Assess the claim that secular approaches to environmental issues are of more use than religious approaches (35)

When looking at the Maldives and other quickly diminishing countries, coupled with raising temperatures and huge variations in extreme weather across the world, it is clear that environmental ethics must be taken very seriously. But there have been a number of ethical approaches towards the environment trying to tackle and provide moral guidelines on how to treat and use the earth. During the course of this essay I will attempt to outline a few of the main secular and religious approaches to environmental issues and then through evaluation come up with a conclusion on which I feel is the best to follow.

To make a good environmental theory, the ethical approach must provide moral guidelines for governments, big businesses and individuals alike. One secular theory, which tries to achieve this, is Conservationism.
The conservationist theory aims to look at the value of that the environment has to humans and how looking after it and using it will affect us. The conservationist approach takes a shallow ecology approach, which believes that the earth has instrumental value. This means that if lowering the carbon emissions to protect the Maldives will benefit human life then a conservationist approach will argue that this is a good thing to do. The conservationist approach can be closely linked to Bentham’s hedonistic approach to Utilitarianism, sharing the ‘ if its beneficial enough to humans then we will do it but we wont bother if its too much work’ approach, which is also a secular theory. This anthropocentric view is useful when looking at ways to ensure individuals to there bit as it holds the moral opinion that by helping the earth you help humans in the long run, however it is somewhat flimsy and fails to appreciate the idea that the earth can have intrinsic worth something which a lot of libertarianists believe is a criticism. It also falls when looking at nuclear power and future generations. The shallow ecology approach fails to recognize that an effect on animals now is very likely to seriously affect human prosperity in the future.

The Liberation approach has a rather different view on environmentalism. It suggests that earth has intrinsic value. They suggest that environmental ethics should be valued not just for individuals but suggest that governments and big businesses should be forced to do more to protect the planet also. Coining the term ecosophy, which is the belief that all living things have rights as well as humans. A leading Deep ecologist Aldo Leopold argued that humans should stop viewing themselves as the ‘dominators’ of the earth and instead we should see our existence as part of a moral community that includes the land and all its life. He Famously quoted ‘ a thing is right when it ends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. Otherwise it is wrong’. This view when developed by Naess went further to say that in order to protect the planet humans must: significantly reduce the human population, abandon goals of economic growth for preservation of diversity of species. Live in self reliant and sufficient communities and work to protect the earth and live in balance.
This view is somewhat controversial and has been rejected by many environmentalists as too radical but the basic principle of deep ecology does have many benefits to earth and humans and does offer a very clear strict set of rules to follow with regards to environmental ethics for businesses, governments and individuals. This surprisingly fits in quite well with Kant’s view, who argues that any protection of the earth is ultimately beneficial to humans and although his means to an end theory doesn’t technically apply to animals through his other work it seems that he would agree with some aspects of the Deep ecology view, not that earth has intrinsic value but instead it has such strong instrumental value that by protecting it as much as is possible we are benefiting humans.

These secular approaches to Environmentalism make very clear and bold points providing two very different views on the environment, something which religious approaches aren’t all that different from. Christian theology provides multiple approaches to environmental ethics the main of which being Dominion and Stewardship.

Christianity isn’t directly clear in scripture about humans’ responsibility towards the environment, but some Christians believe that humans are given Dominion of the earth directly from god because they are created in the image of god. This view suggests that humans are at the top of the highrachey and that the earth is free to be used in any way that is beneficial for them, a very anthropocentric view, much like shallow ecology. However this view doesn’t seem to fully comply with traditional views on the creation story. ‘And so god saw all that he had created, and he saw that it was very good’ this statement would suggest that the biblical interpretation of Christian theology would see the earth holding intrinsic value after all god said it was good, something that doesn’t comply that well with the idea of dominionship.

Instead, most Christians believe in Stewardship. Focusing on the scripture from Genesis 2 which is based around the idea of protecting and preserving gods earth. The basic belief is that god created the earth and humans are the stewards or the grounds keepers, it is our job to protect and care for the planet as best as we can. This doesn’t mean that humans can’t use the planet to benefit them, but that it must be sustainable and in an environmentally protective way which works to preserve the earth and its life and acknowledge its intrinsic value. This view is favoured amongst most Christians especially those who are concerned for the environment, because it has a healthy balance between protecting the earth and using it for our benefit.
This isn’t enough for one branch of Christians however; creationists often hold the strong view of creation spirituality. This view sprouted by ST. Francis, argues that the earth and god are connected; god is in every tree and water drop and in everything upon the earth is a piece of god. This is a similar view to deep ecology but goes further suggesting that any destruction to the earth is harming gods plan. And argue that it is naïve to see humans as a separate entity but instead we must see creation as a whole and acknowledge that humans are just a part of that. This view is very similar to that of James Lovelock.

Lovelock was Famous for the creation of the GAIA hypothesis. This hypothesis suggests that the whole of the earth is connected and a massive self-regulating biological organism. Beyond this is argues that humans are a tiny part of this and are not indispensible to the earth and no superior to other life. Lovelock argues that unless we as humans realise this and start treating the earth with respect our survival as a species is under threat. Unless we tackle climate change humans will no longer be able to inhabit the planet and will become extinct.

This view is somewhat compatible with Christian approach of creation spirituality but does face some criticisms from both religious and secular theorists. Dawkins argues that the idea of mutual benefit is inconceivable and incoherent. He suggests that survival of the fittest proves the exact opposite responding to conditions to survive.
To conclude I would reject the belief that secular views are of more use than religious ones on the basis that I think they can be quite compatible. Shallow ecology and dominion hold very similar values, as do stewardship and deep ecology. I think that to draw a real conclusion science must be used to observe and learn in order to realise the importance of environmentalism. This is possible weather you deem God responsible for earths creation or not. The real matter is preservation in order to survive and in my opinion following the stewardship and deep ecology model whilst still making use of the resources that we have.

(PLAN) intro - Government, buisnesses and inderviduals need to pay attention to environmental issues … global warming on the rise etc. in the essay I will outline what the main secular and religious approaches are and then evaluate there usefulness.

Secular approaches … utilitarian ethics, Conservationism libertarianism

Religious ethics – Christian ethics ( dominion and stewardship)
Creation spirituality. O SIN

Conclude with GAIA which is a secular view that has been adopted and supported by religions and secular environmentalists.