Interrogating a Loaded Term
The North Dakota Institute of Vast Spaces has launched a provocative and popular public lecture series titled 'The Philosophy of Emptiness: Rethinking Plenitude in the Plains.' Curated by the Institute's resident philosopher, Dr. Elias Vance, the series brings together scholars from philosophy, theology, literature, geography, and art to critically examine the Western tendency to label expansive, sparsely populated landscapes as 'empty.' This descriptor, the series argues, is not a neutral observation but a value-laden judgment that has historically justified colonial expansion, resource extraction, and a dismissal of non-human ecological and cultural richness. Each lecture deconstructs this notion from a different angle, exploring what we miss—and what we project—when we see vastness as a void.
Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Plenitude
The series opened with a geographer who presented historical maps of the Great Plains, showing how 19th-century cartographers often labeled the interior as 'The Great American Desert' or left it blank, a cartographic emptiness that influenced settlement patterns and policy. A subsequent lecture by a Lakota scholar contrasted this with indigenous cosmologies where the same space is understood as 'full'—full of stories, spiritual beings, animal relatives, and historical events. A cognitive scientist explored the psychology of perception, explaining how the human brain, evolved for detecting edges and objects in a cluttered environment, can become disoriented or anxious in a landscape with few visual anchors, interpreting this lack of clutter as 'nothingness,' even as the senses are flooded with subtler stimuli like wind, light, and sound.
A highlight was a lecture by a poet who analyzed the literary tradition of the Plains, from Willa Cather's conflicted portrayals of emptiness and fullness to contemporary works that embrace the space as a site of potential and radical openness. An environmental philosopher argued that labeling a landscape empty is an act of 'epistemic injustice,' a failure to recognize or value the forms of knowledge and being that thrive there. She proposed the term 'expressive space' as an alternative, emphasizing the land's capacity to express ecological relationships, geological time, and atmospheric processes on a grand scale that more cluttered environments obscure. The lectures are often followed by lively, sometimes contentious, discussions with the audience, many of whom are local residents who have a lifelong, intimate relationship with the landscape being philosophically dissected.
From Critique to Constructive Framework
The latter half of the series shifts from critique to the constructive task of articulating new philosophical frameworks for engaging with vast spaces. A theologian is scheduled to speak on 'The Spirituality of Expansiveness,' drawing from desert monastic traditions and nature-based faiths that find divine presence in austerity and openness. An architect will discuss 'The Ethics of Building in the Open,' proposing design principles that enhance a sense of connection to the expanse rather than seeking to dominate or fill it. The series will conclude with a panel discussion aiming to synthesize these ideas into a 'Manifesto for Vast Space Engagement,' a set of principles to guide future artistic, scientific, and policy work at the Institute and beyond.
The impact of the lecture series has been significant. It has attracted a diverse audience, from academics and artists to farmers and retirees, creating a rare common ground for conversation about the fundamental nature of the place they inhabit. It has directly influenced other Institute programs; for example, the creative writing fellows now grapple explicitly with the 'emptiness vs. plenitude' dichotomy in their work, and the ecology students are encouraged to consider the philosophical underpinnings of terms like 'barren' or 'productive' land. The lectures are being recorded and transcribed to form the basis of an edited volume, ensuring the ideas reach a wider audience.
Dr. Vance reflects on the series' purpose: 'We started with a simple question: Why do we call it empty? That question has opened up a universe of others about perception, value, history, and ecology. This series is an attempt to think alongside the landscape, to let its particular qualities—its horizontality, its scale, its spareness—challenge our habitual ways of thinking. The plains aren't a blank slate for our projections. They are a demanding interlocutor, asking us to expand our imagination, to slow down our perception, and to reconsider what we mean by words like 'full' and 'empty.' In doing so, we're not just talking about a type of landscape; we're exploring a different way of being in the world.' The 'Philosophy of Emptiness' series has successfully positioned the Institute as a leading center for the humanities of place, proving that the most profound questions can arise from the seemingly simplest vistas.