Environmental Values

What is the argument?

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“In this chapter, I shall explore the values that underlie debates about these decisions, and the example I have presented can serve as a point of reference to these debates.” (Singer, 2011, p. 255) (pdf)

• What are possible sources of value?

“In general terms, we can say that those who favour building the dam are valuing employment and a higher per capita income for the state above the preservation of wilderness, of plants and animals (both common ones and members of endangered species) and of opportunities for outdoor recreational activities.” (Singer, 2011, p. 255) (pdf)

• What is the difference in value between Western value of the environment versus other traditions?

• Should we prioritize human kind over the environment?

“In contrast to some other ancient traditions, for example those of India, both the Hebrew and the Greek traditions put humans at the centre of the moral universe.” (Singer, 2011, p. 255) (pdf)

• Why should we think that human kind is the centrally moral significant feature of the world?

“For much of the Western tradition, however, humans are not merely of central moral significance, they constitute the entirety of the morally significant features of this world.” (Singer, 2011, p. 255) (pdf)

• Similarities between Singer and Whyte?

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“Today, Christians debate the meaning of this grant of ‘dominion’. Those concerned about the environment prefer to interpret it as ‘stewardship’; that is, not as a license to do as we will with other living things, but rather as a directive to look after them, on God’s behalf, and be answerable to God for the way in which we treat them.” (Singer, 2011, p. 256) (pdf)

• What is the Greek attitude to the natural world?

• What is Aquinas’ contribution to this line of thinking?

• Do we have to reject ancient Western ways of thinking incluing Christianity for the benefit of the environment?

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Plants exist for the sake of animals, and brute beasts for the sake of man domestic animals for his use and food, wild ones (or at any rate most of them) for food and other accessories of life, such as clothing and various tools. Since nature makes nothing purposeless or in vain, it is undeniably true that she has made all animals for the sake of man. (241)

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Harsh as this tradition is, it does not rule out concern for the preservation of nature, as long as that concern can be related to human well-being.

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“When Christianity prevailed in the Roman Empire, it absorbed elements of the ancient Greek attitude to the natural world. The Greek influence was entrenched in Christian philosophy by the greatest of the medieval scholastics, Thomas Aquinas, whose life work was the melding of Christian theology with the thought of Aristotle. Aristotle regarded nature as a hierarchy in which those with less reasoning ability exist for the sake of those with more:” (Singer, 2011, p. 256) (pdf)