the land ethic, moral development, and ecological rationality

The Southern Journal of Philosophy (2007) Vol. XLV

The Land Ethic, Moral Development,and Ecological Rationality

Charles StarkeyClemson University

Abstract

There has been significant debate over both the imiplications and themerit of Leopold's land ethic. I consider the two most prominentobjections and a resolution to them. One of these objections is that, farfrom being an alternative to an "economic" or cost-benefit perspective onenvironmental issues, Leopold's land ethic merely broadens the range ofeconomic considerations to be used in addressing such issues. The otherobjection is that the land ethic is a form of "environmental fascism"because it subordinates the welfare of humans to the good of theecological whole. I argue that these objections are based on afundamental misunderstanding of his theory by advocates and detractorsalike. The land ethic is centrally a psychological theory of moraldevelopment and ecological rationality that advocates a shift in the waythat environmental problems are conceptualized and approached.

Introduction

In his land ethic, Aldo Leopold advocates a change in "the roleof Homo sapiens from conqueror of the land-community toplain memher and citizen of it."^ The impact of his work onenvironmental thinking is immeasurahle, and it is perhapsthe most historically important and influential articulation ofan environmental ethic. Wallace Stegner has referred toLeopold's A Sand County Almanac, in which the land ethic isproposed, as a "prophetic."^ Research centers and foundationshave heen named in Leopold's honor. However, its receptionhas been mixed, and there has heen significant dehate overhoth the implications and the merit of the theory; it issometimes regarded as stirring hut impractical. Philosophical

Charles Starkey is assistant professor of philosophy and fellow ofthe Robert J. Rutland Institute for Ethics at Clemson University. Hisresearch interests include ethical theory, moral psychology, and emotiontheory.

149

Charles Starkey

criticism of the theory has been much more damning than this,and interestingly, the two most prominent philosophical criti-cisms of the theory are diametrically opposed. One of theseobjections is that, far from being an alternative to an "eco-nomic" or cost-benefit perspective on environmental issues,Leopold's land ethic merely broadens the range of economicconsiderations to be used in addressing such issues and isthus itself essentially an economic environmental ethic, albeitmore subtle and complex than that provided by a traditionalcost-benefit perspective. The other objection is that the landethic is a form of "environmental fascism" because it sub-ordinates the welfare of humans to the good of the ecologicalwhole in such a way that it is incompatible with the idea ofhuman rights.

I argue that these objections are based on a substantial mis-reading of Leopold's theory: the land ethic is properly under-stood as a theory of psychological development. Regarded assuch, it can respond to these objections because it is centrallya theory of moral development that advocates a shift in theway that environmental problems are understood andapproached, rather than a simple expansion of the range ofenvironmental considerations or an elevation of the ecologicalwhole to the diminishment of human rights. What is called forin Leopold's expansion of the ethical sphere is not the adoptionof a moral principle but a repositioning of the perspectivefrom which the land is seen and understood—more specifi-cally, the development of an ecological rationality constitutedby a fundamental psychological reframing of issues involvingland use.^ This is not however a simply exegetical essay. Iargue that the claims of the land ethic understood in this wayare borne out by ensuing work in psychology and cognitivescience, and such work provides critical support for the landethic as the basis of an environmental ethic. In section 1, Ioutline the land ethic; in section 2, I consider two centralobjections to the land ethic; in section 3, I argue for a newunderstanding of the land ethic; in section 4, I discuss therole of framing and ecological rationality in moral psychology;in section 5, I respond to the objections to the land ethic andoutline other benefits of this interpretation of the land ethic;in section 6, I address two possible objections to the landethic understood in this way.

1. The Land Ethic

Leopold claims that the land ethic is a necessary developmentaway from the predominant view that the land and its useare to be considered in terms of human economic self-interest.Many parts of the land community lack commercial value butare nonetheless important because of the interdependent

150

The Land Ethic, Moral Development, and Ecological Rationality

nature of its various components. The prevailing economicview of the land is myopic in that it discounts those parts ofthe land community that are of no immediate economic valueto humans but are necessary to the healthy functioning of theother parts of the land community and the community as awhole. Leopold's central argument for the interdependence ofthe community utilizes a model of a hiotic pyramid, in which"each successive layer depends on those helow it for food andoften for other services, and each in turn furnishes food andservices to those above."* The lines of dependency for theseservices and food are food chains, and in this model eachspecies is a link in many chains. Leopold's point here is thatthe relations between species are very complex, and thiscomplexity obscures the dependence on cooperation betweenthe parts for the stability of the system.

Change is endemic to this intertwined biotic system, butwhen change occurs to one part of the system, the rest of thesystem must adjust to it. The natural changes to the systemover time have been slow and local, but, Leopold contends,"Man's invention of tools has enabled him to make changes ofunprecedented violence, rapidity, and scope."^ This ability onthe part of humans to make sudden changes to parts of thesystem poses a threat to other parts of the system and to theoverall stability of the system. Such power is particularlydangerous because the interdependence of the various systemsin the biotic community is not recognized by humans, thusleaving the door open for use of the land that endangers theentire biotic community.

To Leopold, an ethic involves a differentiation betweensocial and antisocial conduct and a limitation on freedom ofaction and is, at its root, a "tendency of interdependent indi-viduals or groups to evolve modes of cooperation."^ Coopera-tive mechanisms develop because they are necessary forsurvival and flourishing, and as populations evolve andenvironments change, so also does the ethic of a populationchange. Leopold identifies three successive developmentalsequences in the course of the social evolution of humanbeings. In the first, ethics involves the relation betweenindividuals, and in the second, ethics involves the relationbetween the individual and society. The third ethical para-digm, which has yet to come to fruition, involves the relationbetween human beings and the land. Leopold regards thedevelopment of this ethic as both a possibility for humans andan ecological necessity for the sustainability of the landcommunity.

The central characteristic of this progression of ethicalparadigms is the enlargement, over time, of what we may callthe boundaries of the moral community. This enlargementinvolves a broadening of the range of moral concerns rather

151

Charles Starkey

than a shift in which some concerns are replaced by otherconcerns. The first ethic is based on the recognition of theinterdependence of specific individuals and their need tocooperate with each other. The second ethic is based on therecognition of the moral standing of larger groups of people,rather than local collections of concrete others belonging tothe same small community. The land ethic, in turn, furtherenlarges the boundaries of the moral community so that itencompasses "soils, waters, plants, and animals."' It is in theadoption of this third paradigm that the change in role fromconqueror of the land-community to member and citizen of ittakes place. To Leopold, this paradigm implies respect on thepart of bumans for tbe other members of tbe land communityand for tbe community as sucb.

