“Carbon Emissions and Climate Change in East Asia” With Prof. Ling Zhang, Department of Geography
Abstract: Through identifying the sources of carbon emission from various economic sectors and clarifying the relationship between carbon emission and climate change by the case study of East Asia, this workshop focuses on how teachers can use the concept of carbon emission to raise students’ awareness about climate change and environmental protection. Topics include greenhouse effect, global warming, carbon footprint mitigation, and discussion questions and activities that can be used in the classroom.
“Embodying the Supreme Ultimate: Exploring the Concept of Qi through Experiential Methods” With Prof. Adam Frank, Schedler Honors College
Abstract: This workshop will provide an overview of the many frameworks, ancient and modern, in which the Chinese concept of qi (“air,,” “vital energy” or “breath”) circulates, including historical, cultural, and aesthetic frameworks. It will also look at how Chinese martial arts like taijiquan (tai chi) embody Daoist principles like yin and yang in their movement principles. Participants over zoom will be invited to practice some simple exercises from the Wu family style of taijiquan.
“Alternative Visions of Japanese Culture and Ecology in Princess Mononoke” With Prof. Tim Strikwerda, School of Language and Literature
This workshop focuses on how teachers can use Hayao Miyazaki’s acclaimed anime masterpiece Princess Mononoke to think critically about Japanese approaches to the environment in world history, literature, and geography courses. Topics include eco-catastrophe, the representation of indigenous minorities, and Miyazaki’s perennial critique of Japanese militarism, as well as a list of discussion questions for instructors to use in their classes.
“Imagining Community: Considerations of Gender in Ecological and Asian Futurist Frameworks” With Prof. Taine Duncan, Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies
How do we see the world? Do we see it from the perspective of an individual or do we understand it in terms of community? Do we feel trapped in the current environmental crisis, or do we see our responsibilities to the crisis and opportunities for envisioning better futures? In this discussion I address the frameworks of feminist ecology and Asian Futurism. These frameworks help us to imagine other ways of seeing the relation between community and flourishing. In my presentation, I explore these resonant concepts of community and flourishing, and how they can be used in classroom teaching about ecology, philosophy, literature, and social theory.
Nicholas Brasovan, “Confucian Cosmology: All Things are Patterns of Energy”
Abstract: Wang Fuzhi (1619 – 1692) presents a naturalistic philosophy of persons and the world
as patterns of energy (qizhili 氣之理). While he is an advocate of the Cheng-Zhu school of Song
Ming Lixue, he presents a unique, critical, naturalistic, philosophy of qi 氣 and li 理. In short,
Wang Fuzhi speculates that the world and its myriad constituents are complex systems of energy.
This presentation analyzes Wang Fuzhi’s statements on patterns of energy. As a context, we
focus on Wang Fuzhi’s commentaries on the Confucian classics, including his commentaries on
the Yijing. Before concluding this presentation, we review the work of Yung Sik Kim, The
Natural Philosophy of Zhuxi (2000), and demonstrate that Wang Fuzhi inherits and critically
advances Zhu Xi’s philosophy of li.
Bio: Nicholas Brasovan is a Lecturer in the Department of Philosophy at Purdue University, as
well as Curriculum Developer in the Department of Computer Science at Purdue. He is the
author of Neo-Confucian Ecological Humanism: An Interpretive Engagement with Wang Fuzhi,
1619-1692, published by SUNY Press in 2017, and co-editor of Buddhisms in Asia: Traditions,
Transmissions, and Transformations.
Sunghwan Cho, “Korean Philosophy from the Perspective of Energy Philosophy: Focusing on
Eastern Philosophy(東學) and Qi Philosophy(氣學)”
Abstract: Both human beings and objects are understood as the changes of Chi in Choi, Hanki’s
Philosophy of Qi (氣學), and in this respect, Choi understands human beings and objects as
equal ‘agents.’ This is quite close to the understandings of new materialism and actor-network
theory. This study focuses on the similarities and differences between these two positions, and it
will compare Choi’s understanding of Qi (Chi) with Jane Bennett’s new materialist thoughts.
