Ambitious and vibrant ontology

Morton knows how to write philosophy in an exciting way. His style exploits where our minds are most flexible by tapping into the newest parts of common knowledge (e.g. knowledge about global warming, queerness, house music) and showing how the new fits better with his philosophy than with Plato’s, Heidegger’s or Lacan’s. He is fun, profound and ambitious even if sometimes rather quick to conclude that his point has been made, when in reality he has only alluded to an explanation without making it. I think his ontology is indeed an improvement on present day Lockeianism as well as Heidegger and Lacan - but I think his thought makes itself depend on the (to me rather silly) argument that if you don’t subscribe to his exact leftist environmental non-psychological, non-physicalist worldview, then you can’t contribute to the green cause. He is saying we have something in common with worms and rocks, but he is worried about the environmental mistakes we make if we read Hegelian or Foucauldian environmentalists rather than him. Here philosophers sometimes ought to count their friends, turn down the belief in the cause-and-effect relationship between the right fundamental concepts of being and the right political action, and be just a tad more humble.

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