PROFESSIONAL ETHICS
IN SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING
CDT409
ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS
Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic
Department of Computer Science and Engineering
Mälardalen University
2007
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Environmental Ethics
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The Earth
"We have not inherited the Earth from our
fathers. We are borrowing it from our
children."
Native American saying
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Is Nature Fragile or Resilient*?
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Nature seen as powerful in past
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Nature seen as a delicate balance as technology increases our
ability to disrupt
*resilient - som har lätt för att återhämta sig (komma igen)
elastisk, spänstig
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Science as a Way of Knowing
A Faustian Bargain?
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Technology can create power to
save and destroy life
Dr. Faustus sold his soul to the
devil in exchange for power and
wealth.
On a deeper level, this shows
the decay of a person who
chooses material gains over
spiritual belief and in doing so,
loses his/her soul.
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Current Environmental Conditions
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Half the world’s wetlands were lost in the last 100 years.
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Land conversion and logging have shrunk the world’s forests by
as much as 50%.
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Nearly three-quarters of the world’s major marine fish stocks are
overfished or are being harvested beyond a sustainable rate.
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Soil degradation has affected two-thirds of the world’s
agricultural lands in the last 50 years.
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Major Causes of Environmental
Degradation
Population Growth
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More than 6 billion people now occupy the Earth,
adding about 85 million more each year.
In the next decade, most population growth will be in
the poorer countries - countries where present
populations already strain resources and services.
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Human Dimensions of Environmental
Degradation

More than 1.3 billion people live in acute poverty, with an
income of less than $1 per day. These people generally lack
access to an adequate diet, decent housing, basic sanitation,
clean water, education, medical care, and other essentials.
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Four out of five people in the world live in what would be
considered poverty in the U.S. or Canada.
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The world’s poorest people are often forced to meet short-term
survival needs at the cost of long-term sustainability.
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Resource Extraction and Use
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Burning of fossil fuels
Destruction of tropical
rainforests and other
biologically rich landscapes
Production of toxic wastes
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Management Ethics and the
Environment
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Anthropocentric Approaches
– Corporate Social
Responsibility
• Stakeholder
• Normative
• Social Contract

Green Management
–
–
–
–
Ecocentricism
Adjusted Stakeholder
Sustainablity
Resource Based Approach
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Environmental Ethics and Business
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Western Society - Objectifies Nature
– Locke - “Something in a state of nature has no economic
value and is of no utility to the human race”
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Ethics - a concern with actions and practices directed to
improving the welbeing of people.
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Economic Fundamentalism and
Ethics
“The corporate social responsibility of a business is to
increase profit.” M. Friedman

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Those things that cannot be traded on the market have no
value.
Where does the environment fit in these definitions for
environmental ethics?
Will people and corporations do environmentally responsible
things on their own? What happens if they do?
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Corporate Social Responsibility
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By doing socially responsible things, businesses better human
life.
Hopefully ..good ethics is good business.
Is this true?
Is enlightened self interest a good way?
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Incorporating Environmental Ethics
into Management
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Environmental Ethics is a starting point
– Expanding ethics to include nature.
– Natural objects have intrinsic value and morally
relevant in their own right.
– Deep Ecology: nature has an ethical status
at least equal to humans.
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Green Management
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Ecocentricism views industrial relationships in a cycle, and a
whole set of philosophies.
Closed technological cycles, zero emissions to the environment.
How radical is this?
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Sustaincentric - going beyond sustainability of “development
that meets the needs of the present without compromising the
ability of future generations to meet their needs.
– Human and economic relationships inextricably linked with natural
systems.
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Ascribing Responsibilities.
Definitions

Moral Agents
– Those who have the
freedom and rational
capacity to be responsible
for choices
– Those capable of moral
reflection and decision.
– Example: adult humans of
sound mind
• Infants and mentally
infirm adults are NOT
moral agents
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Definitions

Moral Standing
– Have moral standing means
that
• your existence or welfare is
valuable in itself (intrinsic
value)
• your interests and wellbeing must be respected
– Example: humans of all kinds
• babies, children, adults,
old people, dement people,
mentally sick people, etc.
• women, different races,
different cultures, minority
groups
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Definitions