Specifically, Cho will point out that Jane Bennett’s understanding of “thing-power” is very
similar to Choi’s understanding of things as ‘the changes of Chi’, and he will also pay his
attention to a possibility of flat ontology in both by focusing on the ontological parity of humans
and things. In doing so, Cho will seek for a political ecology of Qi, the theoretical construction of
which will naturally accompany some comparison works with Bennett’s thoughts, and this will
be led to a possibility of ‘new-materialist philosophy of energy’.
Bio: Sunghwan Cho, assistant professor at Wonkwang University, specializes in
Tonghak(Eastern Learning). He also examines Ki-pihlosophy of Chi-Hangi from the perspective
of Anthropocene and new materialism. Cho earned his master’s degree in Chinese philosophy
from Waseda University and completed his Ph.D. at Sogang University. His English-language
article is “The Philosophical Turn in Tonghak: Focusing on the Extension of Ethics of Ch’oe
Sihyong”(2022), and Japanese-language publications include “東学の気学的人間観(Tonghak’s
Ki-philosophical View of Man)”(2024).
Clayton Crockett, “Towards a General Economy of Energy and Spirit Beyond East and West”
Abstract: In his masterpiece The Accursed Share, Georges Bataille presents a political economy
based on the energy that Earth and all of its inhabitants receive from the sun. He contrasts an
open, general economy that is always excessive with a more closed, restrictive economy based
on scarcity. I will show how Bataille’s work is compatible with a non-linear and non-equilibrium
thermodynamics, and suggest how that transforms our understandings of economy, ecology,
nature, and spirit.
Bio: Clayton Crockett is Professor and Director of the Religious Studies program in the
Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at the University of Central Arkansas. He is the
author or co-author of a number of books, most recently Energy and Change: A New Materialist
Cosmotheology, published by Columbia University Press in 2022. He is currently working on a
follow-up called God & Energy.
Dai Zhaoguo, “Philosophical Thoughts on Energy/Neng”
Abstract: From the perspective of the ultimate existence of all things, Neng(能) can be seen as
the most fundamental existence, or rather the most primitive way of existence. Exploring the
existence of Neng(能) from an ontological perspective is to return to the essence of the existence
and operation of all things. The existence and laws of change in the natural, social, and spiritual domains can all be explained through the way in which Neng(能)moves. Neng(能)evolves into
Shi(势), and Shi(势)evolves into Li(力).The progressive and interwoven evolution of Neng(能)
has created the entire universe and all things. According to the theory of the Three Realms of
Time-Space (三界时空), the Neng-Shi-Li (能-势-力) corresponds to the three major space-times
of the universe, history, and survival.
Bio: Dai Zhaoguo is Editor in Chief and Vice President of Anhui Normal University Press. He
has a Doctor of Philosophy from East China Normal University, and was a Postdoctoral
researcher in Philosophy from Peking University. He has published works such as Xin-xing(心性
) and Virtue, Mingli(明理) and Jingyi(敬义), Brief Discussion on Philosophy, New Tales of
Human Nature, The Discourse of Dao (East West Publishing Group), and his First Bilingual
Book of Chinese Studies, Analects (Editor in Chief). His main research areas include basic
Marxist theory, moral philosophy, and comparison between Chinese and Western philosophy.
Namjin Heo, “A Philosophy of Eating and Dying: A Philosophy of De-Composition and
(Ex)Change”
Abstract: The act of eating, when we consume something, means the death and decomposition
for the prey. Crockett understood this cycle of eating and being eaten as a transformation of
energy, and 19th-century Donghak (東學) thinker Choi, Si-Hyung described it as “the energetic
change of Chi of sky eating sky”(以天食天 氣化作用). Understanding the act of eating in this
way can change the ways we think about food and the way we eat. This is because the act of
eating is recognized as part of the energetic change of Chi(氣化) that circulates the earth’s
energy and changes the earth’s atmosphere. This study will focus on the energy circulation
aspect of the act of eating (食事), and propose a food philosophy that understands eating as
dying (食死).