2. Economic Motive andEnvironmental Fascism

One objection tbat bas been leveled against tbis tbeory is tbatin tbe end it does not in fact propose an alternative to wbatLeopold refers to as "economic motive." Leopold's centralargument for tbe land etbic ascribes an importance to tbevarious parts of tbe biotic community because of tbeinterdependence of its members (including bumans) on eacbotber for tbeir well-being and continuance and calls attentionto tbe myopic ignorance of tbe empbasis on sbort-termeconomic self-interest. But bow different, one may ask, is tbisfrom a traditional economic approacb to tbe environment?Take for instance William Baxter's environmental tbeory. Tobim, dealing witb tbe land and solving environmental problemsis simply a matter of cost—benefit analysis. Devoting resourcesto one tbing—sucb as wildlife conservation—is to moveresources away from otber tbings tbat are valued by bumans,and so decisions regarding tbe use of tbe land are reducibleto tbe determination of tbe relative costs and benefits of, forexample, producing consumer goods versus preserving wildlife.Tbus, "One builds a dam or cleans a river by diverting laborand steel and trucks and factories from making one kind ofgoods to making anotber" and "tbe costs of controllingpollution are best expressed in terms of tbe otber goods tbatwe will bave to give up to do tbe job."^ So to Baxter, tbere areopportunity costs in all decisions regarding tbe land. Putin Leopold's terms, tbe cost of preserving a part of tbe bioticsystem can be expressed in terms of tbe forgoing of otbergoods.

Leopold's cbarge is tbat tbe range of considerations indetermining cost is too narrow because it is restricted toeconomic value understood as commercial value, and be callsattention to tbe necessity of tbe uneconomic parts of tbe land

152

The Land Ethic, Moral Development, and Ecological Rationahty

community for the functioning of the economic parts.^ However,this appears to be symmetrical with Baxter's approach to theuse of the land. The myopia that Leopold warns of can beaddressed by making the analysis of cost and benefits moresubtle and more expansive, so that such analysis recognizesthe multiple, far-reaching effects of land use and, accordingly,factors in the interdependent relations between members ofthe land community in determining the true cost of anyinstance of land use. Scott Lehman interprets the land ethicin this way, stating that:

Although Leopold claims for communities of plants and animals a"right to continued existence," his argument is homocentric,appealing to the human stake in preservation. Basically it is anargument from enlightened self-interest, where the self in questionis not an individual human being but humanity—present andfuture—as a whole.'"

Understood in this way, Leopold's theory is simply an enlight-ened economic environmental ethic—enlightened because itrecognizes the interlinked "tangle of chains" that constitutesthe relation between the parts of the land community that areof economic value in the narrow (commercial) sense and theparts of the land community that are of economic value in thebroader sense.

A radically different complaint raised against the landethic is that, far from being too conservative, the theory is tooradical and conflicts with some basic intuitions about humanrights. This criticism has been articulated by Tom Regan asa charge that the land ethic is an instance of "environmentalfascism."" Regan's claim is based on Leopold's assertion that"a thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity,stability, and beauty of the biotic community" and "wrongwhen it tends otherwise."^^ In the spirit of Regan, KristinShrader-Frechette notes that the land ethic seems to sub-ordinate the welfare of all creatures to the welfare of thebiotic community. Thus, human populations that disrupt theintegrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community could,according to this principle, be done away with or at leastculled up to the point that they no longer pose a threat to thestability of the biotic community." The land ethic, they claim,is thus fundamentally incompatible with the idea of humanrights and human dignity because humans in the theory areonly valuable insofar as they serve the ends of the biotic whole.

3. The Land Ethic Reconsidered

So Leopold's land ethic has been attacked from both sides, astoo conservative and too radical. These objections are circum-

153

Charles Starkey

vented if the land ethic is understood as a psychoculturaltheory of moral development, that is, as a theory of psycho-logical development operating at the cultural level, notmerely at the individual level.

3.1 Moral Agency and Perspective

In outlining this view of the land ethic, I'll begin by consider-ing some intuitions about human psychology. What; would wethink of someone with whom we live in close quarters (asibling at home or perhaps a roommate at an academic con-ference) who shows no regard for our belongings, taking themat will as if the belongings were theirs? We would certainlybe annoyed by their behavior, but in addition to this, it islikely that we would think that there is not only a moralfailing of courtesy or respect but also an epistemic deficit—that is, that there is something that they just don't get, thatthey don't understand. This sense of a failure of understand-ing is worth considering. What is it that they fail to under-stand? A compelling possibility is that it is something like thefact of our intierdependence as people living in close quartersand our need to be able to rely on each other. Their failure tounderstand seems to be based on a deficient perspective ontheir relations with others. Similarly, consider someone with aclinical sociopathic disorder. Symptoms of this disorder includeno sense of responsibility, impulsiveness, deceitfulness, chron-ically antisocial behavior, lack of guilt, and self-centeredness."Putting aside the similarity between this and a simpledescription of adolescence, we may note that in cases of thisdisorder their fault seems to be at least as epistemic as it ismoral: they simply lack a real understanding of the recipro-cal dependence of people on a minimal measure of good willtoward other people. Again, part of the fault is their lack of aperspective that includes the recognition of the interdepen-dence of their relationships and interactions with otherpeople.^' The claim that they lack this perspective can be bothdescriptive and normative—we fault them for lacking theappropriate sort of perspective as well as observe that theylack the perspective. These considerations seem intuitivelycorrect and correspond with a commonplace in developmentalliterature that human psychological development involvesmoving beyond an egocentric perspective and internalizing arecognition of the need for cooperation.^^

Two alternative explanations of the psychology behind thebehavior are that the person simply does not apply a rule orset of rules regarding proper respect for other people andtheir property, and that the person does apply the rule andknows that what they are doing is wrong, but acts akratically,that is, acts against what they know to be the right thing to

154


do. Witb respect to tbe first, it seems wrong to claim tbat tbeiractions consist in not applying rules about respect. Ourbebavior toward otber people and tbeir property isn't typicallygoverned by explicit rules tbat we apply as we interact witbpeople. Granted, tbere are situations wbere rules areexplicitly attended to in an effort to follow tbem (e.g., "Don'tforget to say 'Tbank you.' before you leave tbe party"), buttbis is atypical and arguably tbe result of tbe awareness of afailure to automatically act in a manner mandated by tberule (sucb as consistently failing to tbank bosts before leavinga party). Of course, one may claim tbat to follow a rule caninclude following a rule tbat one bas internalized, so tbatfollowing a rule can consist in acting according to a normtbat one may or may not be explicitly aware of or articulateto oneself." According to tbis explanation, applying a ruleregarding respect for otbers involves following norms ofrespect toward otber people, and tbe person can be construedas failing to apply a rule in tbe sense tbat tbey fail to actaccording to a norm. But following tbese norms does notinvolve explicitly following a rule. Ratber, tbe rule isinternalized and tbe norm governs tbeir bebavior witbout anyexplicit tbougbt on tbe matter. Acting according to normsunderstood in tbis way is largely tbe same as acting witb acertain perspective, and conversely, failing to act is largelytbe same as lacking as certain perspective—to internalizeand to accept a norm is typically to incorporate tbe norm intoour perspective so tbat tbe norm affects bow we act even insituations wbere we do not explicitly follow a rule or tbinkabout tbe norm governing our bebavior. Certain norms ofpropriety can cause us to go out of our way to tbank tbe bostof a party before leaving, and norms of respect for person cancause us to act accordingly witbout explicitly tbinking aboutrules of respect or our attitudes about respect toward otberpeople. But again, tbese norms of respect can be understoodas a perspective on our relation to otber people ratber tbanas a set of rules, and tbis indicates tbat tbe failure to act in arespectful way is a matter of lacking a perspective ratbertban failing to apply a rule.

