...Biocentric Ethics Analysis SCI/362 December 16, 2013 Biocentric Ethics Analysis Inherent value is to have value in and of oneself, objects are ends in themselves not merely means to some other end (Desjardins, 2013). It has been said that some people value what they consume and this is why genetically modified organisms (GMO’s) are so controversial. Some feel that GMO’s are our only option to the demand of the current population growth, because farmers have said that using the genetically modified seeds have helped the crops grow faster, longer and more fruitful (Robertson, 2003). This is the topic that will be covered in this paper; first, it is important to understand the history of this debate. In 1986, genetically engineered tomatoes were developed and it proved to make the tomatoes more resistance to many herbicides. The Department of Agriculture and the Environmental Protection Agency was not concerned with the thought of possible side effects at this time. In 1990 when “Forbes article “The Lesser of Two Weevils” was released stating “that cotton farmers in the United States had put 100 million pounds of agricultural chemicals on their crop each year for the last several years” (Newton, Dillingham, Choly, 2006) the media went rampant on this information. This caused the controversy to explode into worldwide news headlines. Some countries were claiming that the over use of chemicals in the United States were reckless and dangerous to them as well, with the...
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...Biocentric Ethics Analysis SCI/362 June 29, 2015 Mark Leeper Biocentric Ethics Analysis The term biocentric ethics means any theory that views all life as possessing intrinsic value (DesJardins, 2013). Genetically modified organisms are living organisms whose genetic material has been artificially changed in a laboratory through genetic engineering ("Non-Gmo Project", 2015). In recent news, there has been controversy over the use of GMOs. Since the Food and Drug Administration approved the use of Flavr Savr tomato for sale on grocery store shelves in 1994, more GMOs has since came on the market (GMOinside, n.d.). Does GMOs have inherent value? INHERENT VALUE Inherent value is a quality attributes to every creature that has a life that matters to it (Regan, 2004). According to DesJardins (2013), inherent value is to have value in and of oneself. Objects with inherent value are ends in themselves, not merely means to some other end (DesJardins, 2013). CONTROVERSY REGARDING GMOs There are two main problems that concern GMOs. GMOs have no boundaries and do not have labels. Once a genetically modified organism is planted they are in risk of contaminating any regular crops planted nearby (The Non-GMO Report, 2005). A survey reports that in the Midwest, where there are millions of acres of GM corn and soybean crops, up to 80% of organic farmers reported direct costs or damages resulting from genetic trespass (The Non-GMO Report, 2005). Unlike the organic...
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...Animal Rights Introduction Ethics and morality have consistently been topics of concern in our society. Concerns about ethics and morality also extend to matters associated with the treatment of animals. The purpose of this discussion is to summarize and critique several different theories associated with the ethical treatment of animals. The discussion will focus on the treatment of animals as it relates to hunting and trapping animals, eating animals, using animals for research, and the manner in which domestic and wild animals are treated. The research will summarize and critique several theories including anthropocentrism, Animal liberation, Strong Animal Rights Theory, Weak(er) animal rights theory, Two-factor egalitarianism, biocentric egalitarianism, ecocentric views. Anthropocentrism Anthropocentrism views human being as the center of the universe and regards the world from the point of view of human values and experiences (Dictionary). According to the western philosopher Immanuel Kant human beings alone are rational beings and as such have intrinsic moral worth. Kant asserts that human beings do not owe animals anything because they are not rational beings. However, he does assert that people should be kind to animals but only because kindness to animals assists in developing character in human beings. In other words kindness to animals should not take place for the sake of the animal but for the betterment of the human being. In addition to Kant...
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...University of Phoenix Material Terms and Definitions Worksheet Write brief descriptions for each of the following terms. If you use an outside source to define them, include an APA citation for the source. Scientific method “The way a scientist approaches a problem (by formulating a hypothesis and then testing it by means of an experiment)” (Raven, Berg, & Hassenzahl, 2010, p. G-13). This means that an individual uses a possible outcome to analyze and determine if the results are possible. Environmental science “The interdisciplinary study of how humanity interacts with other organisms and the nonliving physical environment” (Raven, Berg, & Hassenzahl, 2010, p. G-6). An analysis of the interconnections between living and nonliving species. Anthropocentrism “Focusing primarily or exclusively on human needs and interests” (Raven, Berg, & Hassenzahl, 2010, p. G-1). This means that an individual is self-centered, only worried about their needs or the needs of the humans. Biocentrism “Focusing on all life-forms as equally important” (Raven, Berg, & Hassenzahl, 2010, p. G-2). This means that an individual believes that all species are one, and that all live is valuable. Dualism “The state of being dual or consisting of two parts; division into two” (Dualism, 2012). This means that one was split into two equal parts. Ecocentrism “The view or belief that environmental concerns should take precedence over the needs and rights of human beings considered in isolation” (Ecocentrism...
