, 2022
Gorgeous, profound, inspiring. It's rare to find and read a book that touches me so deeply.
December 18, 2022
Intéressant mais la traduction ne m'a pas convenu je pense.
January 4, 2023
Lovely writing about nature and one’s place in it by one of my favorite Pacific NY authors.
November 13, 2024
Je n'ai pas terminé la lecture. Certain chapitre devenait intéressant, puis on changeait déjà de sujet. Je comprends l'idée du livre, de partager des anecdotes de vie. Mais je n'ai pas embarqué.
January 6, 2025
Un beau livre très philosophique (et aussi avec une couverture splendide)
April 12, 2008
By a philosophy prof and nature writer. Essays on stitching together the rent-asunder, mostly set in Alaska and Oregon. (She owns property on the Mary's River. She never described where it was, but I'm betting that it's between Blodget and Wren.)
Some new faces. Some new faces, who, from their comments, had been attracted by the environmental message of the book. So the book was preaching to the choir, yet again. We had a tendency to wander off the subject of the book, to our favorite camping spots, or love affairs with houses, or to practical matters, like how to buy furniture without a car.
Some new faces. Some new faces, who, from their comments, had been attracted by the environmental message of the book. So the book was preaching to the choir, yet again. We had a tendency to wander off the subject of the book, to our favorite camping spots, or love affairs with houses, or to practical matters, like how to buy furniture without a car.
February 7, 2008
I loved this book! I had to read it for an environmental spiritual class and it was well worth it. I would love to be a person who lives by national forests and gorgeous untouched pieces of land but unfortunately that life is not in my near future...but I love reading about people that can enjoy Gods beautiful gift of nature!
This book was an easy read and the author had a wonderful gift and making you feel like you were right beside her experiencing kayaking along side sea lions in the pacific ocean or in her backyard watching gray jays stealing from each other.
This book was an easy read and the author had a wonderful gift and making you feel like you were right beside her experiencing kayaking along side sea lions in the pacific ocean or in her backyard watching gray jays stealing from each other.
January 2, 2013
A collection of nature essays, beautifully written, grounded largely in the Pacific Northwest (my home). I loved the connections she draws - nature, humans, cosmos, family, that which is simple and that which is vast, the sacred, the numinous, the everyday, thrilling, frightening, beautiful. Highly recommended.
March 6, 2009
This is one of my favorite books, introduced to me by one of my favorite teachers. It speaks to environmentalism and an ethic of care. I have used this book to teach students about their enviroment and build a stronger connection.
February 22, 2009
I was an ignorant fool and hadn't heard or read Kathleen Dean Moore until I heard her speak at the Whidbey Island Writers Workshop. Wow. Her work is smart, funny, and vivid and compelling. I don't know how I'd missed out for so long...these stories are great.
February 13, 2015
I love reading all of Kathleen Dean Moore's books. I usually read them over again at least once a year. She is a master at describing the miraculous mysteries of this earth and challenges us to see them too.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 39 reviews