Tbe otber possibility is tbat tbe person does apply a rule,but acts akratically. Tbis explanation is inadequate forreasons just given, namely, tbat it is incorrect to say tbattbey are applying a rule. Tbe explanation migbt be reformu-lated as tbe claim tbat tbey bave tbe perspective at issue butact akratically, tbat is, against wbat tbeir perspective suggestsis tbe rigbt course of action. So tbey migbt bave a perspectivetbat includes norms of respect for people but, wben faced witb adecision, act against tbose norms because it is more convenientfor tbem to ignore tbe promptings of tbe perspective. Sucbakratic bebavior is possible and presumably quite common, but

155

Charles Starkey

it does not account for all instances of the behavior at issue. Itis likely that some people simply do not have the perspective, sothat respect for others does not enter into their thoughts aboutwhat to do. The decision of the captain of the Patna to flee theship in Joseph Conrad's Lord Jim is motivated not by fear forhis life, but by a belief that the passengers on the ship, beingno more than "cattle," are simply not worth trying to save. ^The captain is not acting akratically because he sees no pointin risking his own safety by assisting the passengers. Inaddition, in the event that someone incorporates a recognitionof interdependence and respect in their perspective but suchrecognition consistently fails to sway their behavior, one maypresume that they lack the perspective. In their perspective,the recognition is of such little significance that the perspec-tivecan be said to be different in kind from a perspective in whichthe recognition of interdependency and respect is a significantand salient feature and resonates with the person as they goabout acting. Accordingly, though such behavior is in some casesthe result of akrasia, in many cases it is likely the result of thelack of a moral perspective that would mandate such behavior.

The moral deficiency described above is thus justifiablycharacterized as the lack of a certain moral perspective. Thismoral perspective is the way in which one apprehends morallyrelevant situations and is conceptually prior to one's delibera-tive reasoning. The groundbreaking work by Lawrence Kohlbergon differences in moral "reasoning" provides empirical supportfor the role of perspective in moral judgment and moraldevelopment. His work reveals different perspectives behindexplicit reasoning—subjects in his studies had different ways ofpicturing the moral issues, even when the answers to moraldilemmas posed to them were identical. On the basis of changesover time in the moral reasoning of the subjects of his studies,Kohlberg identifies three levels of moral thinking, the precon-ventional, conventional, and postconventional, and each of theseinvolve "distinct views of the social-moral world." ^ The precon-ventional level involves an egocentric perspective, interpretingcultural labels of good and bad and right and wrong in terms ofreward and punishment. Subjects at this level are responsive tothese labels, but the labels are made sense of in terms of theeffects of the act on the subject. At the conventional level,expectations and rules of family, group, or nation are perceivedas valuable in their own right. Thus, when subjects move fromthe preconventional to the conventional level, the moralperspective of the subjects expands beyond the subjects them-selves toward those people or social institutions that thesubjects identify with. Right and wrong and good and bad areconstituted by the norms and expectations of those groups. Atthe postconventional level, right and wrong and good and badare seen as being independent of the authority or conventions of

156


groups tbat tbe subject identifies witb and independent of tbeirmembersbip in a group. Here again, tbe perspective of tbesubject broadens so tbat it includes all of bumankind, not merelypeople belonging to groups witb wbom tbe subject identifies.

Koblberg focuses on tbe researcb data being indicative of aprogression toward tbe adoption of abstract principles sucb asbuman rigbts, but tbe statements of tbe subjects clearly reflectan expanding moral domain underlying tbeir moral reasoning.As tbe subjects move from preconventional to conven-tional andpostconventional levels of moral development, tbe domain of tbemoral expands from oneself to one's community, and on to amoral perspective tbat includes all people. Tbe abstractprinciples appealed to in tbe tbird level of moral developmentsucb as tbe intrinsic value of buman life or buman rigbts areindicative of an expansion of tbe range of moral considerationbeyond one's community or nation to include all buman beings. "Tbe reasons tbat are appealed to by tbe subjects are indicative ofa perspective and are a means of articulating tbeir perspective,and tbe cbanges in tbe reasons are in turn indicative of cbangesin tbeir perspective. Indeed, Koblberg bimself believes tbatunderlying eacb level of moral develop-ment is a sociomoralperspective, wbicb composes "tbe point of view tbe individualtakes in defining botb social facts and sociomoral values, orougbts."^^ Tbe function of a moral perspective is explicitly notedby Carol Gilligan, wbose work follows in tbe same tradition asKoblberg. Gilligan observes tbat tbe objects of perception aretypically ambiguous and can be perceptually organized in moretban one way. A figure can be seen in several different ways,and past experiences and expectations can affect tbe perceptualorganization of wbat is seen. Similarly, sbe adds, an object ofmoral perception can be organized in different ways or seenfrom different perspectives.^^ Her influential distinctionbetween care and justice moral perspectives is connected to tbisobservation, and tbougb sbe rejects Koblberg's specific model oflevels of moral development, ber tbeory also involves tbe expan-sion of moral perspective.^^ Tbus, common to botb Koblberg andGilligan is tbe idea tbat a perspective underlies tbe moraldynamic tbat is recognized by tbe moral agent as well as tbemoral judgments tbat are ensuingly made by tbe agent.Understood in tbis way, moral development isn't a matter of tbeadoption of moral principles or virtues but, ratber, tbe adoptionof a new perspective from wbicb one makes sense of andarticulates moral situations. Moral principles are articulationsof wbat is salient witbin tbe moral perspective.

3.2 Cultural Perspective and the Land Ethic

Work in developmental psycbology tbus provides evidence tbatmoral development consists in an expanding moral perspective.

157

Charles Starkey

However, it regards the psychology of individuals rather thangroups of people and in this way differs from Leopold's emphasison a cultural perspective rather than the perspectives of specificindividuals. The viability of the land ethic as a theory ofcultural psychological development depends on the plausibilityof cultural moral perspectives and on the ability of suchperspectives to change.

