當代生態批評論述，在基於自然(相對於人的外在世界)正步步惡化的前提下，重新思考人的位置，包括環境危機的根本原因與適切的解決之道。然而，當生態評論者，對於「何謂自然存有」的觀念，給予程度不同的重視，「自然」的定義在生態論述中變得歧異而模稜：一方面，任何生物或自然環境被等同於它所佔有的空間；另一方面，所謂的空間性，只能夠作為其存在的指標。這種定義上的歧異性，在當前後現代的思維脈絡中，愈益明顯：在普遍對於聲稱「自然的」論述多所存疑時，任何對於「何謂自然存有」的討論，容易落入是否為本質主義與知識霸權的辯論。本篇論文，在回顧分析當代生態評論的潛在的歧異與討論的走向後，針對兩種主要的存在論述做比較，並進一步爬梳出歧異的根本原因──「視覺」在人與自然關係中的位置。本篇論文，在意識到自然定義的歧異性下，一方面希冀得以喚起生態批評論述對自然定義歧異性的重視；另一方面，也希冀能有更多對於視覺所隱含的存有觀對於自然環境所造成的影響之研究。

With the substantive belief that nature (the material world) is deteriorating from its original circumstance to the terminal catastrophe, contemporary ecocritical discourses investigate the factors for such degrading situation and explore any possible solutions. These two ways, though seemingly distinct, are in truth re-defining the place of humans in the world. As a result, when the concern about the role of human beings diverts the attention from the concern about the exact definition of the material world, what counts as the being of the material world becomes ambiguous: the being on the one hand is equalized with the occupancy of space; on the other hand, the spatial contour is only a visual presence of the being. Furthermore, this ambiguity in terms of ontological status of the material world is further aggravated when the current academic realm is dominated by the debates over the nature of knowledge: in the context of the disbelief in “the natural,” any proposal about the material world in terms of its ontological status is vulnerable to be criticized as naively naturalistic or blindly monopolistic in light of the knowledge of the material world. Beginning with this problematic in the current ecocritical discourses, this thesis is devoted to the incipient comparisons of the premises underlying the ambiguous ontological contentions and to the inductive suggestion of the determinant of such ambiguity—the role of vision. With the awareness of the ambiguity of nature’s ontological status, this thesis aims not only to raise the awareness of what counts as the being of a natural entity, but also intends to pave the way for exploring the impact of the ontological implication of sight on the material world.

Abstract ............................................ i
Chinese Abstract ....................................ii
Acknowledgement ....................................iii
Chapter One: The Review of Contemporary Ecocritical Discourses: the Sense of Time, the Human Roles, and Some Ambiguity.............................................1
Chapter Two: The Proscenium and Backstage of Nature’s Ambiguous Ontological Status: Distribution Maps and Debates over Epistemology.............................21
Chapter Three: The Comparisons of the Status of Being:
The Visible and The Invisible.........................46
Conclusion: The Significance of the Awareness of Nature’s Status of Being: Visual Images in the Culture of Nature
......................................................74
Work Cited............................................83

Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Rev. ed. London: Verso, 2006.
Armbruster, Karla. “Creating the World We Must Save: the Paradox of Television Nature Documentaries.” Writing the Environment: Ecocriticism and Literature. Ed. Richard Kerridge and Neil Sammells. London and New York: Zed Book Ltd, 1998. 218-238.
Arnold, David. The Problem of Nature: Environment, Culture, and European Expansion. Oxford and Cambridge: Blackwell, 1996.
Bennett, Michael. “From Wide Open Spaces to Metropolitan Places.” ISLE Reader: Ecocriticism 1993-2003. Ed. Michael P. Branch and Scott Slovic. Athens: U of Georgia P, 2003. 296-317.
Berger, John. “Why Look At Animals?” About Looking. New York: Vintage Book, 1991. 3-28.
Berman, Morris. The Reenchantment of the World. Toronto: Bantam Book, 1984.
