Conservation values and Ethics (保育的價值與倫理) 鄭先祐 (Ayo) 國立台南大學 環境生態研究所 教授 環境與生態學院 院長 Japalura@hotmail.com

Contents The value of biodiversity (生物多樣性的價值) Instrumental value Intrinsic value Monetizing the value of biodiversity Conservation Ethics (保育的倫理) Essay 4.1 our duties to endangered species Essay 4.2 Monks, temples, and trees: the spirit of diversity Essay 4.3 The importance of value systems in management Case study 4.1 Cypress forest conservation on Taiwan: a question of value

The value of biodiversity Environmental philosophers customarily divide value into two main types, instrumental or utilitarian and intrinsic or inherent. The view that biodiversity has value only as a means to human ends is called anthropocentric. The view that biodiversity is valuable simply because it exists, independently of its use to human beings, is called biocentric or ecocentric.

Instrumental value Four basic categories: goods, services, information, and psycho-spiritual (Table 4.1)

Intrinsic value The sorts of things that may possess intrinsic value Whether intrinsic value exists objectively or is subjectively conferred. Value in the philosophical sense Biocentric environmental philosophers – organism is self-organizing and self-directed.

Norton’s convergence hypothesis Anthropocentric instrumental values + non-anthropocentric intrinsic value = conserve biodiversity

When biodiversity is only instrumentally valuable Burden of proof according to instrumental and intrinsic value systems (Fig. 4.2) When biodiversity is only instrumentally valuable Burden of proof 是在 conservationists When biodiversity is intrinsically as well as instrumentally valuable Burden of proof 是在 developers

Monetizing the value of biodiversity The tragedy of the commons (Hardin, 1968) Holmes Rolston III provides an alternative perspective in Essay 4.1 Essay 4.1 Our duties to endangered species Safe minimum standard (SMS), Bishop (1978) Assumes that biodiversity has incalculable value and should be conserved unless the cost of doing so is prohibitively high (Fig. 4.3).

CBA vs. SMS (Fig. 4.3, p.119) Standard cost-benefit analysis (CBA) Burden of proof → conservation Safe minimum standard (SMS) Burden of proof → development

Conservation Ethics (Table 4.2, p.120) Anthropocentrism In the western religious and philosophical tradition, only human beings are worthy of ethical consideration. All other things are regarded as mere means to human ends. The Judeo-Christian stewardship conservation ethic Diversity is God’s property, and we, who bear the relationship to it of strangers(陌生者) and sojourners (寄居者), have no right to destroy it.

Conservation Ethics (Table 4.2, p.120) Traditional non-western environmental ethics Muslim (Islam) (回教), Hinduism(印度教), Jainism (耆那教), Confucianism (孔教), Daoism (道教) (Table 4.3) Biocentrism (生命中心主義) Life-centered environmental ethics All living things are of equal inherent worth (Taylor, 1986) (Fig. 4.6, p.127) Ecocentrism (生態中心主義)

Biocentrism (生命中心主義) Rolston’s biocentrism Taylor’s biocentrism All individual organisms baseline intrinsic value → Sentient animals → self-conscious human beings Species → ecological systems → wholes Taylor’s biocentrism Equal intrinsic value：self-conscious human beings, sentient animals, invertebrates, plants, bacteria,

Ecocentrism Leopold land ethic Changes the role of Homo sapiens from conqueror of the land community to plain member and citizen of it. A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.

Fig. 4.7 Leopold land ethic

Supplements Essay 4.1 our duties to endangered species Essay 4.2 Monks, temples, and trees: the spirit of diversity Essay 4.3 The importance of value systems in management Case study 4.1 Cypress forest conservation on Taiwan: a question of value

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