natural law is the best approach to environmental issues. Discuss.
“The earth mourns and withers, the world languishes and withers; the earth lies polluted under inhabitants; for they have transgressed the laws, violated the statutes, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore, a curse devours the earth”
(The revised standard version of the bible – Isaiah 24:4-6)
What is natural law?
Natural law is a deontological, absolutist ethical theory, meaning that it is focussed upon “the ethicity of actions”. The ethical theory derives from Aristotle, and his idea that everything has a purpose to fulfil in life; this is the supreme ‘good’ to be sought as we all have a goal to reach that purpose. This goal for humans is eudaimonia, which can translate into happiness; however, it carries more depth in that it carries the idea of living and doing well. The foundational principle is ‘to do good and avoid evil’. This is the ultimate message of natural law. “Natural law is not concerned with what nature does… rather; it is based on nature as interpreted by human reason.” (mel-thompson.co.uk/naturallawlecture).
Natural law is closely linked within Christian teaching because of St. Thomas Aquinas and the impact he had upon the ethic. He continued from Aristotle to develop the theory by describing natural law as a moral code existing within nature. At the heart of the theory is the “eternal law of divine reason” (Bowie- ethical studies).
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Lord of the Flies clearly defines society as being shaped by the individuals ethical nature not by what political system is intact. Any sanction of people or land my attempt to establish a type of government or monarchy. The government or political system may try to shape society how the "leaders" want it, but it will never work out unless the "people" abide. The maturity of the people can play a ...
Natural law maintains that a moral life can only be lived in accordance with reason and reason is vital as it determines that the ultimate purpose of life is fellowship with God. Aquinas’ primary precepts that are required to ensure this goal is reached and fulfilled. The primary precepts are absolutist and do not change with society’s, “natural law is the same for all men” (Aristotle – Nicomachean ethics).
How can natural law be applied to Environmental ethics?
Aquinas developed 5 precepts, “to live, to learn, to reproduce, to live in an ordered society, to worship God” (Aquinas, summa theologica).
These five primary precepts are vital in maintaining a good and prosperous world where we have the ability to flourish. Through these we need to apply the relevant precepts to the environment, therefore, ‘worship God’, ‘to live’ and ‘ordered society’ are applicable precepts that we can develop. Worship God, conveys that we should preserve Gods natural creation and respect it, by doing this we are respecting God and his influence in the world, this is highlighted within the book of Genesis, “have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth”. Ordered Society is also significant because in order to obtain an ordered society it is necessary to have a stable and sufficient environment for us to grow as a culture. By keeping an ordered society we should be sustaining the environment and respecting it. ‘To live’, the environment is beneficial as it gives us oxygen to live and provides springs of water for us to drink. If we cut down a mass of trees and life, we are left with no resources to stay alive and thrive in the world. Also, if we keep releasing large CO2 emissions, we are creating a hole within the Ozone layer- this could eventually leave us with a new extreme climate, ultimately threatening life. Therefore, by damaging the environment we are corrupting and defying the three precepts, deeming us to further our argument and create secondary precepts, for example, ‘to live’, we could create a secondary precept, ‘to swap a car journey for public transport/walking once a week’, or for ‘worship God’ we could acquire the secondary precept, ‘treat Gods creation with absolute respect and love’. Therefore, we are creating secondary rules that will prevent harmful activity toward the environment, so that we can flourish as human beings, and reach eudaimonia; our ultimate goal.
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Question #1 Aquinas says that law is an! ^0 ordination! +/- or! ^0 dictate! +/- of reason, and that these always aim at happiness or blessedness. What Aquinas means here by! ^0 ordination! +/- is that he is saying that ordination is laws that are through God, not by us humans. Unlike God-made-laws, human-made-laws are either just or unjust in which case they do not impose the obligations of ...
To what extent is natural law the best approach to environmental ethics?
Natural law is deontological and absolutist, therefore, sustains the same rules for every person in every culture. This leads to consistent environmental rules, and therefore, the world can reduce their impact on the environment more effectively as we are all subject to following the secondary precepts. The fact that it is deontological means that it is also useful because we are acting as it is intrinsically ‘good’ to act, not because we want to reap the benefits of a better and stable environment.