With respect to the first, there is evidence that morallyrelevant psychological perspectives can be attributed to cultures,that is, that perspective is a characteristic of cultural as well asindividual psychology. Such perspectives play a significant rolein the way that the members of the culture understand theworld around them and, accordingly, in the way that they act.One example of a cultural psychological perspective is found inthe conception of the self that is employed by various cultures.The psychologists Hazel Marcus and Shinobu Kitayama haveconducted cross-cultural studies of the concept of self, comparingin particular Western and Japanese views of the self, anddescribe the Western view of the self as an independent construaland the Japanese view as an example of an interdependentconstrual. In Western cultures there is a "faith in the inherentseparateness of distinct persons" and in the "uniqueness of eachperson's configuration of internal attributes."^* Many non-Western cultures, in contrast, conceive of the self in terms of"the fundamental connectedness of human beings to each other."The Japanese word for self, for instance, "refers to 'one's shareof the shared life space'."^^ In this way. Western and Japanesecultures have a fundamentally different conception of the self.Work by Catherine Lutz indicates similar differences betweenWestern conceptions of the self and relationships and thoseamong Sufi Muslims and the Ifaluk of Micronesia.^^ Thesediffering conceptions illustrate the simple but important pointthat psychological perspectives operate at the cultural as wellas the individual level. Cultural psychological perspectives areconstituted by a compound of conceptual paradigms, beliefs, andnorms, and to live in a culture is typically to adopt the perspec-tive of that culture, just as one adopts a language. The cultureof course has a formative effect on the perspective of theindividual members of the culture, including perspectives on therelation between self, society, and environment. These perspec-tives on the self are moreover relevant to the moral lives ofthose within the respective cultures in that they affect norms ofinteraction between people.

There is evidence as well that cultural psychological perspec-tives can develop and change over time. These changes caninclude changes in the range of things that fall within thedomain of the moral, such as the decline of honor culture in theAmerican South, and changing norms, such as the relativeimportance of nuclear versus extended families.^' With each of

158


these there is not simply a change in what one considers right,wrong, or important, but also a perspective from which thesecultural institutions are seen and understood. It is this sort ofcultural psychological change that is at the heart of Leopold'sland ethic, as well as a change that involves the expansion ofthe domain of moral consideration in a way much like thedevelopmental path revealed in Kohlberg's studies.

Consider Leopold's description of the historical expansion ofthe domain of the moral. He describes Odysseus' vision of slave-girls in his household as property, so that their treatment wasnot a question of propriety because "the disposal of propertywas then, as now, a matter of expediency, not right and wrong."This is not simply Odysseus' point of view: Leopold uses thisexample not to make a point about Odysseus' moral perspectivespecifically but rather about the moral perspective of theculture within which Odysseus lived, and of which Odysseus isa single example. Leopold notes "During the three thousandyears which have since elapsed, ethical criteria have beenextended to many fields of conduct, with corresponding shrinkagein those judged by expediency only." ® This is clearly an expan-sion of the moral realm, and to Leopold, the basis of thisdevelopment rests in symbiosis, that is, the "tendency of inter-dependent individuals or groups to evolve modes of coopera-tion."^^ The extension of ethics that he identifies is broughtabout by changes in interdependency that result in newsymbioses. As people and collections of people have becomemore interdependent, their attitudes have changed and theirmoral perspectives have expanded. The land ethic involves achange in perspective that expands the moral realm so that itincludes the land and so that the "despoliation of the land isseen as not only inexpedient but wrong."^" He thus regards theland ethic as a possible evolutionary development, and onethat is moreover necessary from an ecological point of view.

What is advocated here is a developmental change in culturalpsychology (and by implication, the psychology of those withinit) that expands the domain of the moral beyond that of humanbeings, so that nonhumans are afforded moral consideration.Understood in this way, the land ethic is primarily a theory ofhuman moral development. As human beings have becomeaware, to an increasing extent, of the breadth of their inter-dependence, so has the range of morality grown. A move to theland ethic is simply—but profoundly—another expansion ofhuman moral vision.

This moral development should not be equated with anevolutionary change in the sense of biological or psychologicalchange resulting from group selection. Moral development inLeopold's sense is distinct from evolutionary conceptions ofmoral development, which center on the idea that a change inmoral perspective is a product of an adaptive advantage that

159

Charles Starkey

becomes a genetically based characteristic of the species. Suchtheories hold that socially beneficial psychological traitsincluding altruism and loyalty develop through group-levelselection, in which the traits are selected hecause they arehelpful to that group. Evolutionary development has heenincreasingly appealed to in explaining altruistic hehavior andthe development of altruistic emotions. ^ Though Leopold refersto evolution in descrihing the land ethic, the focus is on changesin moral perspective—such as the expansion of the moraldomain since the time of Odysseus—that are not evolutionaryin this sense. They evolve in the sense that culture evolves.Thus, the development identified here does not consist in theevolutionary development of a new psychological module orcapacity that makes possihle the expansion of the moralperspective. Rather, it is a development that is a product of thecurrent psychological features of human heings. This shift inperspective is dependent on what is perhaps an evolved capacityto have such shifts—a sort of psychological plasticity—hut suchshifts are not themselves evolutionary.

Accordingly, a move to a land ethic does not consist in thedevelopment of a psychological "land ethic" module—rather,we use existing resources and structures within our hrain torecognize interdependency and internalize standards ofconduct accordingly. ^ A poignant example such recognition andensuing hehavioral changes is the spontaneous cooperation thatoccurred during trench warfare in WWI. Rohert Axelrod notesthat initially the fighting was mobile and very bloody, but "asthe line stabilized, nonaggression between the troops emergedspontaneously in many places along the front. The earliestinstances may have been associated with meals that wereserved at the same times on both sides of no-man's land."'^Troops on either s de would cease to shell each other on a rigidschedule that enabled them to enjoy a hot meal and, in latercases, minimized casualties on hoth sides. The hehavior wasreciprocal and thus beneficial to both groups; it is illustrative ofthe development of cooperative hehavior that is not evolu-tionary. Though the capacity to engage in such behavior mayhave evolved, the development of the cooperative relationshipitself does not depend on further evolution. * Note however thatthe shift in behavior in this example is temporary, whereaswhat Leopold is advocating is a cultural fixture that likeindividualist and social perspectives on the self is durable,stable, and widespread.

4. Framing and Ecological Rationality

The importance of something like perspective in moral thinkingis underscored in work on practical reason. Philosophers andpsychologists have noted that our minds frame the situations

160


that we encounter, so that what is brought to our attention forconsideration is a selection of a multitude of possible choices.Framing refers to the set of psychological processes that mustoccur in order to enable the focusing of attention on particularinformation (ideally, relevant information) and the dealing witha number of possible inferences that is narrow enough for themind to be able to make decisions. As Daniel Dennett observes,"There must be ... some highly efficient, partly generative orproductive systems of representing—storing for use—all theinformation needed" for comprehension and inference to takeplace. ^ It is at this point, after framing, that we consider theselected alternatives and decide between the alternatives oract upon one of them. This process of framing is necessarybecause thinking through all possible inferences and coursesof action is, in practical terms, not possible. Part of whatconstitutes this framing is the possession of a certain perspectivewithin which there is a limited range of choices. A particularframe serves as a heuristic that both limits the amount of infor-mation taken in and determines what information to attend to.

