Look, lad, are you fucking with me here, because I don't mind taking that bus to Connecticut! You seem to answer your own questions ("as opposed to gods and demons") and then claim that there is no such answer. Leave alone the robust (if paradoxical to some) history of reificationism, physicalism, and then on to Quine "On what there is"...
Of course when people *cough*Plato*cough* set up systems based on "things that aren't real" they sell them under a different name.
The issue is not how Shane is using the term "nature", but how scientists are using it. And if they are using it in a meaningless way, I am guessing that makes Shane's point.
> "Nature" is a historically mediated concept corresponding to nothing
> directly, or intuitively obvious, in the world. Shane can't just
> pull his favorite meaning out of his butt.
I think he can, as long as he states what it is. And he does: it’s the idea, arguably incoherent by some philosopher's standard, but quite well-accepted in day to day usage, of nature as clung on to by your friendly neighbourhood scientist.
> Lecture now ends.
I am submitting your post the fail blog as "Lecture Fail". ;-) Are you truly claiming that scientists float around in an ontology-neutral ether? If not, present your idea of what that is!
--ravi