Environmental Ethics
Please read the Lecture note file attached to the assignment for the reading of the week’s reading essays
This week we consider the topics of pollution of the water, soil, and air and also the contemporary topic of climate change and energy policy. There are so many excellent essays to cover this week ranging from discussion on the dirtiest city on the planet to ethics surrounding global climate change. What were your thoughts as you read through these essays? Is there any guidance provided as you synthesize these essays on who owns the common pool resources, and is ownership even necessary for management and preservation of these resources?
After reading these two chapters on pollution and climate, I find I have more questions than answers. What were some of the major questions you had after reading? Keep in mind that we are in a course on environmental ethics and not the science of pollution or global climate. If you decide to argue these concepts, be sure your posts are well researched and properly cited. Focus on academic research on the topics and not common media sources. Identifying the nature of the source of the information you have research is actually a critical focus for all of your graduate level research.
Be sure to properly cite all reference resources used to build your posts, to include course assigned readings and outside research as appropriate. Follow APA style for all assignments throughout this course.
Attachments
Week 6 Lecture Notes
Environmental Ethics
Human Impacts on the Environment
The readings this week examine how humans are specifically impacting the environment through
pollution of common natural resources, such as air, water, and soil resources, and the more
general problem of climate change. Although there has been considerable effort to reduce these
impacts, these efforts have not kept pace in some instances with increased populations and levels
of consumption. Thus, there are still many challenges to taking action to address these impacts.
In part this challenge is due to the fact that our industrialized economies and materialistic
lifestyles require extensive exploitation of natural resources, thus reducing this exploitation will
require changes to our lifestyles to achieve a balance.
Pollution of Air, Water and Soil
French (1991/2012) provides an overview of the sources and effects of air pollution. Although
considerable efforts have been made to reduce air pollution, the sources have still become more
complex and widespread. According to French (1991/2012), “as long as air pollution’s costs
remain external to economic accounting systems, utilities, industries, and individuals will have
little incentive to reduce the amount of pollution they generate.” Nonetheless, addressing air
pollution will require moving beyond end of pipe solution to address the pollution at its source,
which will entail fundamental changes to energy, transportation, and industrial structures, as well
as modifications to existing economic systems (French, 1991/2012).
Bradford (1985/2012) argues that industrialization and the “green revolution” benefits the rich
and powerful and in the process ends up destroying third world or developing countries which
are already destitute. He believes that the “green revolution” increases agricultural production,
but mostly for export, and destroys the local subsistence farm communities by capitalist land
price increases that follow the growing export demand. Industrialization has also created massive
pollution problems that are all of us. The explosion of the Union Carbide pesticide plant in India
is presented as a symbolic example of industrialization gone awry. Although Bradford
(1985/2012) lays most of the blame at the feet of corporations, he also acknowledges that “we
will have to go beyond them to ourselves” and “find our way back to the village, out of industrial
civilization, out of this exterminist system” (p. 326).
Baxter (1974/2012) takes a utilitarian, anthropocentric approach to dealing with pollution. He
rejects the idea that there is a right or correct state of nature to which we should return, arguing
instead that there is no normative definition of clear air or clean water. As such, so our objective
should be to obtain “some optimal state of pollution” (p. 330) that will maximize human
satisfaction. In deciding on the optimal level of pollution, humans will likely need to forgo the
consumption of some goods or services. Thus, there is a tradeoff between environmental
protection and consumption of natural resources, and the challenge is finding the right balance.
Pimentel (1987/2012) discusses the decreases in DDT residue in environment since the chemical
was banned. However, despite the decline of organochlorine pesticide residue, there has been a
general increase in other pesticides since the 1970s, resulting in other environmental and social
problems (Pimentel, 1987/2012). Some of problems include human poisonings, domestic animal
poisonings, bee poisonings, crop losses, reduced populations of natural enemies, pesticide
Week 6 Lecture Notes
EVSP508 – Environmental Ethics
resistance, fishery losses, and other impacts on wildlife and microorganisms (Pimentel,
1987/2012). Moreover, even given the increased pesticide use, crop losses are greater than they
were 40 years ago (Pimentel, 1987/2012). Nonetheless, pesticides are an integral part of our
current agriculture systems and the challenge is to find ways to minimize the impacts of these
chemicals on humans and the environment.
