Philosophy & The Environment

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Descriptive Claim

Back 1

Make claims about the way the world is, was, or will be.

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Normative Claim

Back 2

Make claims about the way the world ought to be or have been.

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Philosophical Ethics

Back 3

The reasoned attempt to resolve important practical dilemmas. Itsconclusions are action guiding. That is, it tells us which actions are permissible.

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Moral Agents

Back 4

Anythingthat can act for moral reasons (who can say, “I will do x becauseit is the right thing to do”).

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Moral Patients

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Entitiestoward whom or which we may have duties (if our proposed course of actionimpinges on them in some way).

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Environmental Ethics

Back 6

The investigation of thescope of our duties to certain non-human entities: non-human animals, plants,species, ecosystems, the biosphere.

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Supererogatory

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Going above and beyond the call of duty.

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Ethical Egoism

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The view that for each of us it is best to perform those actions that fulfill our own desires and interests regardless of the effect such actions have on others

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Ethical Relativism

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The view that moral codes and the practices associated with them arise from particular cultures and that there is no set of transcultural moral standards against which any particular code or practice can be assessed.

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Moral Skepticism

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Thinking that there are no moral truths.

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Utilitarianism

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Consequentialism view according to which we should strive, with respect to each action we perform, to maximize welfare among those affected by the action

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Deontology

Back 12

the rightness or wrongness of actions themselves, as opposed to the rightness or wrongness of the consequences of those actions

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Autonomy

Back 13

giving the law to oneself

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Virtue Ethics

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Actions are made right by being the product of the correct character or disposition of the agent performing them

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Instrumental Goods

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Those that are desired entirely for the sake of something else (e.g. medicine, exercise)

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Intrinsic Goods

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Those that are desired entirely for their own sakes. (Only one intrinsic good - happiness)

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Speciesism

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Theview that the values or interests of one species have greater weight than thoseof other species