IPP 503: Environmental Ethics

AWAYMAVE - The Distance Mode of MA in Values and the Environment at Lancaster University

Aims and Outcomes

Module Aims

This module aims to explore some key perspectives on environmental ethics. It will:

• Introduce students to the main different approaches to ethics can be and have been applied to environmental questions. This will include utilitarian, deontological and virtues theories.
• Consider the boundaries of the beings, to whom moral consideration is owed in our environmental decisions.
• Examine the claim that nature has intrinsic value.
• Engage in the debates specific controversies such as the value of wilderness and the paradoxes involved in the restoration of nature.
• Examine ecofeminist approaches to environmental ethics

Learning Outcomes

After taking this module, students should be able to:

• Discuss the major approaches to ethics;
  
• Evaluate their effectiveness in dealing with ethical issues relating to animals, living things and the environment;
  
• Understand a range of different approaches to environmental ethics;
  
• Present critical analyses of different approaches to environmental ethics;
  
• Explain the difference between intrinsic and instrumental values;
  
• Debate problems concerning the intrinsic value of non-humans;
  
• Demonstrate clear thinking;
  
• Express their own thoughts on environmental ethical issues in discussion and in writing.