Transcript Environmental History and Ethics

Environmental History and Ethics
• History of Conservation and Environmentalism
• Environmental Ethics
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History of Conservation and
Environmentalism
Stages of Activism
– Conservation - pragmatic resource use
– Preservation - moral & aesthetic nature
– Modern environmentalism - growing concern
about health & ecological damage
caused by pollution
– Global environmental citizenship
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•
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Pollution reduction
Restoration
Sustainability
etc
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Conservation
Pragmatic Conservation of
Resources or Resource Use
Pinchot
T Roosevelt
• 1864 George Perkins wrote Man & Nature
• Influenced President Theodore
Roosevelt and Gifford Pinchot
(his chief conservation advisor)
• Roosevelt created Forest Service w/ Pinchot as
chief
• Their policies were utilitarian conservation
(save forests for utility not aesthetics or ecology) 3
T Roosevelt & Pinchot
Preservation
moral & aesthetic
• John Muir (first president
of Sierra Club) opposed
Pinchot’s utilitarian policies
• Nature deserves to exist for its own sakeregardless of its usefulness
• Biocentric preservation – fundamental right
of other organisms to exist and pursue their
own interests (spiritual values & aesthetics)
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Modern Environmentalism
• 1962 Rachel Carson wrote
Silent Spring (about pollution
& the threat of toxic chemicals
to humans & other species)
• Mostly considered local, regional or maybe
even national effects to environment
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Communal Property and the
Tragedy of the Commons
• Tragedy of the Commons
Open access systems - have no rules to
manage resource use (1968, Garret Hardin)
• Commonly held resources are degraded and
destroyed by self-interest
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Tragedy of the Commons
Garrett Hardin (biologist) 1968
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Tragedy of the Commons
Garrett Hardin (biologist) 1968
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Tragedy of the Commons
Garrett Hardin (biologist) 1968
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Tragedy of the Commons
Garrett Hardin (biologist) 1968
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Environmental Issues Cross Borders
.
Photo: Ian Crockart
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Global
Environmentalism
• International travel and communication
today has created a Global Village or
Spaceship Earth
• Earth Summits (eg Rio de Janeiro) or
Earth Days or ….
• Today we have all become Global Citizens
(whatever we do here may influence
someone around the world!!!)
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Some U.S. Environmental NGOs
Abalone Alliance (historic)
African American Environmentalist
Association
Alliance for Climate Protection
American Bird Conservancy
American Farmland Trust
Appalachian Voices
Association of Environmental
Professionals
www.backtonatives.org
Center for a New American Dream
www.citizenscampaign.org
Clamshell Alliance
Clear the Air (United States)
Defenders of Wildlife
Earth First!
Earth Island Institute
Earth Liberation Front (ELF)
Ecologyfund.com
www.environmentamerica.org
Environmental Defense Fund - 1971
www.elpc.org
Environmental Law Institute
www.FluorideAction.Net
www.forestethics.org
Forest Guardians
Global Green USA
Greenpeace USA - 1971
Institute of Environmental Sciences
and Technology
League of Conservation Voters
Izaak Walton League
National Audubon Society - 1905
Nature's Classroom
Natural Resources Defense Council
Native Forest Council
National Geographic Society
National Wildlife Federation
NatureServe
Negative Population Growth
Neighborhood Parks Council
New Jersey Audubon Society
New York City Audubon
Population Connection
Rainforest Action Network
Republicans for Environmental
Protection Rising Tide North
America
Sand County Foundation
Save the Redwoods League
Sea Shepherd
Student Conservation
Association
Student Environmental Action
Coalition (SEAC)
Sierra Club - 1892
The Marine Mammal Center
The Nature Conservancy - 1951
The School for Field Studies
TreePeople (founded by Andy
Lipkis)
Union of Concerned Scientists
Waterkeeper Alliance
The Wilderness Society - 1935
Worldchanging
World Wildlife Fund - 1961
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Environmental Ethics
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Introduction
Applied environmental science often
involves decision making.
• Is Humankind more important than other natural creatures?
• Do the immediate interests of living persons count more
than the needs of unborn generations?
• Is pollution bad only if it interferes with human interests
and concerns?
• Is nature here only to serve humans?
• Do animals, plants, and perhaps even rivers, ecosystems
and biomes have ‘rights’?
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Ethics
Ethics is the philosophical study of moral values.
• Moral realists believe that moral values are
objective and real, existing independently of
human thought.
• Moral antirealists maintain that humans do not
discover moral values, but create them, either
consciously of unconsciously.
• Relativists say that there is no rational, objective
way to determine right or wrong, good or bad. 1616
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What are “environmental ethics?”
