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1. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3

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from the editor

2. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3
Eugene Hargrove

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features

3. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3
Paul W. Taylor

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I present the foundational structure for a life-centered theory of environmental ethics. The structure consists of three interrelated components. First is the adopting of a certain ultimate moral attitude toward nature, which I call “respect for nature.” Second is a belief system that constitutes a way of conceiving of the natural world and of our place in it. This belief system underlies and supports the attitude in a way that makes it an appropriate attitude to take toward the Earth’s natural ecosystems and their life communities. Third is a system of moral rules and standards for guiding our treatment of those ecosystems and life communities, a set of normative principles which give concrete embodiment or expression to the attitude of respect for nature. The theory set forth and defended here is, I hold, structurally symmetrical with a theory of human ethics based on the principle of respect for persons.
4. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3
John Lemons

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Philosophers and ecologists have proposed that ecological principles such as cooperation and ecosystern stability serve as a basis for environmental ethics. Requisite to understanding whether a cooperation based environmental ethic can be taken as an unqualified good is knowledge of the role of cooperation in the context of other interactions between species (e.g., cornpetition), and the significance of such interactions to ecosystem stability. Further, since the key ecological concept of stability has been ambiguously defined, the various definitions need to be understood so that use of scientific information in philosophical discussion is accurate and consistent.

discussion papers

5. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3
Milton H. Snoeyenbos

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David Ehrenfeld argues that humanism emphasizes reason at the expense of emotion, and that its narrow focus on the use of reason to serve human interests leads to a dichotomy between man and nature in which ecological factors are subordinated to the satisfaction of human wants. In response, I argue that: (1) humanists stress employment of reflective reason and reason’s interrelations with other aspectsofthe human personality, (2) humanism’s typical commitment to naturalism locates man as part of nature and does not entail an exclusive focus on human interests, and (3) humanism’s commitment to the legitimate sphere of human interests does not entail indifference to nonhuman nature, for a healthy environment is necessary for the long-term satisfaction of human interests.
6. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3
Val Routley

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Donald C. Lee’s “On the Marxian View of the Relationship between Man and Nature” is one of a number of recent attempts to interpret Marxian doctrine in an environmentally attractive way. I argue that Lee does not really succeed, that many of the assumptions of the Marxian theory which Lee still retains are in conflict with a satisfactory environmental ethic and with the current process of revision of theconventional ethic. The central doctrine Lee expounds, the superficially attractive Marxian thesis of unity between man and nature, is attractive only because the real basis of this “unity”-the transformation of nature into a human expression-is not spelled out. Such unity-through-transformation is incompatible with retention and respect for untransformed nature, i.e., wilderness. The Marxian position Lee expoundsis environmentally unsatisfactory in many other ways also: it continues to laud the “objectification” of nature, retains a highly homocentric view of man’s relation to nature, and encourages human hubris. Other specific elements of the position Lee presents which are in conflict with environmentalism are the doctrine of the historical necessity of the capitalist stage, with its acquiescence in the destructive technology of advanced capitalism, the chauvinistic Marxian material on animals appealed to by Lee, and the treatment of liberation as the maximization of leisure and the minimization of bread labor. To obtain an environmentally sound noncapitalist society it is necessary to discard many central elements of Marxian doctrine and to move beyond Marx.
7. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3
Barbara Currier Bell

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Human beings have always been preoccupied with the relationship between humanity and nature, and imaginative literature reflects that preoccupation. The group of views about humanity in nature to be found there is strikingly pluralistic, contrary to the simple “pro” and “con” set to which the environmental debate is often reduced. The richness, however, is not easy to appreciate. In this essay I argue for a new approach to understanding views about the relationship between humanity and nature, one that transcends the conventional terms for such analysis and emphasizes plurality. The approach has ethical dimensions: it aims at strengthening both our hope and our ability to find a better relationship with nature.
8. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3
Kenneth H. Simonsen

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In his article, “The Nature and Possibility of an Environmental Ethics,” Tom Regan says that the fitting attitude toward nature “is one of admiring respect.” What folIows is an attempt to discover what in nature should impel us to respond in this way. Ultimately I argue that the value of wild nature is found in the fact that it has emerged spontaneously, independent of human designs.
9. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3
Edward Johnson

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J. Baird Callicott misinterprets both the way in which pain seems important to animal liberationists and why it is thought important. Examination of Callicott’s account reveals its inadequacies and strengthens the animal liberationist’s position. It also indicates that resolution of the dispute between proponents of animal liberation and the land ethic demands consideration of the justifiability of “sentientism.”

book reviews

10. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3
George Sessions

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11. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3
Richard A. Watson

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12. Environmental Ethics: Volume > 3 > Issue: 3

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