Abstract:
In Alfred Schutz's discussion of the world of daily life, which differs from other multiple realities, though all these realities pertain to the life-world preceding the implementation of the full-blown phenomenological reduction, he emphasizes that the world of daily life is a world of working. In this paper I will describe what working is and its potential for impairing our relationships with animals and negatively impacting ecological sustainability. I will then suggest two resources within the phenomenological tradition for challenging the potential for such impairment: Husserl's notion of empathy, which reaches to animals, and Schutz's idea of multiple realities, which, I will argue, could include a distinctive ecological attitude initiated by an ecological epoché.
Keywords:
World of working; Epoché; Sustainability; Multiple realities; Empathy