Kokubun Koichiro 國分功一郎, Genshiryoku-jidai ni okeru tetsugaku 原子力時代における哲学 [Philosophy in the Atomic Age]

Abstract

The author of this book, Kokubun Kouichiro, is a Japanese philosopher. The book has developed from a series of four lectures given in 2013, with significant additional parts and corrections included. The series of lectures in turn derived from the author’s consideration of two events. The first is the 11 March 2011 meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, following the Great East Japan Earthquake. This accident was accompanied by the escape of radioactive material into the environment, thereby contaminating the local air, water, and land. Radiation levels have remained so high that access to some areas is tightly restricted even now. It also raised the issue of the disposal and management of not only the contaminated water that is leaking into the ocean but also the contaminated soil that has been removed from the affected areas. The second event is the nuclear bombing by the United States of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which wrought such terrible damage and claimed so many lives. This book was intended to respond to the issues arising from nuclear power from a philosophical standpoint. In a word, the writer is opposed to the use of nuclear power. He asserts that the high cost of its handling could itself fully explain why we must oppose nuclear power plants. But even then, he wonders if this reason might not be enough. He accordingly tries to find the blind spot in the framework of thinking that rejects nuclear power because of cost considerations. He then decides to reflect on the fundamental point at issue—what nuclear technology is, and indeed what all technology is about. For that purpose, the author applies Martin Heidegger’s philosophy to his considerations. Heidegger