PHIL 4328 Environmental Philosophy
This course will look at the vibrant and growing philosophical literature concerned with the environment. This may include ethical questions such as the nature and extent of human responsibility for the environment, whether nature and the environment are intrinsically or instrumentally valuable, the nature and extent of our responsibilities to future generations, whether entities other than humans have moral rights, and the extent to which fights for civil rights and justice play out in an environmental context. It may also include discussions of philosophically rich topics such as the concept of "nature" and "natural," what "sustainability" and "resilience" mean, whether entities like "ecosystems" are real or merely tools for thinking, and how we ought to think about different kinds of knowledge about environments.