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... | | |Environmental Issues and Ethics | Copyright © 2010, 2009, 2006, 2004, 2003, 2001 by University of Phoenix. All rights reserved. Course Description This course applies scientific, philosophical, economic, and ethical principles to current and future environmental issues. Students will analyze the cumulative impact of human activities on global ecosystems, as well as responsibilities to the natural world, in terms of the complex interrelationships humans have with their environment. Policies Faculty and students/learners will be held responsible for understanding and adhering to all policies contained within the following two documents: • University policies: You must be logged into the student website to view this document. • Instructor policies: This document is posted in the Course Materials forum. University policies are subject to change. Be sure to read the policies at the beginning of each class. Policies may be slightly different depending on the modality in which you attend class. If you have recently changed modalities, read the policies governing your current class modality. Course Materials Light, A., & Rolston, H., III (Eds.). (2003). Environmental ethics: An anthology. Malden, MA: Blackwell Pub. Raven, P., Berg, L., & Hassenzahl, D. (2010). Environment. (7th ed.)....
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...The Ethics of Design The industrial revolution was a period between 18th and 19th centuries in which the world transitioned from a more natural environment, to heavy industry and infrastructure. During the industrial revolution, rural societies in Europe and America became industrial and urban through advancements in technology and manufacturing processes. Growth in industrialism in combination with an anthropocentric world view, brought with it a lack of sentiment for the environment, health risks, and resource depletion. Naturally, as ideologies have shifted to a more basic biocentric point of view, people have sought out to replace the design and production methods of industrial environmentally hurtful materials with more sustainable methods. Among these people are William McDonough, and American architect, and Michael Braungart, a German chemist. Based on the idea that nature is a designer and that human industrial structure works in contrast to the natural environment, McDonough and Braungart have pioneered “cradle to cradle” design which attempts to imitate nature’s structural design that produces without pollution. Additionally, David R. Keller and E. Charles Brummer, professors and directors of studies, have developed postmechanistic agricultural ideas to humane and environmentally conscious food production. To offer a greater philosophical view, Aldo Leopold’s, “The Land Ethic” reorients ethics to view human beings as members of a much larger biotic community...
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...This article is a copy of the one published in New Society Magazine No.237, January-February 2012, ISSN 0251-3552, www.nuso.org A major transition for a great transformation Reflections from the Yasuní-ITT Initiative René Ramírez Gallegos1 When discussing the development of a political project from the Left there are two opposing positions or aspects: those which promote the idea of better managing and regulating capitalism – that is, striving for “good capitalism” – and those who hold anticapitalist positions. The author of this article argues that a Left that does not give up on the generation of alternatives to capitalism but at the same time is responsible for governing, should think about a “great transition” without losing sight of the horizon of a “great transformation”. This article analyzes the Yasuní-ITT Initiative and presents it as an example of how to merge concrete and innovative proposals (transition) and utopias which go beyond capitalist development (transformation). Key words: Left, Capitalism, Good Living/Sumak Kawsay, Yasuní-ITT The world does not need alternatives for development, but alternatives to development. The world does not need to “better” use capitalism, but to transform it. That is the great historical challenge that the Left should take on, both intellectually and politically. The concept of “development” has been recycled and reborn again and again for all its critics and detractors. However, in a strict sense it has never been questioned...
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...Ecologism: Core themes | Ecology | * Ecology developed as a distinct branch of biology through a growing recognition that plants and animals are sustained by self-regulating natural systems (i.e. ecosystem) composed of both living and non-living elements. All ecosystems tend towards a state of harmony or equilibrium through a system of state regulation. Biologists refer to this as homeostasis: Process where food and other resources are recycled and the population size of animals; insects and plants naturally adjust to the available food supply.Eco systems interact with other ecosystems.E.g. A lake may constitute an ecosystem, but it also needs to be fed fresh water from tributaries and receive warmth and energy from the sun. In turn, lakes provide water and food for species living along its shores. The natural world is therefore made up of a complex web of ecosystems – the largest of which is the global ecosystem: the “ecosphere” or “biosphere”.Ecologists argue that humankind currently faces the prospect of environmental disaster because of material wealth.Material wealth and consumption upsets the ‘balance of nature’ and endangered the ecosystems that make human life possible. * This is all a result of the growth in human population * The depletion of finite and irreplaceable resources such as: Coal, Oil, and Natural Gas * The eradication of tropical rain forests * The pollution of rivers, lakes and forests and air itselfEcologism presents a radically different...
