Question

QUESTION 2

1. Discuss the challenges to morality presented by Dale Jamieson. Your answer should demonstrate a solid understanding of the issues presented in the text. Be as clear and detailed as you can.

Answer 1

Climate change presents us with a complex moral problem that our current political system is not well-suited to address. Thus, it should not be surprising that we are failing to address it. In fact, climate change presents us with several distinct challenges. The first and most obvious involves coping with the changing climate itself. Dale Jamieson, book on Ethics and the Environment: An Introduction, is both an introduction ethics and an introduction on how we should value the environment with an emphasis on ethical evaluation. According to him, there are three broad scenarios for what the future may bring: [1] environmental catastrophe; [2] continuing and increasing global inequality and environmental degradation; or [3] a change in the way of life of the world’s most privileged people. Jamieson sees three major challenges to morality as such: amoralism, theism and relativism. In rejecting these challenges Jamieson is clearing the road for moral reasoning about environmental problems. Amoralism states, according to Jamieson ‘that there is no such a thing as right and wrong.The amoralist chooses to opt out of morality altogether.’ Amoralism in its purest form probably is unlikely to be widespread, but indifference towards the suffering of others is not uncommon. This position could be called nihilism (though Jamieson doesn’t use the term).

Jamieson remarks that the view that morality comes from religion is ‘outside of a few pockets in which Enlightenment ideals continue to thrive,probably the dominant view in the world.’

The third obstacle for morality is relativism, which is associated with the postmodernist turn in late twentieth century philosophy. The relativist denies the possibility of moral claims transcending the moral system of the speaker’s own society. This deprives ethics of ‘its critical edge’ . Is female circumcision wrong or not? Some relativists say: ‘It depends.

Jamieson points out that humans have an enormous impact on the earth. It matters what we decide to do or not to do. We humans can choose how to live and what we value. Environmental ethics is more than an academic course.

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