Moral Duties
– That which is owed by
moral agents to those with
moral standing.
– Example: It is wrong to kill
children because we have a
moral duty toward them
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Philosophical Issues

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Who or what has moral
standing, and why?
– Does the environment
have moral standing?
– Must look at criteria for
moral standing
What moral duty do we
(moral agents) have toward
those with moral standing?
– Different ethical positions
suggest different moral
duties.
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Ascribing Moral Standing

Membership in the species
Homo sapiens
– Humans are moral agents and
are responsible for knowing
right from wrong
– Humans are intelligent
– Humans have personhood
and self-consciousness
– Humans have ability to
communicate and learn
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Moral Standing

Sentience, the ability to feel
pain
– Therefore extend moral
standing to animals
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Moral Standing

Being alive
– Therefore extend moral
standing to animals and
plants:
– All living things.
[However, it seems reasonable to
expect that saving life of a virus
and saving life of a human is
not seen as equally urgent. ]
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Moral Standing

Being part of nature
– Therefore extend moral
standing to the
• earth
• ecosystems
• rocks
• rivers
• plants animals
• the entire natural world
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Ethical Positions

Anthropocentrism- Human
centered morality
– Only humans have
intrinsic value and moral
standing.
– The rest of the natural
world has instrumental
value (use to humans).
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Anthropocentrism
We can best protect nature by
looking out for human
needs.
• Ducks Unlimited
preserves wetlands
• Saving the rainforests
will provide O2 and
medicines for humans.
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Ethical Positions

Sentio-centrism: Sentient-being
centered morality
– All and only sentient beings
(animals that feel pain) have
intrinsic value and moral
standing.
– The rest of the natural world
has instrumental value.
– Both humans and sentient
animals have rights and/or
interests that must be
considered
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Ethical Positions

http://www.ecologicalinternet.org/
Biocentric Individualism:
Life-centered morality
– All and only living beings,
specifically individual
organisms (not species or
ecosystems) have intrinsic
value and moral standing.
– Humans are not superior to
other life forms nor privileged,
and must respect the inherent
worth of every organism
– Humans should minimize harm
and interference with nature:
eat vegetarian since less land
needs to be cultivated.
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Ethical Positions
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Eco-centric Holism:
ecosystem centered morality
Non-individuals (the earth as
an interconnected ecosystem,
species, natural processes)
have moral standing or
intrinsic value and are
deserving of respect.
Individuals must be concerned
about the whole community of
life/nature,
Humans should strive to
preserve ecological balance
and stability.
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Traditional Patriarchal Dualisms

Greek, Roman, Hebrew:
– Humans are separate from
and superior to nature
– Human, mind, rationality, and man
are linked and superior
– Nature, body, feelings, and woman
are linked, and inferior
– Justifies domination by men over
• Nature (“Mother Nature”)
• Women
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Ecofeminism

Rejects Patriarchal
Dualisms
– The domination of nature by
men is wrong, is similar to and
related to the domination of
women by men.
– Must break the pattern of
"power over" relationships, will
benefit both humans and the
natural world.
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Topics in Applied
Environmental Ethics
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Environmental Effects of War
Genetic Engineering
Nanotechnology
Cloning
Resource Allocation
Animals and Vegetarianism
Air and Water Pollution
Radiation
Ozone Crisis and Global Warming
Population and Environment
Indigenous Peoples
Related ethical concepts:
common good | communitarianism | consequentialism | ecology |
environmentalism | ethics: deontological | ethics: virtue | feminist (interventions):
ethics | rights
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Deep Ecology
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Deep ecology is a recent branch of
ecological philosophy that considers
humankind as an integral part of its
environment.
Deep ecology places greater value on
non-human species, ecosystems and
processes in nature than established
environmental and green movements.
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Deep Ecology