Bio: Namjin Heo earned his Ph.D. in Religious Studies from the Academy of Korean Studies and
is currently teaching at Hanshin University and Incheon National University. His research
focuses on modern Korean thought, particularly the philosophy of Korean new religions. He also
explores the connection between indigenous Korean thought and Anthropocene philosophy,
seeking alternatives to the challenges posed by the climate crisis through religious and
philosophical inquiry. Recently, he has been reinterpreting death through the lens of the
“philosophy of decomposition” and examining religious responses to alternative burial methods,
such as the Mushroom Burial Suit and Human Composting, which have emerged in the United
States as responses to the climate crisis. His representative works include: “Philosophy of Eating
and Being Eaten from a Planetary Perspective” (2022) and “The Search for a New Ontology in
the Age of Anthropocene” (2021).
Peter D. Hershock, “Crisis Intervention: Some Buddhist Thoughts on Energy, Evolution, and
Transformative Ethics”
Abstract: A degraded environment is evidence of degraded and degrading consciousness. The energy and
environmental crises in which we are embroiled will not be resolved by some miraculous new
technology or green energy. They will be resolved only if we first heal what the Buddha called
the “wound of existence”—our presumed human independence on Earth, which is in fact our severance from both Nature and our own true selves. In this talk, I will make a case for seeing that this will require us to reconceive energy and evolution relationally, and to qualitatively transform how we are present in deliberating ethically about what matters most in determiningtogether what matters most.
Bio: Peter D. Hershock is an intercultural philosopher who makes use of Buddhist resources to reflect on contemporary issues of global concern. He is the Director of the Asian Studies Devel-
opment Program and coordinator of the Humane Artificial Intelligence Initiative at the East-West Center in Honolulu. He has written or edited more than a dozen books, including Reinventing the Wheel: A Buddhist Response to the Information Age; Buddhism in the Public Sphere: Reorient-
ing Global Interdependence; Valuing Diversity: Buddhist Reflection on Realizing a More Equita-
ble Global Future; and Buddhism and Intelligent Technology: Toward a More Humane Future. His newest book, Consciousness Mattering: A Buddhist Synthesis, offers nondualist theory of
consciousness and raises ethical questions about machine consciousness, the algorithmic hacking
of human consciousness, and humanity’s evolutionary future.
Catherine Keller, “Energy Divine, Energy Degraded: on the Vibratory Ecology of the Spirit”
Abstract: If the universe consists of vibratory patterns of energy—at the most elemental and the most encompassing levels—what does it mean that the pattern of the human species is now dom-
inated by the climate-altering exploitation of energy? Might the vibratory pattern of the Spirit help us to confront the degradation of energy with an alternative that may be the only hope for
our ecology: a collective attunement to the energy, the chi, of everything that is?
Bio: Catherine Keller is Professor of Constructive Theology at Drew University’s Theological
School. She teaches, writes, and wrangles along a broad
spectrum—ecological, process, feminist, political, pluralist. She has authored
13 books, the most recent being Facing Apocalypse: Climate, Democracy and
Other Last Chances, and No Matter What: Crisis and the Spirit of Planetary Possibility. She has led the Drew Transdisciplinary Theological Colloquium since its inception in 2000, and co-edited several of its volumes, published by Fordham University Press.
Wonjean Lee, “A Speculative Experiment on De-Composition Intelligence”
Abstract: In Discognition (2016), speculative realist Steven Shaviro describes the remarkable
cognitive abilities of a protoplasmic organism known as Physarum polycephalum. Its flexible
and contextualized behavior reminds us that all organisms can make “spontaneous decisions,”
and its distributed cognition shows that consciousness does not have to be unified to make
complex decisions. As such, it is an example of the so-called “extended mind,” meaning that
cognition does not occur solely in the brain but involves “the coupling of biological organisms
and external resources.” Drawing on Shaviro’s speculative philosophy, this study argues for recognizing the “de-compositional intelligence” of microbes and mycorrhizae, and for
cognitively engaging with them.
Bio: Wonjean Lee, a research professor at Yonsei University, specializes in Korean Neo-
Confucianism, particularly Toegye’s philosophy, exploring its relevance within 21st-centuryphilosophies such as speculative realism and new materialism. She also examines speculative
fiction as a means of imagining indigenous future modes of living and thinking, connecting it to
embodied cognition expressed in Confucian texts. Lee earned her bachelor’s and master’s
degrees in French philosophy from Seoul National University and completed her Ph.D. at
Sungkyunkwan University. She has also contributed to the Sunghaksipdo VR project. Her
English-language publications include “Sunghaksipdo VR: Virtual Reality Embodying
Philosophical and Conceptual Heritage,” published in Digital Creativity (2024).