With respect to perception, framing serves to organize andstructure sensory information. Perceptual experience is notthe awareness of "raw" sensory information. There is muchmore information in our environment and in our minds thanwe can deal with, and it can be organized in a multitude ofdifferent ways. Our ability to perceive objects and events ispredicated on our selectively attending to and conceptualizingsensory information in a certain way. This is necessarily tothe exclusion of other possible ways of attending to and concep-tualizing the information. Thus, experience is not unmediatedby cognitive processes; what is perceived is a product of theorganization and recognition of certain percepts from the massof sensory information taken in from the world around us. Theinformation that is taken in is both reduced and given somemeasure of significance as it is conditioned by cognitiveprocesses. ^

Framing also enables one to selectively attend to a narrowrange of salient information and a limited number of inferenceswhen making decisions. When things are cognized and decisionsmust be made, there is often an infinite variety of possibleconsequences and thus situations that must in principle beconsidered before coming to a decision, but there are significantcomputational constraints on the number of consequences thatcan be considered when a decision must be made. Thus forexample, to perceive an object rapidly moving toward us neces-sitates the conditioning of sensory information, and to recognizethat it presents a threat and deal with it requires selectiveattention. These two processes of forming perceptions andattending to particular information and possible inferences aredistinct but intertwined. If a car makes a sudden stop in front

161

Charles Starkey

of us, we notice the car instead of the beautiful vista to our left,and when approached by a snarling dog we are aware of thedog's bared teeth rather than the deft proportions that make ita specimen of a pit bull. When situations are cognized, somefeatures that are recognized are more salient than others, andthe salient features of the situation determine courses of action.So to perceive a situation in a certain way is often to be motiva-ted to act in a certain way, and the course of action that onetakes (or is strongly disposed to take) is in the perception itself. ^

The relevance of framing to morality consists in the role offraming in perception and practical reason. A moral perspec-tive is a frame in this sense because the perspective serves as astructure that organizes and limits information about one'senvironment that is attended to. To see that a child needs helpas s/he is about to walk into the middle of a busy street is toput aside the other information about our environment avail-able to us and to focus on action possibilities related to the child.The goal of a frame in the domain of morality is to directattention to, and focus inferences on, information that is mostconducive to thriving or otherwise morally appropriate attention,cognition, and behavior. The moral perspectives identified byKohlberg can be seen as frames because they are ways of organi-zing and making sense of situations involving moral dynamics.

Like internalized norms, these moral frames are ways ofquickly and efficiently organizing information about the socialenvironment, thus enabling a rapid cognition of and responseto environmental conditions. In fact norms, once internalized,become part of the psychological repertoire that constitutessuch frames. The value of perception, we might say, is to see theworld as it truly is, but to attend to those aspects of what weencounter that are most relevant to our well-being, includingour moral relationships. What Amelie Rorty writes about therationality of what she terms "psychological attitudes" (such aslove, joy, indignation, fear, and desire) is illustrative of theimportance of framing.

What is it then that we want, when we want psychological attitudesto be rational? There is often no one whose inferences are morelogical, more formally impeccable, and often there is no one moretruthful, than the local lunatic. It is because his impeccable andexemplary truth-preserving inferences do not serve him in theright way that the local lunatic is in trouble. No particular addi-tional truth or inference can help him.... We want more than thatour attitudes be corrigible by considerations of truth and validity. Wealso want them to be appropriately informed to suit our thriving. *

In the same way, we want to properly understand and attend toaspects of our environment that are relevant to our thriving,and doing so involves having the appropriate frame. One way of

162


describing this process of framing directed at thriving is interms of ecological rationality, as it involves the goal of success-ful cognitive and behavioral interaction of an organism with itsenvironment. This approach focuses on "identifying simple, fast,and effective heuristics that work within the computationalconstraints of an organism and the informational constraintsof the environment and still result in adaptively adequatebehavior."^^ The concept of framing is purely descriptive—itrefers to a process that must occur in order for humans to per-ceive and problem-solve in the way that they do. Ecologicalrationality in contrast is a normative concept in that it dealswith psychological functioning that is appropriate to the interestsof the organism.*"

What Leopold is advocating can be described as a type offraming based on ecological rationality, that is, the extractionand conceptualization of information about the environmentthat is most conducive to the thriving of the individual, popula-tion, or ecosystem. The relevant environment is not merely thehuman social environment but the natural environment as well.Within this frame, the land is seen as worthy of respect andmoral consideration, and certain choices are presented as possi-bilities and other possible choices and courses of action aresimply not noticed. To Leopold, the land ethic is justified byconsiderations of ecological rationality because it is moreconducive to proper decisions regarding land use than perspec-tives that do not include a recognition of the significance of theenvironment. So the concept of ecological rationality provides anormative specification for framing: having the appropriateframe in perceiving, cognizing and making decisions regardingthe environment includes internalizing a recognition of theinterdependence of humans and the land. The land ethic is notmerely a descriptive theory of moral psychology. It is givennormative force by the concept of ecological rationality.

5. The Viability of the Land Ethic

This conception of the land ethic provides it with the means torespond to the two chief objections raised against it. First, theland ethic is not simply an economic model with a substantiallybroadened cost-benefit analysis because it involves a shift inthe very way that the land is conceived. This is a fundamentalchange in moral perspective because it internalizes the recogni-tion of interdependence and in doing so changes our vision ofthe land, not merely the scope of our cost-benefit calculations.Just as we "see" people differently if we consider people, aspeople, worthy of some baseline level of respect, so we see theland differently if we consider it worthy of a baseline level ofrespect. Similarly, just as a person does not become morallyenlightened by adopting a policy of carefully weighing the long-

163

Charles Starkey

term cost and benefits of robbing or hurting another person, soa culture does not become morally enlightened by adopting apolicy of carefully weighing the long-term costs and benefits ofdespoiling the land. The difference between a sociopath and a"normal" person is a difference in perspective, not a differencein the range of calculations that they make regarding theirbehavior. We would think of someone as odd who constantlycalculates just how much they can hurt and transgress againstothers without being punished, rather than internalizing normsof respect, and we should similarly think of someone as odd whofocuses on calculating just how much environmental damagecan be done without it coming around and seriously hurtingthem. As with a normal person interacting with other people,respect for the land is internalized and places limits on the rangeof options that are entertained.

Thinking of the land ethic as a shift in perspective addressesthe second objection as well. The charge that the land ethicadvocates a sort of environmental fascism seems false. Leopold'sclaim that "a thing is right when it tends to preserve theintegrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community" is justthe sort of view that is entailed by the adoption of the moralperspective of the land ethic. But the adoption of this perspec-tive is as a guide, not the adoption of a categorical moral axiom.In other words, the land ethic consists of a change in vision, nota change in rules. In this way, it is no more anti-individualisticthan a perspective that emphasizes norms of social cooperation.Accordingly, the land ethic need not involve the subordination ofall species to the interests of the biotic community. Moreover, ascare ethicists and others have noted, we might have special orpriority obligations to certain relationships, in this case inter-human relationships, in a way that is compatible with universalobligations.^^ Just as giving greater weight to the interests ofloved ones and those with whom we share close relationships iscompatible with respect for all humans, so giving some greaterweight to human beings is compatible with respect for othermembers of the biotic community and for the biotic communityas a whole. This allows for holding that we have specialrelationships with humans, as humans, and that humans thuscan have priority over other parts of the land community withrespect to our treatment of them.*^ Thus, the land ethic accom-modates the idea of human rights, and the adoption of thisperspective does not entail the absolutist priority of the bioticwhole that is attributed to the theory by those who claim that itis environmentally fascist. Moreover, Leopold's theory providesa powerful argument that environmental progress requires anexpansive reframing of our cultural perspective on the relationbetween humans and the environment that will produce anecological rationality more suited to the thriving of the bioticcommunity, human and otherwise.