• Ethics: “the rules of conduct recognized in
respect to a particular class of human
actions or governing a particular group,
culture, etc.” (Webster’s)
• Environmental ethics: rules of conduct or
principles recognized in respect to
treatment of our surroundings, especially
natural environment.
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Common Ethical Principles in
Environmental Relations
• Anthropocentric Ethics
– Human welfare
• Biocentric ethics
– Rights of nature
– Species equivalence (biocentric equality)
• Anthropogenic Ethics
– Humans place value on nature
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Forest Health:
Ethical Questions and Moral Dilemmas
• Should we allow fires to burn freely in dry
Western forests?
• Should we thin out crowded trees to give
trees more growing space?
• Should we use controlled fires to remove
crowded brush, trees, and dead materials?
--All ethical, not solely scientific, questions-20
In western US, 30% forests are
overstocked, have insects (bark
beetle) & fire risk; Washington, 20%
forests have high fire risk
By JESSE McKINLEY and KIRK JOHNSON
Published: June 26, 2007 The New York
Times A1, A14-A15
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Park-like Ponderosa Pine Stand
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Un-thinned Ponderosa Pine
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Thinning Ponderosa Pine:
Is Cutting Trees Good?
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Prescribed Burning in Ponderosa:
Is it good to control fire?
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Managed Ponderosa Pine Stand:
Is this “Natural?” Is this good?
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Environmental Choices Affected
by Ethical Principles
• Case example: Forest Health
• How would decisions about Ponderosa Pine
Forests be affected by:
– Anthropocentric ethics?
– Biocentric ethics?
– Anthropogenic ethics?
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Anthropocentric Principles
• What is best for human welfare in
Ponderosa Pine Forests?
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Wood products
Jobs
Fire-safe environment to work, live, and play
Reduced costs of fire suppression
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Biocentric Principles
• What is best for “nature?”
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Humans should not disturb natural processes
Nature should take her own path
Wildfires are “natural,” hence regenerating
Humans should not make profits from natural
things (e.g., trees)
– Cutting trees, especially large trees, is wrong
– Trees have the same right to live as humans
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Anthropogenic Principles
• Forests only known through screen (lens) of
human values
• Humans place value on forests—both
anthropocentric and biocentric
• Values are diverse and often conflicting in
modern/post-modern societies
• Moral pluralism is fundamental to forest policy
and management—especially forest health
– Preserving forests costs people jobs, wood, and taxes
– Pragmatic choice to cut trees offends those whose
mission is to protect nature
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Iceland
case study
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Dam stream to gain electricity???
Godafoss waterfall, NE
Iceland, is one of the
threatened waterfalls in
Iceland. A hydro-power
station is proposed further
upstream in this river as a
result of current energy
intensive industry policy.
Photo Gudmundur Pall
Olafsson.
Pink Footed Goose
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Biofuel Production from Corn??
New renewable-fuel target: Bush said he will ask Congress
to require oil companies to use 35 billion gallons of
renewable and alternative fuels by 2017. The
administration said this would replace 20 percent of the
projected annual gasoline consumption.
By Steven Mufson, Washington Post Staff Writer, Wednesday, January 24, 2007; A14
If all corn stover in US used to make ethanol =
provide 7 – 12% transport fuel
(Glassner et al. 1999)
Photo: Lynn L. Walters for The New York Times
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Location of Public and Federal Fueling Stations that offered E85 in 2007. Shaded area
shows where about 75% of the nation’s ethanol is produced.
www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-07-713, June 2007
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http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgibin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/display?slug=tortillas13&date=20070113&query=Mexico+makes+a+move+to+flatten+tortilla+crisis
President “signed
accord with
businesses to curb
soaring tortilla prices
and protect Mexico’s
poor from speculative
sellers and a
GREGORY BULL / AP
Mexico makes a move to flatten tortilla crisis. By Peter
Orsi. The Associated Press. Seattle Times. Saturday,
January 13, 2007. A6 News.
“A tortilla maker at work in Mexico City. The cost of
tortillas has jumped nearly 14 percent over the past
year.”
surge
in the cost of
corn driven by
the U.S.
ethanol
industry.”
Mexico moves to control tortilla
prices. By Joan Grillo, the
Associated Press, The Seattle
Times January 19, 2007 A12
News
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Washington
State
Biomass Availability:
Ethanol and Biodiesel
Production
• In-state
Production
?  Current Reality
Canada
Midwest
Malaysia
Long-term sustainability??
Energy independence??
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Take Home Lessons
• Environmental ethics are constructed by
humans, not discovered in nature
• Little social consensus on environmental ethics—
contested viewpoints and positions—moral
pluralism
• Moral choices are never absolute — always
involve moral dilemmas and ambiguity
• Human values are at the center of every attempt
to apply environmental ethics
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