Anthropocentric Consequentialism Summary

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Recommended: Environmental ethics, ethical dilemmas

Several economic and technological advances have led mankind down a steep path to environmental disintegration. Environmental ethics is established on humans’ intuitions about what is right and wrong. Our knowledge about what is morally right comes from day-to-day interactions among our species. In today’s globalized society, the effects of our actions are indirect and cumulative. Do our ethical intuitions correctly reflect our global environmental concerns? To start off this paper, I will investigate the anthropocentric-consequentialist approach to environmental ethics. Anthropocentrism meaning humans as the most important life form, and consequentialism meaning the morality of actions solely based on their consequences. Anthropocentric consequentialism …show more content…

If we treat her nicely, she will keep us going for a while. If we scratch her, she will bleed, kick us out, bandage up, and go about her business at her planetary scale.” Gould is essentially saying a good action will yield a good consequence, the main ethical point for anthropocentric consequentialism. Gould also makes a great point that humans are insignificant compared to the planetary scale. A consequentialist would say the point of morality is to make the world a better place. In order to do so, sentient beings must make decisions that ultimately have positive consequences. In regards to affluent countries, maximizing the good might seem too demanding. Let’s say you decide to take your car to work every morning, rather than public transit. You are wasting money on gas and polluting the atmosphere. A consequentialist approach would have you take the bus because it would lessen hazardous gas emissions into the air and you can spend gas money on more pressing matters (like donating a portion of your gas money to the World Wild Life Foundation). This approach is designed specifically for human

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