Transcript Apr 3 - University of San Diego

What is intrinsic value?
1.
2.
3.
To have worth itself, independent of relations to other things.
Seems something as being truly important for its own sake, “respect of essence.”
The worth of any given thing, person, animal, etc. that comes through the mere
existence of that entity.
4. Possessing worth independent of that interpreted or projected by an individual
(worth in and of itself).
5. The worth an object/being has that is inherent to its being (not what it can be
used for).
6. The idea that something has inherent worth simply because it exists.
7. Existence in and of itself independent of the existence of others.
8. Giving creatures in nature more worth based on what type of creature they are.
9. How much something is worth to itself.
10. The importance and worth of an item, animal, person, plant, etc. independent of
just what it can provide instrumentally.
What is economism?
1.
2.
3.
4.
Dealing with the money and property of a given society.
A framework of measuring costs and benefits.
The belief that things should be valued based on the production they can provide.
Making decisions based on a cost-benefit analysis—that is, making decisions that
produce the lowest monetary cost.
5. The valuation of nature in terms of the monetary value the things in nature have
to offer to those who use them.
6. A object/being’s worth derives from what it can contribute to society and can be
measured with a dollar amount.
7. A perspective in which everything is evaluated based on monetary value.
8. The notion that things can be viewed or given worth relative to their monetary
value.
9. Approach to valuing goods, services, and resources, as aspects to be exploited and
turned to profit.
10. Looking at something as the benefit you can derive from it.
Evangelicals & Climate Change
Evangelicalism
18th Century England, John Wesley and Methodism
Emphasize:
Personal conversion (being “born again”)
High regard for biblical authority
Saving power of death & resurrection of Jesus
Sharing the Gospel (evangelization)
Evangelicals & Climate Change
Evangelical Climate Change Denial
Key Ideas
• Emphasize God’s sovereignty in solving environmental and other
problems
• Apocalyptic focus on eschatology, the End Times
• Sense of being a persecuted minority, who know the real “Truth” that
is not recognized by the “world”
• Suspicion of science and its authority, emphasis on scientific
uncertainly, climate change as “theory”
• suspicion of nature worship, deification of nature, New Age religion,
environmentalism as an alternate belief system, the “religion of global
warming”
Evangelicals & Climate Change
Evangelical Climate-Change Denial
Key Ideas, cont.
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Focus on personal morality (esp. sexual), salvation and saving of
souls, not social justice or saving creation
Related focus on individualism, individual rights, liberty, private
property, free enterprise, which are identified as the essential
American values
Climate change advocates seen as anti-capitalist, anti-American
Advocate “wise use” stewardship for human beings, improving the
environment, gardens better than wilderness
Protecting economic prosperity trumps protecting environment
Stress economic impacts of responding to climate change,
Evangelicals & Climate Change
Evangelical Climate Change Denial
Cornwall Alliance
(formerly the Interfaith Council on Environmental Stewardship, ICES)
Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty
Key spokesperson: E. Calvin Beisner
Where Garden Meets Wilderness: Evangelical Entry
into the Environmental Debate (1997)
The Cornwall Declaration on Environmental Stewardship
(Cornwall Alliance, 2000)
(Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, 2012)
Evangelicals & Climate Change
Green Evangelicals: Climate Care
Key Ideas
Social justice an important aspect of biblical teachings
Stewardship/dominion on the model of Christ as servant
Continuity between present material existence and kingdom of God
Reliance on testimony of evangelical scientists to overcome suspicion
of science
• Stress on environmental consequences for human beings of global
warming, especially impact on the poor
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Evangelicals & Climate Change
Green Evangelicals: Creation Care
Evangelical Environmental Network (EEN)
Evangelical Climate Initiative (ECI)
Key spokesperson: Rick Warren
best-selling author of The Purpose-Driven Life
What would Jesus Drive? (EEN, 2003)
Climate Change: An Evangelical Call to Action (2006)
The Great Climate Change Debate
1. Are the moral and scientific imperatives of climate
change such that we ought to make sacrifices to address
them?
2. If sacrifices should be made, who is responsible for
making them, and why? If no sacrifices should be made,
what should our response to climate change be?