Brennan, Andrew. Thinking About Nature: An Investigation of Nature, Value, and Ecology. Athens: U of Georgia P, 1988.
Buell, Lawrence. The Environmental Imagination: Thoreau, Nature Writing, and the Formation of American Culture. Cambridge: Belknap P of Harvard U, 1995.
Capra, Fritjof. The Tao of Physics: An Exploration of the Parallels Between Modern Physics and Eastern Mysticism. 2nd ed. Shambhala: Boulder, 1983.
---. “Deep Ecology: A New Paradigm.” Deep Ecology for the 21st Century: Readings On the Philosophy and Practice of the New Environmentalism. Boston and London: Shambhala, 1995. 19-25.
Coates, Peter. Nature: Western Attitudes since Ancient Times. Berkeley: U of California P, 1998.
Collingwood, R. G.. The Idea of Nature. London: Oxford UP, 1960.
Cosgrove, Denis. “Landscape and the European Sense of Sight—Eyeing Nature.” Handbook of Cultural Geography. Ed. Kay Anderson. London and Thousand Oaks, Sage Publications, 2003. 249-268.
Coupe, Laruence, ed. The Green Studies Reader: from Romanticism to Ecocriticism. New York: Routledge, 2000.
Cronon, William, ed. Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature. New York: W. W. Norton,1995.
Daston, Lorraine and Fernando Vidal, ed. The Moral Authority of Nature. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 2004.
Devall, Bill. “Simple in Means, Rich in Ends: Practicing Deep Ecology.” The Deep Ecology Movement: An Introductory Anthology. Ed. Alen Drengson and Yuichi Inoue. Berkeley: North Atlantic Books, 1995. 38-72.
Devall, Bill and George Session. Deep Ecology. Salt Lake City: G.M. Smith, 1985.
Dijksterhuis, E.J. The Mechanization of the World Picture: Pythagoras to Newton. Trans. C. Dikshoorn. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1986.
Dobson, Andrew. Green Political Thoughts. London: Routledge, 2000.
Eder, Klaus. The Social Construction of Nature: A Sociology of Ecological Enlightenment. London and Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications, 1996.
Ellis C. Jeffrey. “On the Search for a Root Cause: Essentialist Tendencies in Environmental Discourse.” Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature. Ed. William Cronon. New York: W. W. Norton,1995. 256-268.
“Eurema Daira, South Carolina.” Map. Butterflies and Moths of North America. <http://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/>.
Evernden, Neil. The Social Creation of Nature. Baltimore: John Hopkins UP, 1992.
---. The Natural Alien: Humankind and Environment. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 1993.
Foltz, Bruce V. Inhabiting the Earth: Heidegger, Environmental Ethics, and the Metaphysics of Nature. Atlantic Highlands: Humanities Press, 1995.
Foucault, Michel. The Archeology of Knowledge and The Discourse on Language. Trans. A. M. Sheridan Smith. New York: Pantheon Books, 1972.
Fox, Warwick. Toward a Transpersonal Ecology: Developing New Foundation for
Environmentalism. New York: State U of New York P, 1995.
Franklin, Adrian. Animals and Modern Culture: A Sociology of Human-Animal Relations in Modernity. London: Sage Publications, 1999.
Gare, Arren E. Postmodernism and the Environmental Crisis. London and New York: Routledge, 1995.
Garrard, Greg. Ecocriticism. London and New York: Rouledge, 2004.
Grange, Joseph. Nature: An Environmental Cosmology. Albany: State U of New York P, 1997.
Gregory, Derek. Geographic Imagination. Cambridge: Blackwell Publishers, 1994.
Hannigan, John A.. Environmental Sociology: a Social Constructionist Perspective. London: Routledge, 1995.
Harley, J.B. The New Nature of Maps: Essays in the History of Cartography. Ed. Paul Laxton. Baltimore: The John Hopkins UP, 2001.
Harvey, David. The Condition of Postmodernity: An Enquiry into the Origins of Cultural Change. Oxford: Basil Blackwell Ltd, 1990.
