Brian Baxter

The values which are definitive of the humanist project, such as freedom and self-determination, are of central concern to environmentalism. This means, according to Lewis P. Hinchman, that environmentalists should seek a rapprochement with humanism, rather than rejecting it for its apparent anthropocentrism. He argues that this requires in turn the acceptance of those approaches to human self-understanding which are central to the hermeneutic traditions and the rejection of naturalist approaches, such as sociobiology, which is accused of producing deterministic, reifying, reductionist, dehumanising forms of understanding of human beings and human life. This paper seeks to show that sociobiology does not pose the kinds of threat to humanism and environmentalism outlined by Hinchman

Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection is considered in its application to human beings in this book. Brian Baxter examines the various sociobiological approaches to the explanation of human behaviour which view the human brain, and so the human mind, as the product of evolution, and considers the main arguments for and against this claim. In so doing he defends the approaches against some common criticisms, such as the charge that they are reductionist and dehumanising. The implications of these arguments for the social sciences and humanities are assessed, as is the naturalistic view of ethics to which they lead. A key issue examined in the book is the connection between this Darwinist perspective on human beings and modern environmental ethics, which also often assume that human beings are part of an evolved living world. The implications of these positions for the meaningfulness of human life are also examined.Throughout the discussion, the positions in sociobiology and environmental ethics developed by Edward O Wilson are taken as an exemplar of the characteristic features of a Darwinian worldview, and the arguments of Wilson and his chief critics are thoroughly examined.

"As a result of human activities, many organisms on Earth face serious and worsening threats to their continued existence. This is usually regarded as a matter of concern because maintaining a healthy non-human environment affects the well-being of humans. A Theory of Ecological Justice adopts a very different approach, defending in detail the claim that all organisms, sentient and non-sentient, have a claim in justice to a fair share of the planet's environmental resources." "This book makes a thoroughly developed, ground-breaking case for ecological justice. It is an essential read for everyone interested in environmental politics and ethics."--BOOK JACKET.

S. Hailwood argues that if political liberals, in the Rawlsian sense, refuse to grant non-human nature anything other than instrumental value, then they may properly be characterised as human chauvinists, but not as inconsistent political liberals. He also argues that political liberals who do grant non-instrumental value to the nonhuman are thereby committed to a form of moral valuation of the abiotic. However, an analysis of what is involved in regarding non-human biota as possessing instrumental value reveals that humans must recognise the existence of interests, needs and desires of those non-human organisms which they wish to treat instrumentally. Given this, political liberalism in its most persuasive form, as articulated by Barry, implies that political liberals are not permitted to decide arbitrarily that non-human biota have only instrumental value. But the crucial role of interests in this argument precludes the attribution of any form of moral value to the abiotic.