Personal Economic Sacrafice to Better our Environment
Personal Economic Sacrafice to Better our Environment
Humans live in the midst of an ecological community. Although living in cities has caused many of us loose touch with the land and the other species that inhabit it, our actions still effect the environment, thus we should still consider ourselves a part of this community. Just as humans have a set of rules of how to act within their own human community and social sphere so should they have a set of rules on how to behave within the larger ecological community. Rules for our own society are based on morality, concepts of right and wrong, and behaviors that help maintain the safety of individuals living within the society. For the same reasons we should have rules on how to behave within our ecological sphere. It is important to preserve our safety in this sphere, to keep pollution that causes health risks to minimum, and to make sure we our living sustainably by not over using our vital resources. We also have an ethical obligation to the species with which we share our planet. They have the right to exist on this planet. That our sense of justice does not extend to them, that we do not recognize they have rights and that there are moral ways to treat them, proves that we are so focused on our own species, we do not realize we live in a larger community that we should respect. Our sense of justice should expand to include this larger community.
I am not suggesting they be included in our judicial courts as member of our societies, for obviously we live in different societies. But we do live in the same community, and there should be rules that enforce just behavior towards that community and punishments for defecting from these rules. Just behavior towards them means protection of the community and its stability. The other species of this planet are immensely valuable to us and we should work to conserve them and their habitats. Conservation will never be truly be sucessful unless we realize the economic value of other species and the services they provide as well as realize that their value goes deeper then economics.
Our economy relies on natural capital. Natural capital is all the resources of this earth. These include not only the obvious physical resources such as minerals, soil, water, but also the living...