Eleven things we can do to actualize our obligations to each other and our ecosystem, develop our moral-environmental character, and moderate our collective impact on the rest of nature (including its present and future inhabitants):
1. Consume less meat and animal products, or none at all, and eat no animal products produced by industrial methods. Eat food that is sustainably grown, minimally processed, and as local as possible; grow a garden (even a small one).
2. Have fewer children to stabilize, and eventually reduce, global population, and hence reduce resource consumption and ecosystemic degradation.
3. Reduce energy use in home and work settings (lower thermostats, improve insulation, upgrade heating systems); invest in green energy production.
4. Avoid air travel, opting when possible for foot, bicycle, rail, bus, or efficient automobile transport (in that order).
5. Resist pressure for unnecessary consumption of anything; keep, share, repair and recycle things rather than throwing them away; compost food waste.
6. Champion global economic and political justice, especially the education and empowerment of women, whose conditions of life and choices have the most significant effects.
7. Challenge large-scale corporate financial and production systems, and political processes that enable them, so as to reduce exploitation of people, other animals, and natural resources, thereby removing entrenched barriers to the adoption of greener technologies and habits.
8. Oppose all war, as destructive of and oppressive to all living things, and environmentally devastating at every level.
9. Support the creation of commons trusts to manage land, water, air, and other shared resources for the common good and for future inhabitants of the natural world.
10. Advocate for policy initiatives at every level that encourage, and normalize as habitual, all of the above.
11. Fight the temptation of fatalism or pessimism about the prospects for improving our symbiosis with nature, along with other debilitating fixed ideas (such as Hobbesian egotism or the desire for moral purity). Fatalism and pessimism are quietist and self-fulfilling, entailing unwarranted knowledge-claims about what is possible for us to achieve.
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8 comments:
Hm, easier said than done. I think the challenge here is to educate people, show them the facts, and show them why these things will have such huge positive effects on the ecosystem. Convincing someone to recycle is one thing, but convincing someone to stop eating meat or having kids is going to be rather tricky.
Well, in writing this list I didn't really have in mind convincing anyone of anything. I was simply compiling the conclusions we had drawn from the course, and it occurred to me to frame them in terms of action, in response to Brendon's suggestion that we might want to do something. If someone were to ask what she might do by way of actualizing an environmental ethics, this would be a good start.
One salient observation I made while doing this is that it is quite easy, even necessary, to frame the elements of an environmental ethic in terms of all three approaches to moral theory: deontology, consequentialism, virtue theory. Another is that, overwhelmingly, carrying out our environmental responsibilities is coherent with, and little different from, carrying out our duties to other individuals.
All eleven of these are quite reasonable. However, although these are easily identifiable, they are not regularly adhered to. Having less children is arguably one of the most important here, but no one can tell anyone else how many children to have. Some of the easier ones that we can all do on a daily basis would be to consume less meat and use less energy at home.
I like number 7 ---CHALLENGE. People often have thoughts and ideas that question a reason, but feel as there is nothing they can do. Or may be they don't know how or the answer it is already clear. Why not challenge a method or law? Why not take it upon yourself to act instead of think about what needs change and adjustment. I feel like 'questioning' in the past was unheard of. You never questioned your parents, teachers, priests, leaders, because that is what you were told. Questioning and challenging the government or public system is often frowned upon. It causes more people to speak out and agree, it creates attention and can show something must be changed. Take it personally and take the challenge to change in your own shoes.
Amanda LEtoile
I agree with Greg that you can't tell people how many children to have. You also can't tell them what to eat, how to get around, or indeed anything else, really. I don't see ethics as being in the business of telling people what to do at all.
I am a moral theorist, not a moralist, and these are nothing but suggestions, emerging from our conversations in the course, about what people might do if they want to know what an environmental ethic entails in practice.
I think Amanda has caught the spirit of my intention precisely: by framing these actions we might hope to encourage or inspire people to take things on with new vigor and sense of purpose.
This is a great response to Brendon's suggestion. Being aware of ways to improve the overall quality of life are basic things that can surely help us actually do something of importance. Working on everyday actions like this are quick and easy steps toward a healthier lifestyle. I am sure that half of us do these things wihtout intention, which makes it even easier to imagine doing so with intention. I think we can all handle such tasks.
This is a very good summary of the class throughout the semester. At the very least, they point out the important actions one can take in discovering an environmental ethic that they can live by. To me, these are set of guidelines that can slowly be achieved, with time, effort, and education.
Something else to notice here is that, whereas some of these are primarily individual actions and some involve collective activity, all are likely to have significant effects only in the aggregate -- that is, only if large enough numbers of people undertake them in a serious and sustained way.
Although I do not pose them here with the intention of persuading anyone, Shelby and Aliesha are quite correct that education is key -- no doubt that should be the twelfth item. Thus much more important than this list of conclusions is the evidence and reasoning that leads us to them. Then comes the creative (and really hard) work of organizing.
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