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ETHICS AND CLIMATE CHANGE
Due Monday, November 9.
Throughout his book The Ethics of Climate Change, James Garvey argues that climate change has ethical dimensions, and he claims that policy-makers and the public (in the UK and the US) are not taking these dimensions seriously enough.
Garvey’s arguments are wide-ranging, from the question of who has responsibility to the question of whether policy actions should focus on countries with high rates of per capita consumption or on countries with growing populations and growing energy use.
Frame one ethical issue and propose a way of working through it based on one of our four ethical frameworks. The moral problem you propose may be broad (e.g., that people living today have a moral responsibility not to ignore the problem of climate change) or it may be specific (e.g. that the U.S. should invest in reconfiguring the electrical grid in ways that encourage the development of renewable forms of energy). If you choose to evaluate a very specific policy proposal, then please give a citation to a source of information about it. [Hint: narrower, more focused problems usually make for more successful arguments because there is less confusion about what the issue is.]
The ethical frameworks we have studied include deontology, utilitarianism, virtue ethics, and the justice framework. I encourage you to try to apply a framework that you have not used so far because working through this assignment is one way of preparing for the final exam.
This outline is different from previous ones in that you may use up to 5 sentences to describe the issue. Please continue to write concisely. You may find that you can describe the issue you are framing in only 1 sentence. That would be fine. But a very specific policy proposal may require more background.
You may perform additional internet research, but please cite your sources. Additional research is not required, but I do give credit for research that improves your work.
A fellow philosopher of science just happened to blog about the animal testing issue last Friday. In her post she addresses the ethical status of the tactics used by the animal rights activists in this case. The many comments also address the ethics of animal research itself.
Due Wednesday, October 21.
Consider these activities of animal rights activists:
1. There have been several recent firebombings of the homes of research scientists in California. Although no one has claimed responsibility, the police believe that they are the work of animal-rights groups. There have also been cases of threats, harassment, and vandalism of researchers’ private property. For instance, six masked intruders tried to force their way into the home of a UC-Santa Cruz researcher during a birthday party for her young daughter. One of the researchers targeted by a firebomb is a neurobiologist who uses mice in studies of how the mouse’s visual system develops. (See Greenwood et al. editorial.)
2. The anti-whaling organization Sea Shepherd attempts to damage the property of whaling ships which operate in a legal grey zone or illegally because, they say, there is otherwise little enforcement of international agreements. The organization has said, “Yes we have sunk whaling ships, rammed whalers and drift netters, boarded poaching vessels and destroyed equipment used for illegal exploitation of the oceans.”
3. In 2004, animal activists illegally broke into a private egg production facility in Wolcott, NY. The facility housed 750,000 laying hens in battery cages and was similar to other egg farms across the country. The activists filmed the conditions, including dead and sick chickens in unsanitary conditions, and made the film widely available. The animal activists were sued by Wegmans for trespassing, and Wegmans eventually sold the egg farm (though still uses it as a source of eggs).
4. A number of animal rights activists have created alternatives to animal dissections in schools and colleges. These include models, videos, and interactive computer simulations.
Pick one of these activities of animal rights activists and evaluate whether it can be ethically supported. If it cannot be supported, be sure to explain why. If it should be supported, evaluate whether doing so is an obligation or merely a consideration. Depending on the case you pick and your argument supporting it, you might need to distinguish whether your position is in the realm of personal responsibility or public policy. You may support your view with any of these ethical frameworks: Kantian deontology, utilitarianism, virtue ethics, or the justice framework.
Keep your position and your support as focused and specific as possible. Also, be realistic about what is at stake and what various parties actually do. Note that the primary topic of the argument is whether the particular activities are defensible and why. I am also open to examining arguments which address animal rights itself, though this is not the central topic.
The outline format is here.
Sarah Sauer called FMS and found out some information that will be helpful on footprinting quizzes.
She writes:
Our dorm rooms are about 240 sq. ft. and for each square foot, the university spends $1.201 on electricity and 83.1 cents on gas each year. Calculated out, this would mean that $24.02 is spent on electricity, and $16.62 is spent on gas per month per dorm room.
