ISBN:
9789400739918
,
1280798998
,
9781280798993
Language:
English
Pages:
Online-Ressource (VII, 568 p. 1 illus, digital)
Series Statement:
The International Library of Environmental, Agricultural and Food Ethics 19
Series Statement:
SpringerLink
Series Statement:
Bücher
Parallel Title:
Buchausg. u.d.T. Maier, Donald S. What's so good about biodiversity?
Keywords:
Philosophy (General)
;
Ethics
;
Philosophy of nature
;
Biodiversity
;
Environmental sciences
;
Economics
;
Philosophy
;
Philosophy (General)
;
Ethics
;
Philosophy of nature
;
Biodiversity
;
Environmental sciences
;
Economics
;
Biodiversity
;
Biodiversität
;
Bewertung
;
Ökosystemdienstleistung
;
Biodiversität
Abstract:
There has been a deluge of material on biodiversity, starting from a trickle back in the mid-1980's. However, this book is entirely unique in its treatment of the topic. It is unique in its meticulously crafted, scientifically informed, philosophical examination of the norms and values that are at the heart of discussions about biodiversity. And it is unique in its point of view, which is the first to comprehensively challenge prevailing views about biodiversity and its value. According to those dominant views, biodiversity is an extremely good thing so good that it has become the emblem of natural value. The book's broader purpose is to use biodiversity as a lens through which to view the nature of natural value. It first examines, on their own terms, the arguments for why biodiversity is supposed to be a good thing. This discussion cuts a very broad and detailed swath through the scientific, economic, and environmental literature. It finds all these arguments to be seriously wanting. Worse, these arguments appear to have consequences that should dismay and perplex most environmentalists. The book then turns to a deeper analysis of these failures and suggests that they result from posing value questions from within a framework that is inappropriate for nature's value. It concludes with a novel suggestion for framing natural value. This new proposal avoids the pitfalls of the ones that prevail in the promotion of biodiversity. And it exposes the goals of conservation biology, restoration biology, and the world's largest conservation organizations as badly ill-conceived.
Description / Table of Contents:
What's So Good About Biodiversity?; Contents; Chapter 1: Prologue; 1.1 Why This Book?; 1.2 Mixing Philosophy with Biology; 1.3 The Scope and Chief Goal of This Book; Chapter 2: Preliminaries; 2.1 An Environmental Philosopher's Conception of Value; 2.1.1 Concepts and Categories of Value; 2.1.2 Approaches and Key Questions of Moral Theory; 2.1.2.1 Consequentialism; 2.1.2.2 Deontology; 2.1.2.3 Virtue Ethics; 2.1.3 Where Biodiversity Fits in the Philosophical Picture; 2.2 Reasoning About Biodiversity - A Catalog of Fallacies; 2.2.1 The Bare Assertion Fallacy
Description / Table of Contents:
2.2.2 Red Herring or Chewbacca Defense2.2.3 Fallacies of Accident; 2.2.4 The Fallacy of Correlation; 2.2.5 Circularity Fallacies or Begging the Question; 2.2.6 The Fallacy of Modality or Speculation Posed as Fact; 2.2.7 The Fallacy of Equivocation; 2.3 Cautionary Signs; 2.3.1 Abstraction; 2.3.2 The Value of Diversity in General; Chapter 3: What Biodiversity Is; 3.1 The Core Concept; 3.1.1 Egalitarianism; 3.1.2 Fungibility; 3.1.3 Questionable Factors; 3.1.3.1 Abundances; 3.1.3.2 Abiotic Conditions; 3.1.3.3 Interactions; 3.1.3.4 Place; 3.2 Characteristics; 3.3 Biological Categories and Kinds
Description / Table of Contents:
3.3.1 Ta legomena in Biology3.3.2 Which Categories and Kinds Qualify; 3.3.2.1 Features; 3.3.2.2 Abundances (Again); 3.3.2.3 Functions; 3.3.3 Multiple Dimensions; 3.3.4 Place and Scale; 3.3.4.1 Place (Again); 3.3.4.2 Scale; Chapter 4: What Biodiversity Is Not; 4.1 Category Mistakes; 4.1.1 Wilderness; 4.1.2 Measures and Indexes; 4.1.3 Particular Species; 4.1.4 Particular Ecosystems; 4.1.5 Biodiversity as Process; 4.2 Accretive Conceptions; 4.2.1 Charisma and Cultural Symbolism; 4.2.2 Rarity; 4.2.2.1 Geographical Rarity; 4.2.2.2 Abundance Rarity; 4.2.3 Uniqueness
Description / Table of Contents:
Chapter 5: The Calculus of Biodiversity Value5.1 How Biodiversity Relates to Its Value; 5.1.1 The Incremental Model; 5.1.2 The Quantum Jump Model; 5.1.3 The Threshold Model; 5.1.4 The Just-So Model; 5.2 Value Interrelationships; 5.3 The Moral Force of Biodiversity; Chapter 6: Theories of Biodiversity Value; 6.1 Unspecified "Moral Reasons"; 6.2 Biodiversity as Resource; 6.3 Biodiversity as Service Provider; 6.4 Biodiversity as (Human) Life Sustainer; 6.5 Biodiversity as a Cornerstone of Human Health; 6.5.1 Biodiversity as Pharmacopoeia; 6.5.2 Biodiversity as Safeguard Against Infection
Description / Table of Contents:
6.6 Biodiversity as Progenitor of Biophilia6.7 Biodiversity as Value Generator; 6.8 Biodiversity as Font of Knowledge; 6.9 Biodiversity Options; 6.9.1 Option Value and Conservation; 6.9.2 Risk, Uncertainty and Ignorance; 6.9.3 Quasi-option Value and Conservation; 6.9.4 Specific Claims About the Option Value of Biodiversity; 6.9.4.1 Phylogeny; 6.9.4.2 Bioprospecting; 6.9.4.3 Ecological Option Value; 6.10 Biodiversity as Transformative; 6.11 The Experiential Value of Biodiversity; 6.12 Biodiversity as the Natural Order; 6.13 Other Value-Influencing Factors; 6.13.1 Viability and Endangerment
Description / Table of Contents:
6.13.2 Efficiency
Note:
Description based upon print version of record
DOI:
10.1007/978-94-007-3991-8
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