Hayles, N. Katherine. “Simulated Nature and Natural Simulations: Rethinking the Relation between the Beholder and the World.” Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature. Ed. William Cronon. New York: W. W. Norton,1995. 409-425.
Hayward, Tim. Ecological Thought: an Introduction. Cambridge, UK: PolityPress; Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishers, 1995.
Heidegger, Martin. Being and Time. Trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson. Oxford and Cambridge: Blackwell, 1962.
Hutcheon, Linda. A Poetics of Postmodernism: History, Theory, and Fiction. New York: Routledge, 1988.
Ivins, Williams M.. On the Rationalization of Sight: With an Examination on Three Renaissance Texts on Perspective. New York: Da Capo Press, 1975.
Jay, Martin. Downcast Eyes: The Denigration of Vision in Twentieth-Century French Thought. Berkeley: U of California P, 1993.
Jonas, Hans. The Phenomenon of Life: Toward a Philosophical Biology. New York: Harper & Row, 1966.
Keulartz, Jozef. Struggle for Nature: a Critique of Radical Ecology. London and New York: Routledge, 1998.
Killingworth, M. Jimmie and Jacqueline S. Palmer. “Millennial Ecology: The Apocalyptic Narrative from Silent Spring to Global Warming.” Green Culture: Environmental Rhetoric in Contemporary America. Ed. Carl G. Herndl and Stuart C. Brown. Madison: U of Wisconsin P, 1996. 21-45.
Kitsuse, J. I., and Spector, M. “The labeling of social problems” The Study of Social Problems. Ed. Earl Rubington and Martin. S. Weinberg. New York: Oxford UP, 2003. 198-206.
Krug, Christian. “Virtual Tourism: The Consumption of natural and digital environment.” Nature in Literary and Cultural Studies: Transatlantic Conversations on Ecocriticism. Ed. Catrin Gerdorf and Sylvia Mayer. Amsterdam and New York: Rodopi, 2006. 249-273.
Lefebvre, Henri. The Production of Space. Trans. Donald Nicholson-Smith. Oxford and Cambridge: Blackwell, 1991.
Light, Andrew and Holmes Rolston, Ed. Environmental Ethics: an Anthology. Malden: Blackwell Pub., 2002.
Love, Glen A. Practical Ecocriticism: Literature, Biology, and the Environment. Charlottesville: U of Virginia P, 2003.
Lyotard, Jean-Francois. The Postmodern Condition : a Report on Knowledge. Trans. Geoff Bennington and Brian Massumi. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1984.
Macnaghten, Phil and John Urry. Contested Natures. London: Sage Publications, 1998.
McIntosh, Robert P. The Background of Ecology: Concept and theory. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1985.
Merchant, Carolyn. The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology, and the Scientific Revolution. New York: Harper & Row, 1989.
---. Radical Ecology: the Search for a Livable World. New York: Routledge, 1992.
---. “Reinventing Nature: Western Culture as a Recovery Narrative.” Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature. Ed. William Cronon. New York: W. W. Norton,1995. 132-159.
Merleu-Ponty, Maurice. Phenomenology of Perception. Trans. Colin Smith. London: Routledge & Paul; New Jersey: Humanities Press, 1962.
Midgley, Mary. The Myths We Live By. London and New York: Routledge, 2003.
Murphy, D. Patrick. Further Afield in the Study of Nature-Oriented Literature. Charlottesville: UP of Virginia, 2000.
Naess, Arne. Ecology, Community, and Lifestyle: Outline of Ecosophy. Trans. Rothenberg, David. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1989.
---. “Self-Realization: An Ecological Approach to Being in the World.” Deep Ecology for the 21st Century: Readings On the Philosophy and Practice of the New Environmentalism. Boston and London: Shambhala, 1995. 225-239.
Nietzsche, Friedrichh. The Will to Power. Trans. Walter Kaufmann and R. J. Hollingdale. New York: Vintage Books, 1967.