Thanks, Sarah!
The reading assignment for Wednesday is “Big Foot” by Michael Specter in the New Yorker magazine. A comment is due, which I will grade. One question I would like us to discuss in class is: Why does the subtitle say “In measuring carbon emissions, it’s easy to confuse morality and science“?
The other part of the assignment is to take a look at two ecological footprint models.
The two I recommend because they are easy to compare with each other are:
- http://www.myfootprint.org/en/visitor_information/
- http://sustainability.publicradio.org/consumerconsequences/
It would be nice if some of you would pick other similar quizzes from elsewhere in cyberspace. This will allow us to talk about a wider range of differences between the available models.
I will record a separate grade for your analysis of quiz results. For each footprint calculator you examine, record (or print out) this information:
1. The name or URL.
2. The results and the units of measurement (e.g., “4.9 Earths” or “12 tons of CO2”).
3. The average footprint for Americans or for New Yorkers (if your calculators report it–you might need to poke around on the FAQ page).
4. The company or organization that sponsors each quizz.
5. The sorts of questions that each quiz asks. How detailed is it? Does it ask about travel? Diet? Recycling habits? Is your result based on averages of “people like you”?
In class, we’ll analyze footprint calculators in some detail. I’m curious about these questions:
- How can such models be helpful? What is their goal?
- What do they measure?
- What are the differences among them?
- Is there a standard way of measuring carbon footprints?
- What are some obstacles to lowering carbon emissions?
- Is the use of fossil fuel an ethical problem or a practical problem or an economic problem?
- Is the solution to excessive carbon emissions a technological one? A political one?
- What motivates people to lower their energy use? What are some obstacles?
POPULATION CONTROL
Background:
The current global population is over 6.5 billion people. There is much evidence that at rates of Western consumption, this population size cannot be sustained. Global population is forecast to reach 9 billion by 2050, and then to keep growing. At the most efficient rates of consumption, the upper limit for a sustainable population is estimated to be right about 9 billion.
Population control is an important issue for environmental ethics. Some argue it is the most important issue because other policies are moot if the size of the global population is not brought under control. If current rates of population growth are not reversed, then famine and disease will limit population size. Nearly all problems of resource use and environmental degradation are in one way or another linked to population size. However, limiting population growth is a difficult issue because many policy options involve violations of what many believe to be non-negotiable individual freedoms and reproductive rights.
Assignment:
Give an ethical argument supporting or criticizing a means of controlling population size through national policy. Limit your support to arguments that would be expressed either by a deontologist or a utilitarian.
For instance, you might choose to support China’s one-child policy and do so for a reason that a Kantian would approve of. (The objection need not be expressed according to any particular ethical framework.) Your position will be stated in #2. Also state the framework you are adopting in #2 or #3.
Guidelines:
You may base your argument on one of the assigned readings, “Reaching the Limit” or “Lifeboat Ethics,” or on material you research independently on the internet. (You might start with some of the links above.) Not everyone will choose exactly the same topic or approach it in exactly the same way. The argument outline format is here.
Reminder: a homework assignment is due on Monday. And, yikes, there’s also one due on Wednesday!
Anxious? Confused? Read more about my expectations for homework (“reflective comments”) here.
The history of this assignment, in case you’re wondering, is that for a while I tried having no check-up on how and whether students were reading the assignments, except for the important writing assignments and the final exam. Most students did not, in fact, read, and it showed in our lame discussions. And a number of students told me that they wish they had read, but they just needed more pressure or more reward. So then I tried frequent in-class quizzes. That was no fun for anyone. I hated making them, students hated taking the class time away from discussion to take them, and there were always some people who had tried to do the reading but just happened to zone out on the one thing I asked about. But last time I taught this class, these homework assignments were quite successful. You get credit for doing the reading, they’re hard to fake, I listen and respond to your thoughts, and our discussions are really great because nearly everyone is prepared with something to say. I hope you, too, think that this is a good solution.
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