164


In addition to circumventing the above objections, the landethic has significant advantages over other types of environ-mental theory. This theory is superior to an economic cost-benefit approach because the latter has an unrealistic picture ofdecision-making, ignoring the framing that is the hasis ofdecision-making, including cost-benefit analyses. As a result ofthis, it ignores the need for a framing in which the environmenthas a significant place in order to be ahle to, in the aggregate,make appropriate choices regarding the environment. Moreover,the framing of environmental issues from a perspective of self-interest or social-interest encourages risking environmentaldamage hy allowing or encouraging the downplaying of evidenceof risks of human practices and the seizing on any informationthat calls into question the risks, even when the preponderanceof evidence suggests otherwise. The furious pace of glohal indus-trial growth only exacerbates this problem. One argument thatsupports this criticism is made hy Elliot Soher and David SloanWilson regarding altruistic emotions. Soher and Wilson holdthat altruistic motivations are more reliahle than hedonisticmotivations because they do not require the prodding of inter-mediary feelings of pleasure or pain that would he necessary togenerate a self-interested response to heliefs that relevantothers (i.e., one's children) need help. Altruistic motivationplaces one in a motivational state immediately when the welfareof relevant others is at stake, without the need for such inter-mediary feelings. Since pleasure and displeasure can inaccur-ately track the needs of others, a system that does not requirethem in order to act altruistically will he more reliahle. Thisargument can he applied to attitudes toward the environment.A traditional cost-henefit analysis is hedonistic hy nature: itrelies on pleasure and displeasure regarding the effects on one'slong term good in order to motivate. Following Soher andWilson's argument, it is more reliahle to simply possess altruis-tic respect for the environment and to he motivated to act forthe good of the environment than to develop a disposition toappropriate self-interested feelings of pleasure and displeasureregarding the environment. Thus, the same considerations thatindicate that creatures with altruistic desires will make hetterparents than egoists suggest that creatures with altruisticdesires toward the environment will do a hetter joh of maintain-ing the integrity of the environment than creatures motivatedhy self-interested cost-henefit considerations."*^

In the case of glohal warming (among others), humanpleasures, pains, and preferences fail to accurately track thegood of the environment in the manner descrihed hy Soher andWilson. A cost-henefit approach is hazardous in that it is morelikely to lead to decisions that are detrimental to theenvironment and ensuingly to human heings and to fail in thelong-term. Just as thinking solely in terms of self-interested

165

Charles Starkey

cost-benefit analyses is inefficient and possibly self-defeating asa moral system, so thinking solely in terms of self-interest inenvironmental decisions is a less efficient and self-defeatingway of addressing environmental problems. Moral perspectivesinvolving altruistic motives toward the environment are morelikely to aggregately ensure the thriving of the individualswithin that environment.

Bryan Norton has developed a view known as "weak anthro-pocentrism" that tries to circumvent this problem. Nortondistinguishes between felt preferences and considered prefer-ences, and he believes that an environmental ethic should bebased on the latter. A considered preference consists of "anydesire or need that a human individual would express aftercareful consideration, including a judgment that the desire orneed is consistent with a rationally adopted world view" but isan idealization because it "can only be adopted after a personhas rationally accepted an entire world view and, further, hassucceeded in altering his felt preferences so that they areconsonant with that world view."** Norton contends that con-sidered preferences can serve as a standpoint for criticism ofpreferences that are exploitative of nature and that weakanthropocentrism is thus not necessarily conducive to the self-destructive results of a cost-benefit analysis, even though it isbased on human preferences.

The rational acceptance of a worldview is necessary for thepossession of considered preferences, and the rational consider-ation preceding this acceptance will be based on and will makereference to human preferences. But to rationally adopt aconsidered preference and express a complementary desire isnot to have them enter into our thinking and behavior—onemay rationally believe that an attitude or course of action ispreferable, but ignore it or act contrary to it nonetheless. Onecause of this difference between preferences and action is thatthe perspective is not in line with the preferences. The problemwith such preferences then is that they do not provide themotivation for action that the adoption of a perspective does.*^What actually makes the perspective effective is the internali-zation of those preferences into a perspective that framesperception and inference, regardless of what the consideredpreferences are. Though the corrective effect that consideredpreferences provide is a good thing, perspectival change isnecessary for effectively implementing whatever preferencesone has. Moreover, the perspective involved in the land ethictypically operates at a level beneath both felt and consideredpreferences: it is the perspective that lies beneath and givesrise to felt and considered preferences. Further reflection canalter the perspective, but this alteration of perspective is onceagain operative at a more fundamental level than changes inpreferences, be they felt or considered. Thus, the adoption of the

166


land ethic as understood here provides a more effective approachto addressing environmental problems than a weak anthropo-centric view.

In addition, the land ethic avoids the problems of biocentrictheories that give the environment intrinsic rights or valuewhile still bringing the land within the specter of moral con-sideration.*^ Theories that ascribe intrinsic value to the landencounter the problem of whether such a concept is coherent,because the concept of value-bearing so broadly applied makesit a property that is trivially true of everything. A problem withany theory ascribing rights to the environment include deter-mining just what sort of rights nonhumans can have, thestrength of such rights, and how such rights would be adminis-tered. At the same time, the theory shares the virtue of biocen-tric theories in that it gives the interests of the land communitya much more significant role in both the appropriate humanperspective on the land and in the morality of human decisionsregarding land use.

Though the land ethic does not confer strong rights or moralstanding to sentient beings, it is compatible with the moralstanding of nonhuman animals: within the perspective of theland ethic, animals can have some significant moral standingbased on sentience or other criteria.*^ Such theories, particu-larly those attributing strong rights or moral standing, encoun-ter problems including difficulty in collective decision-makingwith other animals, which may necessarily include the forsakingof some rights and the neglect of the ecosystem in such theories,including the potentially disastrous effect that overpopulation,overgrazing, etc. could have on the ecosystem. Threats to theecosystem can be regarded as situations where two importantvalues—the land and the moral standing of individual animals—come into conflict. Proposed solutions to such conflicts may becontroversial, but the tension between the ecosystem and indi-vidual animals is one more point of conflict between importantconsiderations, and it need not be resolved in this essay. Whatis to the point here is that the land ethic can recognize suchconflict and the associated claims of other sentient creatures, butsuch conflict does not diminish the significance of the land ethic.