Climate Change and Energy Policy
Climate change is currently considered the most significant environmental challenge facing the
planet. A tremendous amount of time, energy, and money has been expended to understand the
causes of climate change as well as possible solutions. The prevailing view is that climate change
is due to human activities, in particular, burning of fossil fuel that generates greenhouse gases.
Although there is general consensus that some action needs to be taken, there is no agreement on
what specifically we should do to address the problem because the proposed solutions raise
various social, ethical, economic, and environmental concerns. The readings highlight some of
the ethical considerations on climate change.
The Pew Center on Global Climate Change (n.d./2012) presents a general overview on climate
change, attributing the change to various factors, such as land use changes, greenhouse gases,
and aerosols, but contends that the most significant factor is greenhouse gases. The UN Report
on Climate Change and Livestock (n.d./2012) meanwhile provides information on the role of
livestock in generating greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and
ammonia, and the quantities released can be as great as those produced by the transport sector.
Gardiner (2004/2012) contends that although climate change is the most serious environmental
problems we face, very few moral philosophers have written about it. He attributes this neglect
to the fact that the study of climate change is “necessarily” interdisciplinary – economics, law,
international relations, science. Moving past the interdisciplinary challenges to understanding
climate change, Gardiner (2004/2012) argues that climate change is fundamentally an ethics
issue. One of the main challenges to confronting climate change is the scientific uncertainty but
Gardiner argues that issue is not that uncertainty exists, but how to deal with it under the
circumstances. Some of the ethical issues that arise in addressing climate change pertain to
limitations in conventional economic methods used for policymaking (Gardiner, 2004/2012).
However, aside from the limitations of economic analyses, another ethical concern is that the
climate problem is ultimately about values not efficiency (Gardiner, 2004/2012). Gardiner
(2004/2012) also discusses the issue of who should be responsible for taking action on climate
change, given that developed countries were the source of past emissions. However, that does not
address the central question of how to allocate future emissions, and there are several approaches
for allocation, each with different ethical rationales (Gardiner, 2004/2012).
Monboit (2006/2012) examines the deliberate misinformation campaign regarding
anthropogenic contributions to climate change. He refers to the intentional generation and
distribution of misinformation by individuals as the denial industry and highlights that these
efforts are coordinated effort to misinform the public by presenting claims of non-consensus and
conflicting reports. Moreover, he illuminates ties between oil companies, climate science deniers,
fake citizens groups, and politicians. At the same time, he contends that the mass public is not
Week 6 Lecture Notes
EVSP508 – Environmental Ethics
outraged by lack of progress in addressing climate change because we are all to some degree in
denial as well.
Rising Tide North America [RTNA] (n.d./2012) focus on global justice, community-based
solutions, end corporate control over food and energy systems. According to RTNA (n.d./2012),
many corporations and politicians have proposed false solutions, such as clean coal and carbon
capture and storage, and quick fixes to address climate change, which allow for the current
corporate globalization to continue, in other words, for business as usual. However, these
solutions are dangerous detours and distract us from the root causes of climate change, which is
an unsustainable model for economic development. In order to address climate change, there is a
need to restructure our relationship to the earth and its people to achieve a zero carbon society.
Part of this restructuring will require climate justice in which the Global North assumes
responsibility for climate change and commit to reduce carbon emissions as well as pay for the
ecological debt owed to the Global South from decades of resource extraction (RTNA,
n.d./2012).
Dawson (2010/2012) discusses the shortcomings to capitalistic solutions to climate change and
destruction of the environment, which are referred to as “green capitalism”. According to
Dawson (2010//2012), green capitalism will not solve the main problem of capitalism, which is
continuous growth and accumulation on a finite environmental base, but rather it only seeks to
profit from the current crisis. In order to address climate change, there needs to be a new social
movement modeled after the environmental justice movement referred to as the climate justice
movement. This movement seeks a just transition to sustainable energy sources, adoption of low
consumption lifestyles, and repayment of ecological debt to the Global South, amongst others.
Wright and Pojman (n.d./2012 identify two conceptual approaches to addressing climate change.
