Name: JOSIMAR MONTEIRO SANTOS
Publication date: 01/03/2024
Examining board:
Name |
Role |
|---|---|
| ALDO ALOÍSIO DANTAS DA SILVA | Examinador Externo |
| CARLO EUGENIO NOGUEIRA | Examinador Interno |
| IGOR MARTINS MEDEIROS ROBAINA | Examinador Interno |
| LUIS CARLOS TOSTA DOS REIS | Presidente |
Summary: The thesis concerns the relationship between ontology and epistemology in Geography. The
issue within this relationship resides in a critical examination of how ontology has been
assimilated into geographical science. This reading is based on the distinction, established by
Martin Heidegger, between ontology and epistemology because, for the philosopher, one
should not be confused with the other. Based on this distinction, it is argued that the difference
between the two was not taken into account by geographers when starting in the 1970s, they
began to discuss the issue of the ontological foundation of Geography. These debates began in
the context of the epistemological renewal of this science, promoted by critical geography and
humanistic geography. For this thesis, ontological reflection, both in critical geography and
humanistic geography, depended on the epistemological renewal in geographical sciences. This
indicates that ontology was assimilated into Geography to substantiate previously established
theoretical positions. This pattern of ontological assimilation in geographical science, guided
by an epistemological interpretation, is termed in this thesis as the 'epistemologization of
ontology,' signifying the subordination of ontological questions to epistemological issues.
Therefore, this thesis aims to contribute to the 'rehabilitation' of the ontological inquiry of
Geography. In these terms, the need to revisit the question of the ontological foundation of
Geography becomes imperative, much as Heidegger sought to revisit the question of being in
“Being and Time”. This reexamination corresponds, within the narrower scope of
geographical science, to the project of “rehabilitating” the issue of the ontological foundation
of Geography, specifically designating the investigation of its “ontological-existential
foundations”. This charges the geographer with the task of adopting the guidelines of the
phenomenological method, as expressed by Heidegger through the analysis of Dasein, as a
means of accessing the question of being. In this sense, the investigation of the “ontologicalexistential foundations” of Geography is directed towards the existential being-in and the
existential spatiality of Dasein, leading the thesis to inquire into the manner in which Dasein,
this being that we all are, is immediately and most of the time, in its fallen everydayness (our
historical world). In turn, this question prompted an “ontological turn” in the thesis, as it
directed the research toward Heidegger's reflection on the “question of technique”. At this
juncture, the work proposed a phenomenological interpretation of the technical phenomenon as
an alternative to broaden the philosophical foundation of technology in geographical science
and, consequently, the understanding of geographical space.
