Discussion Topic

[rengetsu]

This entry discusses the Land Ethic set forth by Aldo Leopold in his book A Sand County AlmanacDoes the Earth exist for the benefit of humanity? Do humans have any ethical obligations with respect to the natural world? Have we the right to take all the Earth's resources for our own use? Do we have a responsibility to be good stewards over the

Comments

[ironic_chaos8]

I've never read the book, or even heard of it's author, but I think it's safe to assume from what you wrote that I'm in total disagreement with his views.

Humans have absolutely no ethical obligation to take care of the planet. Regardless of whether you believe in Intelligent Design or in a theory like Panspermia, the fact remains that the end result was us mastering this biosphere. Coming out on top of billions of years of natural selection has given us free reign to do with earth what we will. If another species had won Darwin's game they'd be making jackets out of us right now.

The desire for self-preservation should(and will) be motivation enough for us to keep the planet this side of inhabitable.

[ahnueckh]

I also completely disagree with Aldo Leopold.
I find his set of ethics impractical and I sincerely hope they are never put into practice (especially in the way they are presented here).

Saving the planet is not an ethical issue, its an issue of survival.
Making it an ethical issue would over-estimate the importance of our species.