6. Objections

Two prominent objections can be raised against the land ethicunderstood in this way. The first holds that the land ethic isfundamentally holistic and thus incompatible with this inter-pretation. The second is that the land ethic on this interpre-tation is simply another anthropocentric environmental ethic.

J. Baird Callicott, the most well known advocate of the landethic, characterizes it as a holistic theory where the biosystemicwhole is the center of moral consideration, and "its summum

167

Charles Starkey

bonum is the integrity, stability and beauty of the bioticcommunity."'*^ However, this reflects what can be described as atop-down understanding of the value of the community ratherthan a bottom-up understanding, and it is the latter that iscentral to the land ethic. Contrary to Callicott's interpretation,the biotic whole has value because of the interdependence of itsmembers, that is, the value rises from the bottom up. This is notto deny that the biotic whole has value but merely to assertthat this value arises from the interdependence—the interdepen-dence does not gain significance because of the prior value ofthe biotic whole that the interdependent activities of itsmembers sustain.*^ Though interrelated, valuing the land andits component members should not be equated with valuing thebiotic whole. Analogously, the respect due to other members of acity is not due to the value of the city apart from its members.Rather, the value of the city and its integrated functioning isdue to the value of the integrative functioning of its constitutivemembers. Similarly, respect for other human beings does notentail that humanity as a collective is the center of moralconsideration. The value of the collective good rises up from arecognition of one's status as an interdependent member of thecommunity, not as a result of a prior recognition of an absolutesovereignty of the collective over individuals.®"

Leopold does invoke the idea that rightness and wrongnessis to be understood in relation to the preservation of the bioticcommunity, and this might be taken to support the moralcentrality of the biotic whole, but it can alternatively be seen asa guide rather than as a commandment. The larger discussionof the land ethic supports the latter, as it repeatedly invokesthe interdependency of the members of the community and thepurpose of an ethic as a means of cooperation among members,rather than an ethic as a subordination of all to the authority ofthe biotic whole. In articulating the land ethic, Leopold empha-sizes cooperation, community spirit, and a shift in perspective—a "community instinct in the making"—much more than rightand wrong.' i The claim that good and right are to be understoodin terms of the good of the biotic whole is not only philosophi-cally objectionable as a categorical moral axiom, but it also doesnot accurately reflect the dominant thought in Leopold's articu-lation of the land ethic.

The second objection to this conception of the land ethic, thatthe understanding of the land ethic being proposed here ismerely another anthropocentric ethic, is incorrect becausewithin the perspective of the land ethic the locus of value isnot one's personal interests nor general human interests butrather the interests of the land community. Even if the persongenerally benefits from the system of respect and cooperation,such benefits are not the direct cause of respect and coopera-tive behavior. Rather, the perspective where such respect and

168


cooperation appear appropriate is the motivator. In addition,regardless of whether from a historical or evolutionary point ofview what produces the capacity for the development of themoral perspective is self-interest; the perspective itself is notself-interested. The value of the symhiotic relationship isinternalized, and decisions are made based on this value, ratherthan on the basis of self-interest.^^ Analogously, our mutualrecognition of human rights might on some level serve ourinterests, but the actual recognition makes our decisions andactions that spring from such recognition nonegoistic. Theproximal motive here is human rights, not our own self-interest.Thus, to call this conception of the land ethic anthropocentric ismisguided, just as is calling someone who has internalizedbeneficial norms of respect and cooperation with other humanbeings an egoist.

A similar objection might be made on practical grounds thatbecause the land ethic so understood does not confer intrinsicvalue on the biotic whole, environmental values will be pittedagainst economic values. Callicott has specifically criticizedNorton's weak anthropocentrism on this point, charging that "Ifall environmental values are anthropocentric and instrumental,then they have to compete head-to-head with the economicvalues derived from converting rain forests to pulp, savannahsto cattle pasture, and so on." ^ Callicott regards this as a strikeagainst a theory that does not make the biotic whole the cate-gorical center of moral assessment; if implemented, such atheory would lead to unacceptable environmental destruction.This criticism might be extended to the land ethic. In response,engagement in self-interested projects, including those in whicheconomic motive plays a significant role, is compatible withenvironmental responsibility under the land ethic, and there isnot the competition with economic values that Callicott fears.Within the land ethic, economic values are framed in such away relative to the value of the land that they are put in theirproper place, and thus, though economic values are given somemeasure of importance, they will not portend a wholesaleoverriding of environmental values. Analogously, we engage inselfish projects (restoring an old car, perfecting an ice skatingroutine, etc.) in a society that recognizes the value of otherpeople and their projects, but such selfish projects do notoverride the norms of cooperation and respect owed otherpeople—we do not rob from or encroach on others to support ourprojects precisely because we have internalized these norms ofcooperation and respect.^* Similarly, economically motivatedprojects will be framed in terms of the land, just as economicallymotivated projects are currently framed in terms of andconstrained by consideration of human rights.

It is a virtue of this theory that it recognizes economic value:denying its importance can burden a theory with justified

169

Charles Starkey

charges that it is Luddite and unrealistic. This conception of theland ethic withstands the objection that the theory is not practi-cally workable and that it might have an appeal in the cloisteredtowers of academia but can have no practical import. The adop-tion of the land ethic does not demand adherence to an imprac-ticable moral rule but rather leads to the framing of decisionsin terms of the land. Because framing is an intrinsic feature ofperception and understanding, it is not per se impractical, andframing in terms of the interconnectedness with the land is notimpractical either. Some environmental decisions may becomplicated and difficult, but there is nothing inherentlyimpractical with starting from a perspective that recognizes theinterdependence of humans and the land, just as there isnothing inherently impractical with starting from a perspectivethat recognizes the interdependence of human beings. Thelatter perspective is regularly adopted, and the land ethic canbe adopted in a similar way.

Conclusion

In conclusion, there is strong evidence in Leopold's writingsthat the land ethic is primarily a psychological theory of moraldevelopment that advocates a cultural shift in the human per-spective on the land. Understanding the theory as such providesthe most fruitful way of understanding the theory because itcircumvents serious objections to the theory and accommodatesthe insights of other types of environmental ethic while notsharing their liabilities. A complete defense of this conception ofthe land ethic and its superiority to other environmental theoriesis beyond the scope of this essay but is quite defensible, and itsgroundwork has been laid

Notes' Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 204.2 Stegner, "The Legacy of Aldo Leopold," 233.' Note that here as elsewhere "land" is to be understood in Leopold's

sense, as the air, soils, waters, plants, and animals.•• Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 215.^ Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 217." Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 202.' Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 204.* Baxter, People or Penguins, 11.^ Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 210.1° Lehman, "Do Wildernesses Have Rights?" 131." Regan, The Case for Animal Rights, 361-2.' Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 224-5.' ' Shrader-Frechette, "Individualism, Holism, and Environmental

Ethics," 63. See also Zimmerman, "The Threat of Ecofascism."" Now known in DSM-IV as Antisocial Personality Disorder (APD)

(American Psychiatric Association, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual

170


of Mental Disorders).^^ This is perhaps illustrated on a larger scale by former Secretary

of State Colin Powell's concerns that political decisions he wasinvolved with were being made without regard to, and seemingly blindto, the interdependent relations of the nation he was serving and othernations.