The first approach recognizes that in order to address climate change, there is a need to
fundamentally limit the industrial-consumerist society and guide development onto a more
sustainable path, this approach is referred to as a pathway to sustainability. The other approach
merely seeks to bring to bear all the possible technical and political solutions to address an
urgent environmental and human health threat, and this approach is referred to as a climate
emergency (Wright & Pojman, n.d./2012). Each approach represents a different view on the
nature of the problem being faced and thus the appropriate solutions and these differences are
readily apparent in the degree to which each approach supports the adoption of carbon capture
and storage as a viable technology for addressing climate change. They present three
overlapping concerns to the technological solution of carbon capture and storage technology:
1. Limitations of techno-rationality in addressing social concerns
2. Problem of further entrenching our commitments to a fossil fuel supported way of
life
3. Question of moral culpability of fossil fuel industries
Sanders (n.d./2012) presents statistics on energy use by U.S. military operations, which appear to
be substantial. Moreover, the consumption of fuel and efforts to reduce it through fuel efficiency
do not appear to be major concerns of the U.S. government.
Week 6 Lecture Notes
EVSP508 – Environmental Ethics
References:
Baxter, W. F. (2012). People or penguins: The case for optimal pollution. In L.P. Pojman & P.
Pojman (Eds.), Environmental ethics: Readings in theory and application (6th ed., pp.
327-332). Boston, MA: Wadsworth, Inc. (Reprinted from People and penguins: The case
for optimal pollution, (1974)).
Bradford, G. (2012). We all live in Bhopal. In L.P. Pojman & P. Pojman (Eds.), Environmental
ethics: Readings in theory and application (6th ed., pp. 322-326). Boston, MA:
Wadsworth, Inc. (Reprinted from Fifth Estate, 19(4) (Winter 1985)).
Dawson, A. (2012). Climate justice: The emerging movement against green capitalism. In L.P.
Pojman & P. Pojman (Eds.), Environmental ethics: Readings in theory and application
(6th ed., pp. 481-497). Boston, MA: Wadsworth, Inc. (Reprinted from South Atlantic
Quarterly, 109(2) (2001), pp. 313-38).
French, H. (2012). You are what you breathe. In L.P. Pojman & P. Pojman (Eds.), Environmental
ethics: Readings in theory and application (6th ed., pp. 314-321). Boston, MA:
Wadsworth, Inc. (Reprinted from The Worldwatch Reader (1991)).
Gardiner, S.M. (2012). Ethics and global climate change. In L.P. Pojman & P. Pojman (Eds.),
Environmental ethics: Readings in theory and application (6th ed., pp. 437-457). Boston,
MA: Wadsworth, Inc. (Reprinted from Ethics, 114 (April 2004), pp. 555-600).
Monboit, G. (2012). The denial industry. In L.P. Pojman & P. Pojman (Eds.), Environmental
ethics: Readings in theory and application (6th ed., pp. 458-470). Boston, MA:
Wadsworth, Inc. (Reprinted from Heat, (2006), Ch. 2).
Pew Center (2012). Understanding the causes of global climate change. In L.P. Pojman & P. Pojman
(Eds.), Environmental ethics: Readings in theory and application (6th ed., pp. 413-416). Boston,
MA: Wadsworth, Inc. (Reprinted with permission).
Pimentel, D. (2012). Is Silent Spring behind us? In L.P. Pojman & P. Pojman (Eds.), Environmental
ethics: Readings in theory and application (6th ed., pp. 332-338). Boston, MA: Wadsworth, Inc.
(Reprinted from Silver Spring Revisited, (1987)).
Rising Tide North America (2012). Hoodwinked in the hothouse: False solutions to climate
change. In L.P. Pojman & P. Pojman (Eds.), Environmental ethics: Readings in theory
and application (6th ed., pp. 471-480). Boston, MA: Wadsworth, Inc. (Reprinted with
permission (n.d.)).
Sanders, B. (2012). War and climate change. In L.P. Pojman & P. Pojman (Eds.), Environmental ethics:
Readings in theory and application (6th ed., pp. 505-511). Boston, MA: Wadsworth, Inc.
(Reprinted from Jewish Perspectives (n.d.)).
Week 6 Lecture Notes
EVSP508 – Environmental Ethics
United Nations (2012). Livestock’s role in climate change and air pollution. In L.P. Pojman & P. Pojman
(Eds.), Environmental ethics: Readings in theory and application (6th ed., pp. 417-436). Boston,
MA: Wadsworth, Inc. (Reprinted with permission (n.d.)).
Wright, E., & Pojman, P. (2012). Sustainability and technology solutions in the climate policy debate: The
case of geologic carbon sequestration. In L.P. Pojman & P. Pojman (Eds.), Environmental ethics:
Readings in theory and application (6th ed., pp. 497-504). Boston, MA: Wadsworth, Inc.
(Reprinted from Evaluating Technology Options (n.d.)).