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...extension of ethics to nature. In an anthropocentric ethic nature deserves moral consideration because how nature is treated a¡ects humans. In an ecocentric ethic nature deserves moral consideration because nature has intrinsic value. In two experiments participants (n=91 and 84) generated moral reasoning responses to ecological moral dilemmas. The reasoning was coded as ecocentric, anthropocentric, or nonenvironmental (i.e., social contracts, truthfulness). Individual di¡erences and situational variables were examined in relation to moral reasoning about ecological dilemmas. Pro-environmental attitudes were related to more ecocentrica nd anthropocentrica nd less nonenvironmental reasoning. The presence of information about the impact of ecological damage on the environment, especially a more ‘‘wild’’ environment, elicited more ecocentric reasoning, while the presence of a social commitment elicited more nonenvironmental moral reasoning. The implications of the research for con£icts over environmental commons dilemmas are discussed. # 2001 Academic Press Ecocentrism and Anthropocentrism: Moral Reasoning about Ecological Dilemmas There is as yet no ethicd ealing with man’s relation to land and to the animals and plants which grow upon it. . . The extension of ethics to this third element in human environment is. . .an evolutionary possibility and an ecological necessity. (Leopold, 1949, pp. 238^9) Aldo Leopold, sometimes called the father of environmental ethics, expressed...
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...Biomimicry L. Nicole Doucette, Kim Fields, Tanner Funk, Anthony J. Gallela DeVry University LAS 432: Tech, Culture, and Society March 2013 Session Prof. Colleen Mallory Table of Contents ~ Prepared by L. N. Doucette Abstract --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Page 3 ~prepared by K. Fields Introduction --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Page 4 ~ prepared by A. J. Gallela What is Biomimicry ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Page 5 ~ prepared by T. Funk History ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Page 10 ~ prepared by T. Funk Political Influence -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Page 13 ~ prepared by K. Fields Legal Influence ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Page 16 ~ prepared by K. Fields Economic Questions and Considerations --------------------------------------------- Page 18 ~ prepared by A. J. Gallela Psychological Considerations ------------------------------------------------------------ Page 21 ~ Prepared by K. Fields Biomimicry Cultural Context and Media Influence ---------------------------------Page 24 ~ prepared by A. J. Gallela Sociological Effects -------------------------------------------------------------------------...
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...FROM “(R)EVOLUTION” TO SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT: CURRENT FEATURES AND PERSPECTIVES ABSTRACT This article aims to address the issue of Sustainable Development (SD) in an evolutionary perspective within its multidisciplinary scope. The complexity of developments for sustainability has frequently proven difficult in its implementation, evaluation and effective communication.It was our intention to provide an outline of the diverse views on the subject, focusing on globalization as a change of attitude towards sustainability.It is a review of terminology associated with the SD and its multiple interpretations.It is referenced the apparent and irrelevant impact of initiatives to solve the economic, social and environmental problem. It emphasizes the influence and importance of strategies and the positioning of SMEs on the way to SD in the policy of act local think global. KEYWORDS Strategy Sustainable development Sustainability, SMEs JERÓNIMO, WINSTON CENSE, Center for Environmental and Sustainability Research, Departamento de Ciências e Engenharia do Ambiente, Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal OLIVEIRA, NUNO GASPAR DE CIGEST, Assistente Instituto Superior de Gestão, Portugal 1. INTRODUCTION “(R)Evolution or Death”, adapted from the revolutionary slogan used and popularized by the Cuban regime, serves as motto for the urgent need to transform our production and consumption systems and our standing towards the environment around us....
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...costs + external costs * Internalization: make producers bear the total social cost of production. * Ecological system: an interrelated and interdependent set of organisms and environments * Ecological ethics: ecosystems as having inherent rights or interests and we have direct duties to them. * Ecofeminism: socio-ethical theory which combines ecological ethics with a critique of paternalistic patterns of domination (top down hierarchical authority structures) in our political and economic institutions as contributing to environmental exploitation. * Unlimited resource view: view encapsulating the attitude of bygone times which regarded the earth’s carrying capacity as unlimited, and air and water as "free goods." * Sustainable growth: a level of economic and population growth which enables each generation to hand down a world no worse than it inherited to succeeding generations, which avoids the Doomsday scenario. * Doomsday scenario: scenario in which population is controlled by rising death rates and economic growth is limited by economic collapse. * Direct duty: a duty rooted in the rights or interests of the individual to whom the duty is owed. We have a duty to protect ecosystems for their own sake, as ecological ethics does, is to proclaim a direct duty rooted in rights or interests of the ecosystems...
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... ET AL . Conclusion: Knowledge and Skills for Professional Practice Tim W. Clark Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, Institution for Social and Policy Studies at Yale, Northern Rockies Conservation Cooperative Murray B. Rutherford Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, Northern Rockies Conservation Cooperative Kim Ziegelmayer Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies Michael J. Stevenson Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies Most professionals beginning their careers in species and ecosystem conservation conceive of their future work in terms of hands-on tasks in the field (“doing something important in the real world”). Whether on the domestic or the international scene, typically the forester sees themselves laying out timber sales, the fisheries biologist looks forward to surveying streams, and the range specialist expects to be classifying grasslands. Current curricula in most universities largely mirror this common view. We train future foresters to address logging problems in the Pacific Northwest or in the tropics, or conservation biologists to design a reserve or study an endangered species. But in actual practice, most professionals spend only part—and sometimes a small part—of their time attending to technical tasks in the field. Professionals, over a career or a lifetime, participate in many activities well beyond fieldwork, and there is much more to building a successful professional practice today than skills...
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