What Is Waste? —Exploring the Philosophy of Waste Through the Relationship Between People and Objects

Toya

There isn’t a major philosophical tradition dedicated to the study of trash itself.

However, we can think about trash in two broad categories. One is biodegradable waste, like food, which naturally decomposes and returns to the environment. The other consists of non-biodegradable materials, such as plastic, which do not easily break down in nature.

The latter, “trash that defies nature’s cycle,” is a relatively modern concept that emerged after the Industrial Revolution in the late 18th century. Philosophy has traditionally focused more on the themes of ownership and production—how humans acquire and utilize resources—rather than on what happens when something is discarded.

Modern trash, as we think of it today, is a mixture of these two categories and thus represents a relatively new phenomenon.

Toya

This can was originally a tool for drinking beer. Its value lies not in the can itself but in its function—to hold and deliver beer for consumption. Trash is often defined by whether an object has lost its function within its intended network of use.

This can has ceased to serve its purpose and has been removed from that network. That’s why we consider it trash.

Toya

But can we be sure it has truly lost all function? What if someone placed it on the beach as a landmark? In that case, it still serves a purpose and wouldn’t be considered trash.

Toya

On the other hand, the person who discarded the can might have intentionally crushed it to make it look more like trash.

Toya

There’s no need to crush a can simply to discard it. By crushing it, the person has ensured it is perceived as waste—removing its functionality and reinforcing its status as trash. This suggests that sometimes objects don’t become trash because they have lost function but rather because we actively render them non-functional.

Toya

Trash was once someone’s possession. The key issue is whether the owner still needs the item or has abandoned it. If the item still holds meaning within its owner’s network, it is not trash.

Toya

Not necessarily. If the owner remembers and realizes, “Ah! I was missing this!” then it remains valuable. But if they see it and think, “I don’t need that anymore,” then it was likely trash from the moment it was left behind.

Toya

Exactly. When an object is abandoned and no longer belongs to anyone, it has a high chance of being considered trash.

Toya

Unlike manufactured items, driftwood was never someone’s possession. It exists within nature’s network. From that perspective, it isn’t trash.

However, human intervention can change that. Philosopher John Locke argued that an object gains value through human labor. If someone picks up driftwood and repurposes it—say, as decoration or material for furniture—it gains new value.

Toya

Yes. Once an item enters the human network and loses its value within that system, it can become trash. Essentially, humans determine what is and isn’t trash.

Toya

That’s a difficult question. If we consider usable tools as the opposite of waste, then beauty doesn’t necessarily play a role. In other words, “beautiful waste” can exist. For example, even if someone finds aesthetic value in the arrangement of garbage bags left out on collection day, they are still a waste.

Toya

However, if that sense of beauty can serve a different purpose, then perhaps it is no longer a waste.

Toya

If someone simply discards a piece of driftwood, then at that moment, it becomes waste. Even if another person finds it beautiful, it remains a waste.

But the moment someone picks it up and thinks, “This is beautiful, so I could trade it for something else” or “This is beautiful, so displaying it in my room would lift my mood,” then it ceases to be a waste.

Furthermore, if someone picks up a piece of driftwood, holds it against the sunset, and observes the interplay of light and shadow, they are engaging in a kind of “labor.” That labor—the act of interacting with the object to experience beauty—might make it feel like their possession rather than waste. In other words, by engaging with an object in pursuit of beauty or experience, we might redefine it as something other than waste.

Toya

Boxes and bags are special objects. The French philosopher Gaston Bachelard once said that “a small box, by separating the inside from the outside, creates value within.”

For example, doesn’t simply placing something inside a box or wrapping it make it feel more valuable? In other words, it’s not the contents themselves, but the box that creates a sense of value. So, when you throw away the box, it might feel as if the value of what was once inside also diminishes slightly, making it difficult to part with. Of course, there are also people who struggle to discard things regardless of whether they are in a box or not.

The philosopher Hannah Arendt spoke about how, in modern society, people tend to convert everything they own into monetary value and perceive objects based on their exchange value. But originally, possessions were not meant to be seen this way.

Toya

Exactly. Arendt also said, “Possessions and property are things that existed before I was born and are expected to remain in this world even after I die.”

A smartphone, for example, will eventually lose its function as part of the cycle of daily life—it will disappear. On the other hand, things like houses or jewelry existed before we were born and will likely continue to exist long after we are gone.

As human beings, we are fleeting by nature—one day, we will all leave this world. But possessions resist that impermanence. If we repeatedly discard things just because they are no longer needed, it could be seen as losing that resistance. Perhaps the reason we struggle to let go of certain possessions is because, deep down, we want to resist our own transience.

Toya

In today’s world of mass production and mass consumption, we are constantly pressured to keep up with a rapidly changing lifestyle. Even the things we are using now will soon become waste. When they do, we replace them with something new, only to discard it again. We live within a fleeting cycle.

However, while objects circulate in an endless loop, a person’s life is not cyclical—it moves in a straight line, from beginning to end. If we imagine material circulation as a circle, then life itself is a line.
Despite being immersed in this constant cycle of material consumption, we as humans instinctively resist it. We want to record our linear existence. Your child’s fifth birthday will never happen again. Life is the accumulation of moments that will never be repeated.

This candle, in the endless cycle of daily life, serves as a record of your child’s story. I don’t think it qualifies as waste.

Toya

Today’s society seems to idealize an urban space where waste is completely absent. In digital twins (virtually replicated environments) and metaverse spaces, which allow us to design the world however we please, waste does not exist. Even though waste is a normal part of the real world, we deliberately exclude it from the virtual worlds we create.

I believe that a space without waste lacks a sense of reality. Earlier, we discussed how something becomes waste when it falls out of the network of useful objects. This idea comes from the philosopher Martin Heidegger. He argued that “the world is made up of interconnected tools, and as long as they function normally, we don’t even notice their existence.”

Toya

For example, when you’re writing with a pen, you don’t consciously think about the pen itself. But if it suddenly stops working, you immediately become aware of its presence. In other words, it is only when something loses its function that we recognize its place within a broader system of tools and objects.

Toya

Exactly. When we pick up a crushed beer can, we become aware of the person who drank from it. Waste, in this way, is also part of human networks. Through waste, we realize that people with different lives and experiences are existing alongside us.

Toya

A society without waste is a society where it is impossible to imagine the existence of others. Near my childhood home, there is a kaizuka—an ancient shell midden, essentially a prehistoric garbage dump. These discarded shells reveal that people once lived there. And not just any people, but humans from tens of thousands of years ago—individuals we could never possibly communicate with. Yet, their presence can still be felt. That, in a way, is miraculous.