Oelschlager, Max. Postmodern Environmental Ethics. Albany: State U of New York P, 1995.
Pratt, Vernon et al. Environment and Philosophy. New York: Routledge, 2000.
“Pieris Rapae, South Carolina.” Map. Butterflies and Moths of North America. <http://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/>.
Ross, Andrew. The Chicago Gangster Theory of Life: Nature’s Debt to Society. London and New York: Verso, 1995.
Rothenberg, David. “Introduction: Ecosophy T: from Intuition to System.” Ecology, Community, and Lifestyle: Outline of Ecosophy. Naess, Arne. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1989. 1-22.
Routley, Richard. “Is There A Need for a New, and Environmental, Ethics?” Environmental Ethics: An Anthology. Ed. Andrew Light and Holmes Rolston. Malden: Blackwell Pub., 2002. 47-52.
Rowlands, Mark. The Environmental Crisis: Understanding the Value of Nature. London: Macmillan Press LTD, 2000.
Session, George. Introduction. Deep Ecology for the 21st Century: Readings On the Philosophy and Practice of the New Environmentalism. Ed. Session. Boston and London: Shambhala, 1995.
Shepard, Paul and Daniel Mckinley. Subversive Science: Essays Toward an Ecology of Man. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1969.
Skolimowski, Henryk. Living Philosophy: Eco-philosophy as a Tree of Life. Arkana: Penguin, 1992.
Smith, Mick. An Ethics of Place: Radical Ecology, Postmodernity, and Social Theory. Albany: State U of New York, 2001.
Sontag, Susan. On Photography. New York: Anchor Books, 1990.
Soper, Kate. What Is Nature?: Culture, Politics and the Non-Human. Oxford Cambridge: Blackwell, 1995.
Thomas, Keith. Man and The Natural World: Changing Attitudes in England 1500-1800. Harmondsworh: Penguin Books, 1984.
Thompson, Janna. “A Refutation of Environmental Ethics.” Environmental Ethics 12(2) (1990):147-160.
Thrower, Norman J.W. Maps & Civilization: Cartography in Culture and Society. 2 nd ed. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1999.
Urry, John. The Tourist Gaze: Leisure and Travel in Contemporary Societies. London: Sage Publications, 1990.
---. Consuming Places. London and New York: Routledge, 1995.
Vaughan, France. Inward Arc. Boston: Shambhala, 1986.
Ward, Steven C. Reconfiguring Truth: Postmodernism, Science Studies, and the Search for a New Model of Knowledge. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 1996.
“Western Pipistrelle.” Map. North American Bat Conservation Partnership (NABCP). <http://www.batcon.org/nabcp/newsite/index.html>.
White, Lynn. “The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis.” The Ecocriticism Reader: Landmarks in Literary Ecology. Ed. Cheryll Glotfelty and Harold Fromm. Athens: U of Georgia P, 1996. 3-14.
Whitehead, Alfred. Science and The Modern World. London: Free Association Books, 1925
---. The Concept of Nature. Michigan: U of Michigan P, 1957.
Williams, Raymond. The Country and The City. New York: Oxford UP, 1975.
---. Keywords: a Vocabulary of Culture and Society. New York: Oxford UP, 1976.
Wilson, Alexander. The Culture of Nature: North American landscape from Disney to the Exxon Valdez. Cambridge: Blackwell, 1992.
Yearley, Steven. The Green Case: A Sociology of Environmental Issues, Arguments, and Politics. London and Boston: HarperCollins Academic, 1991.
---. Sociology, Environmentalism, Globalization: Reinventing the Globe. London: Sage Publication, 1996.
Zimmerman, Michael. Introduction. Environmental Philosophy: from Animal Rights to Radical Ecology. Ed. Zimmerman, et al. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1993.
---. Contesting Earth’s Future: Radical Ecology and Postmodernity. Berkeley: U of California P, 1994.
俞懿嫻。Yu, Yi-Xian，《懷海德自然哲學 : 機體哲學初探》，(台北: 正中，2001年)。