Natural law is linked with the Christian approach, which means that it respects God’s creation. Therefore, it has the best interest of the environment and supports sustaining it and doing whatever we can to prevent damage. Through the precepts we can instantly conclude that we need to protect the environment, meaning that we shouldn’t cut down rain forests because we are harming Gods creation. It would also encourage cars that are manufactured to not pollute the environment, than those that release large amounts of carbon emissions and pollute. Regarding animals, natural law would view them again, as respected living creatures and therefore, it wouldn’t allow to knowingly cause the extinction of other species. For example, Natural law would deem animal experimentation as morally wrong as just because rats, chimpanzee’s, and farm animals are not “members of our own species, does not give us the right to abuse them for our own ends”(Joe Jenkins- Ethics and Religion).
Aquinas also commented upon animal testing and abuse within Summa Contra Gentiles, arguing that “through being cruel to animals one becomes cruel to human beings”. These are all in accordance with the primary precepts and ensure we do not violate them by going against nature and by not regarding the decreasing natural resources. Through natural law we could also regard the views of Saints, so for example, St. Francis of Assisi conveyed that God communicates to us through animals, trees, creation and the natural world and it is a sin to destroy them. His attitude to the environment is that the natural world is inherent good and is a sign of God’s love. Therefore, we could translate this into the natural law approach, through the precept ‘worship God’, we have to regard the environment he created for us to live within and sustain what he has given us.
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Introduction Natural law theory is not a single theory of law, but the application of ethical or political theories to the questions of how legal orders can acquire, or have legitimacy, and is often presented as a history of such ethical and political ideas. These theories would explained the nature of morality, thus making natural law theory a general moral theory. The basic idea was that man ...
Natural law also respects the environment through the idea of stewardship. This is the idea that God has put us on the earth to protect the environment. This is supported within biblical passages, such as Adam and Eve within Genesis, “God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to till it and keep it”. Humans were created in the image of God and therefore, we have the mission of being stewards of the earth. God gave us freewill over the environment to look after it, not abuse them. This view point is supported through the primary precepts, where not sustaining a healthy environment corrupts various precepts.
To what extent is natural law not a successful approach to environmental ethics?
Primarily the first problem with Natural laws approach to the environment would be its deontological disposition. Although theoretically it may be purer to sustain the environment because it is simply ‘the right thing to do’, it is not actually realistic. A teleological argument would be more beneficial and would encourage more people to actually follow through on acting to save the environment, by preventing extreme climate change, recycling, and lowering CO2 emissions. An ethical theory such as Utilitarianism that is teleological is more successful when applied to the environment in this sense as it considers the consequences if we don’t act and try to save the environment. This is a large motivation that will make people act; because it’s the reality of the situation; if we don’t act the planet eventually won’t survive. This eventual consequence encourages human beings to act and it’s not beneficial that Natural law doesn’t take this into account, making it unrealistic and less successful at saving our environment from further damage. Because the theory is also absolutist, some may say the environment requires a normative ethic, perhaps in this sense Utilitarianism is the best approach as it treats each environmental situation as a unique circumstance, so for example, the gaia
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In this essay, I will discuss the theories behind Natural Law, as well as the qualities it is seen to possess. I will explain Aquinas’ concepts and theory on Natural Law, discussing eudaimonia and the doctrine of the double effect. Finally, I will reflect on some of the positive and negative aspects, in summarising Natural Law theory. It is important to highlight that Natural Laws differ from acts ...
Because natural law is so involved within religious ethics, it is hard to ignore the impact that it has upon the ethical theory, this would not appeal to atheists and non believers because it’s very dependent on the idea of God’s creation, and preserving what God has made. This may not be an attractive quality to one whom doesn’t associate God with the environment.
Natural law places humans at the centre of its theory, for example human reason holds an important status within the theory. The purpose of the theory, being eudaimonia; is also at the heart of the theory; and Aristotle maintains that it is a goal that all humans should obtain. However, what happens when their is a conflict with the environment? Natural law conveys that