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Arne Næss
The core principle of deep ecology as
originally developed is Norwegian
philosopher Arne Næss's doctrine of
biospheric egalitarianism — the claim
that all living things have the same right
to live and flourish.
Deep ecology describes itself as "deep"
because it is concerned with
fundamental philosophical questions
about the role of human life as one part
of the ecosphere, and aims to avoid
merely utilitarian environmentalism.
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The Roots of Environmental
Degradation
Western Religions
Humans Dominating Nature
– Genesis: God commands humans to "fill the earth and
subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and
over the birds of the air and over every living thing...”
– After the great flood God says to Noah: " the animals will
dread and fear you, and I will give you dominion over
everything that creeps on the ground, and over all the fish of
the sea.“

Christians and Jews respond: traditions promote a care-giving
stewardship not domination of nature. (Noah story)
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Both religious traditions are currently converging towards forms
increasingly concerned with the environment
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Rejection of Old Animism &
Pantheism
– Animists believe that every part of the environment, living
and non-living, has consciousness or spirit. Therefore, all
beings deserve reverence.
– Pantheists warship Nature as a goddess. Nature is
sacred or holy and is worthy of peoples respect.
Western Philosophy
Critics blame its “dualism,” viewing humans as separate from
and superior to nature
the culprit - den skyldige, boven i dramat
Rene Descartes
Mind-Body Dualism
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Rene Descartes (1596-1650) is blamed for mind-body
dualism.
In his dictum “I think, therefore I am” thought signifies not only
existence, but also human superiority over other living beings
and inanimate substance.
For Descartes, humans are separate from nature and
superior.
The nature (physical world) is an objectified "thing" separate
from “mind”.
Some believe that this objectification of nature is a key to
science and ‘progress’.
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Francis Bacon
Nature as a Machine

Francis Bacon (1561-1626), father of the scientific method,
promoted a view of nature as a machine [New Atlantis "a
mechanistic utopia"—1624]
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He thought nature was like women and slaves: They should
be bound into the service of men
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Many scholars think such thinking shaped the anti-nature
views and formed human-nature relations in the west
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Worldviews and Ethical Perspectives
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Individual beliefs towards ecology depend on ethical
perspectives
Most people have set of core values or beliefs
Environmental concerns are a source for
comparisons among different values and perceptions
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Worldviews and ethical perspectives
A comparison
Philosophy
Intrinsic Value
Instrumental Value
Role of humans
Anthropocentric
Humans
Nature
Masters
Stewardship
Humans & Nature
Tools
Caretakers
Biocentric
Species
Abiotic nature
One of many
Animal rights
Individuals
Processes
Equals
Ecocentric
Processes
Individuals
Destroyers
Ecofeminist
Relationships
Roles
Caregivers
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Environmental Justice
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Combination of civil rights and
environmental protection that demands
a safe, healthy life-giving environment
for everyone
Most people of low socio-economic
position are exposed to high pollution
levels
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Holistic Approaches
Criticisms

Individuals get hurt
when you ignore them
in favor of wholes
– This is the key
criticism of all
ends-focused
theories
– In environmental
ethics, the
common charge is
of "eco-fascism"!
The Gradual Extension
of Moral Concern..
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Environmental Science
Environment - the
circumstances and
conditions that surround
an organism or a group of
organisms
Environmental science the systematic study of
our environment and our
place in it
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What ought I to do?
Intention
Action
Consequence
Duty
Deontological Ethics
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What ought I to do?
Intention
Action
Consequence
Consequentialist Ethics
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Sustainable Global
Development
www.earthcharter.org
A declaration of fundamental principles for
building a just, sustainable, and peaceful
global society for the 21st century.
http://www.envirolink.org/
Environmental Resources
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References
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The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Edward N. Zalta (ed.),
http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2002/entries/ethics-environmental
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http://ethics.sandiego.edu/Applied/Environment/index.asp Ethics
Updates - Environmental Ethics Resources
http://www.ethicsweb.ca/resources/environmental/index.html
Environmental Ethics Resources on World Wide Web
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http://www.iep.utm.edu/e/envi-eth.htm Internet Encyclopedia of
Philosophy
www.clas.ufl.edu/users/bron/pp/EE2.ppt Important Questions In
Environmental Ethics
www.public.iastate.edu/~cfford/EnvironmentalEthics.ppt
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