Environmental Ethics and Moral Standing

Ethics of the Environment
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Ethics of the Environment
Question 1
Sustainable development and environmental protection relate significantly to social and gender disparities or injustices. According to Gloor et al. (2022), environmental conservation and gender equality are integrated into the wider social justice realm. Women's underrepresentation in strategic decision-making processes and politics (especially in climate change) currently exists. To address this gap, leaders or managers must provide an enabling environment that includes women in political arenas and decision-making processes. They can do this by appointing, sponsoring, and selecting women in leadership positions. Similarly, demoting women entirely to unique “women’s” spaces is equally significant. For instance, purposeful programs like Women in Finance Climate Action Group and the United Nations Climate Conference devoted day to gender matters, and women might decrease the gender’s participation in the typical political realm. Moreover, women only constitute 27 percent of the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics staff worldwide. A series of systemic obstacles lead to this inequality. However, good leadership can attract more women into crucial areas connected to engineering and climate change by reconsidering how they converse about these responsibilities.
Furthermore, the environment and gender matters are interconnected. Understanding the relationship between the two is important for mitigating the problems efficiently. Enhancing gender parity, redefining gender roles, and empowering women can encourage more environmentally-friendly and sustainable practices (Gloor et al., 2022). People and relevant authorities must address environmental problems using the social justice context, ensuring equitable sharing of proceeds from environmental conservation. It also allows marginalized populations to no longer be downgraded in the sustainability search. Acknowledging and acting on such connections, people, or governments can ensure every entity's increasingly sustainable and inclusive future. Environmental conservation and gender equality are integrated into the wider social justice domain (Gloor et al., 2022). By appreciating the connections of social identities such as class, race, and gender, it becomes clear that environmental harm influences marginalized societal groups excessively. These groups always need more resources and confront systemic obstacles that hamper their capacity to adjust to ecological changes or engage in sustainable activities. Dealing with ecological problems with a social justice lens includes mitigating the disparities and pushing for equitable and more inclusive solutions.
Question 2
‘Moral standing’ denotes an individual's critical inherent value, making it entitled to moral consideration. It is the acknowledgment that specific beings, based on their features, deserve to be considered during moral decision-making. A being with moral standing is regarded as possessing value, interests, or rights that people must preserve or respect (Jaworska, 2007). Various stakeholders reveal, shape, and define the human–animal relationships ethics supporting different viewpoints (Coals et al., 2019). For instance, humans defend their interests or moral standing, considering their capacity for good judgment, self-awareness, and moral relevance. Also, they will likely claim that their interests must come first over nonhuman entities because of their higher cognitive capability. Secondly, the activists for nonhuman animals’ moral standing support that nonhuman entities have inherent value and emotions. Therefore, humans must consider them in various decisions. Thirdly, environmental specialists prioritize environmental or ecosystem protection by arguing that safeguarding biodiversity and natural ecosystems is vital for all species to prosper. Additionally, cultural and religious perspectives also hold moral standing. Some defend humans, while others support nonhuman entities’ priorities. The industrial or economic context also has moral standing for nonhuman animals because they depend on some animals to succeed in the respective marketplaces. An example is the dairy sector.
I agree with the perceptions that equally appreciate the moral standing of nonhumans and human beings. Such views consider all beings’ capacity and value irrespective of the species type. Accepting the perspective demonstrates an increasingly ethical way to ensure equality and rights recognition across the species, reducing potential harm and stressing the relevance of wellness. On the other hand, the opinion that singly gives humans moral standing due to their superiority, cognitive and judgmental capacity, and other unique features is ethically wrong. Therefore, I disagree with it. The view does not prioritize nonhuman animals’ values and disregards their relevance within their systems. By eliminating nonhuman objects from moral consideration, people risk introducing harm and ignoring their roles toward other beings who share the planet.
Question 3
The ‘natural’ or physical sciences offer a critical interpretation of life on the planet and the environment’s status based on theoretical models, investigations, and empirical experiments. The sciences explain nature by investigating or exploring biological, physical, and chemical processes. They also measure variables, establish accurate and relevant data, and predict phenomena to offer accounts of life on Earth. Peng and colleagues (2020) conducted a study that revealed how humans impact the surrounding and how the surrounding responds to them. On the other hand, the phenomenological approach clarifying life on the planet and the interaction between people and the environment concentrates on the personal experience perspective regarding the world as conscious beings live and perceive the world. The ecophenomenological account stresses how persons experience and understand the planet via their personified living and considers how people’s emotions, understandings, and perceptions define their interpretation of the environment around them (Brown & Toadvine, 2012). Overall, the approach acknowledges the relevance of lived personal experiences and cultural backgrounds in defining individuals’ connection with the environment.
From a personal viewpoint, the physical or "natural" sciences approach is increasingly successful or fruitful. Most importantly, the approach provides an objective and reductionist context that discloses significant mechanisms and universal laws that regulate the natural world. It is connected to essential empirical understanding and has fruitfully advanced humans’ comprehension of the environment and life on the planet. The natural sciences guide policy decisions and offer a crucial technological development basis. They ensure accurate measurements and experiments and demonstrate the capacity to make accurate findings (Peng et al., 2020). The sciences also ensure a multidimensional consideration that integrates scientific information with extensive knowledge of independent experiences that may lead to an unquestionably detailed and significant comprehension of life globally and the environment’s state. However, the natural or physical sciences might ignore subjective perspectives, including complete human values, aspects, and experiences.
Combining the physical or natural sciences with phenomenological approaches is practical and relevant. For example, linking information, insights, and understandings from the two elements can allow people to understand more about the immediate environment and its interaction with them. Therefore, the linkage can promote a crucial multidisciplinary and holistic methodology to environmental matters, appreciati...