Michael Norton, “Distributed Agency and Immanent Divinity: Reconfiguring Religion in the
Anthropocene”
Abstract: The Anthropocene, somewhat contrary to its name, brings with it a radical decentering
of humans—particularly as understood according to the model of modern Western subjectivity—
within the broader context of our natural environments and the biosphere as a whole. I argue that weaving together distributed, relational concepts of signification and agency (via the work of Karen Barad and Vicky Kirby) with an immanent, pluralist idea of divinity such as that offered by Mary Jane Rubenstein’s exploration of pantheism can help us understand religion in ways appropriate to the demands of the Anthropocene.
Bio: Michael Norton is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Associate Dean of the College of Humanities, Arts, Social Sciences, and Education at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. His recent research focuses on intersections between philosophy of religion, science studies, and environmental philosophy. His book Anthropocene Religion: Rethinking Nature, Humanity and Divinity Amid Climate Catastrophe is forthcoming in early 2025 from Edinburgh University
Press.
Iljoon Park, “De-Composition as Extendibility”
Abstract: This presentation will reinterpret the ontology of energy as existential extendibility.
Human beings do not exist in isolation, but are always connected to other beings, constituting a
coalition of beings and exercising their ontic capabilities. We are not only connected to people of
our own species, but we are also connected to biologically completely different species. So, all
beings, including us, are not singular as individuals or entities, but plural as the collective. The
power of being is extendibility, capability to associate with other beings, and, in animal
organisms, it is the capability to affect that makes this association possible. At the human level,
this extendibility is exercised through ‘cyborg capabilities’, which are the human capabilities to
form new actor-networks in coalition with other beings and artificial devices, even physical ones.
This paper will focus on discussing this cyborg capability as an ‘ontic capability’, emphasizing
that being is already always a coalition.
Bio: Iljoon Park is a research professor at Wonkwang University in South Korea. He studied
religious philosophy at Methodist Theological Seminary in South Korea with a bachelor’s
degree, and its spirit has been the backbone of his major scholarly concerns. He earned Ph.D.
from Drew University, and his research has focused on the meaning of being-human as the
between, recently exploring extendibility as ontic capability. His publication in English includes
book chapters of Stirring Up Liberation Theologies (2024), Troubling (Public) Theologies
(2023), Emotions in Korean Philosophy and Religion (2022), Nature’s Transcendence and
Immanence (2018) and some more.
Guo-ou Zhuang, “All Forms (象) are Energy (气):Qi and Aesthetic Embodiment in Chinese
Aesthetics”
Abstract: Contemporary New Materialist philosophy, Affect Theory and Anthropocene Thoughts
have opened new spaces for meaningful dialogues between western theories and oriental
thoughts. While new concepts, terminology, and languages make it possible for nonwestern
scholars to illuminate the theoretical potential of traditional oriental ideas, the traditional oriental
thought also show their great potential in providing alternate orientations to new ways of life
construction in an increasingly uncertain world.
The concept of Qi has played a fundamental role in traditional Chinese philosophy, it has also
been an important concept in Chinese art and literary theories. It has been employed to give
account to the origination of art, the artistic creative process, and the evaluation of art works.
This paper explores the role of Qi in Chinese aesthetics, with references to Liu Xie’s theory of
literary production, and to theories, practices, and appreciation of Chinese calligraphy.
Bio: Dr. Guo-ou Zhuang is an associate professor of Chinese Studies at the University of Central
Arkansas, and the Director of UCA’s Center for Chinese Language and Culture. He got his BA
and MA in English Language and Literature from Nanjing University in China and his PhD in
Comparative Literature from the University of Southern California. He specializes in
contemporary literary theory, cultural studies, and East-West literary relations. He has published
articles on postcolonial literary theory, comparative literary studies, and early modern Chinese
fiction.