^ See for example Piaget, The Moral Judgment of the Child." For a discussion of internalized norms, see Gibbard, Wise

Choices, Apt Feelings.'* See a discussion of this event in Wallace, Virtues and Vices, 67-8.'^ Kohlberg, Essays on Moral Development, 16.^° See Kohlberg, Essays on Moral Development, 22.21 Kohlberg, "Moral Stages and Moralization," 33.^ See Gilligan, "Moral Orientation and Moral Development."23 Note however that the claims made in this paper are not depen-

dent on Kohlberg's specific claims about the content of the three levelsof moral reasoning, particularly the controversial idea that justice andseparation are the hallmarks of the highest moral level, nor is itdependent on Kohlberg's structuralist view of cognitive development.

2 Markus and Kitayama, "Culture and the Self," 226.25 Markus and Kitayama, "Culture and the Self," 228.2 See Lutz, "Culture and Consciousness."2' See Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor, and Shorter, The Making of

the Modern Eamily.2 Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 202. This claim regarding a

progressive expansion is disputable as historical fact, but its question-able veracity does not affect his more fundamental descriptive claimthat symbioses do develop or his normative claim that a symbioticrelationship with the land should develop.

2 Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 202.° Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 203.1 See Sober and Wilson, Unto Others; Frank, Passions within

Reason; and Ruse, "A Darwinian Naturalist's Perspective on Altruism."32 Granted, a population that develops such altruistic desires may

be reproductively fitter than a population lacking such desires, butsuch desires can be fostered without the evolutionary development of aspecific capacity for them.

33 See Axelrod, The Evolution of Cooperation, 77.3'* There is some debate over whether there are psychological

modules dedicated to particular social reasoning tasks, or whetherthere is enough plasticity in existing brain structures such as thecortex to generate social reasoning though social learning. See Toobyand Cosmides, "The Psychological Foundations of Culture" andPanksepp, "The Seven Sins of Evolutionary Psychology." The claims inthis essay are independent of this debate; in either event, our brainshave the capacity for developing symbiotic behavioral norms.

35 Dennett, "Cognitive Wheels," 49. For discussions of framing, seeDamasio, Descartes' Error, 169-89, and De Sousa, The Rationality ofEmotion, 192-96. See also Kaneman and Tversky, "Choices, Values andFrames," and the "script theory" described in Nisbett and Ross, "Judg-mental Heuristics and Knowledge Structures." De Sousa correctlynotes that framing involves both the determination of what isperceived and the limitation of inferences drawn from that perception.

3' See Pinker, How the Mind Works, and Dretske, Knowledge and

171

Charles Starkey

the Flow of Information.' This view of the relation between perception and action has been

suggested by Aristotle and defended by John McDowell. See McDowell,"Virtue and Reason," 345.

'8 Rorty, "The Historicity of Psychological Attitudes," 132.^ Ketelaar and Todd, "Framing Our Thoughts," 185; see also

Churchland, "The Neural Representation of the Social World." Theconcept of ecological rationality is related to the concept of ecologicalpsychology put forth by J. J. Gibson. See Gibson, The EcologicalApproach to Visual Perception. For a discussion of the relation ofecological psychology to ecological science, see De Laplante, "Toward aMore Expansive Conception of Ecological Science."

'"' Framing that is consistent with ecological rationality can beregarded as a species of moral perception. See Starkey, "On the Cate-gory of Moral Perception."

• See for example the "differential pull" argument in Hoff Summers,"Filial Morality." One may conceptualize this in terms of differentialrights where human rights outweigh animal rights (see Warren, "TheRights of the Nonhuman World"), but this is not necessary to establishthe broader claim that some beings have stronger or more robustmoral claims on us than others.

*^ Leopold sometimes talks in terms of "biotic right," but the largercontext of his work, particularly his discussion of noneconomic value,suggests an emphasis on value rather than rights. Moreover, even ifrights are granted to nonhumans, either individuals, species, or thebiotic community, the defeasability of such rights make them compatiblewith human rights.

•" Sober and Wilson, Unto Others, 317-21. Note once again thatthis altruism does not require the development of a specific psycho-logical module (what Sober and Wilson call a device)—it only requiresthe utilization of existent psychological mechanisms.

" Norton, "Environmental Ethics and Weak Anthropocentrism," 134.*^ Granted, one may act contrary to the dictates of their perspec-

tive, but the motivation provided by a perspective—the world "looking"a certain way to them—has more motivational power than acts thatare dictated by rational reflection, in part because the rational reflec-tion is not needed to act in line with the perspective.

* For such biocentric theories, see Rolston, Environmental Ethics,and Taylor, "The Ethics of Respect for Nature."

*'' For sentientist theories, see Regan, The Case for Animal Rights,and Singer, Animal Liberation. Callicott discusses a complementaryapproach to animal welfare theories and the traditional formulation ofthe land ethic (see "Animal Liberation and Environmental Ethics").Similarly, Warren argues that it is a false choice between biocentricand individualist environmental theories, as the needs and interests ofboth biosystems and sentient creatures should be taken into accountas moral considerations.

•** Callicott, In Defense of the Land Ethic, 25.•• Leopold's references in his text to the biotic right of species

supports this claim—were the biotic whole the morally central concept,any such species claim would not exist.

^° Callicott has provided a limited modification of his articulationof the land ethic in response to skepticism about the accuracy of theholistic conception the ecological community and its interdependence.

172


See Callicott, "Do Deconstructive Ecology and Sociobiology UndermineLeopold's Land Ethic?" Here, Callicott characterizes duties to theenvironment as an expansion of the altruism toward kin posited bysociobiologists, and though its focus is moral sentiment, this articula-tion resembles a bottom-up view of environmental value. However, thisdoesn't clearly supplant his prior claim about the locus of value andduties residing in the holism of the biotic community. Indeed, he defendsthe idea of a biotic community and duties that are engendered by itsexistence. Relatedly, he dismisses moral impartiality (the root of theenvironmental fascism objection) but does not provide reasons for thisother than claiming that sociobiology provides an explanation andlegitimation of moral partiality. However, the claims of sociobiology aredescriptive, not prescriptive, and thus the questions remain unresolvedof why, on his reading, the duties that arise from a land ethic are notuniversal and absolute, and why the stability of the ecological wholedoes not stand morally paramount over the rights of individuals andspecies.

' Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 203.^ Michael Ruse among others argues that this sense of "oughtness"

that is distinct from self-interest is evolved and is indeed altruistic.See Ruse, "A Darwinian Naturalist's Perspective on Altruism."

^ Callicott, "Environmental Philosophy is Environmental Activism,"22.

^ Granted, these norms can be violated, but norms based on theintrinsic value of nature are just as capable of being violated, so suchpossible violations are not a strike against the land ethic.

^ Thanks to Kevin De Laplante for reading a full draft of thispaper and providing valuable comments and observations. A portion ofthis paper was read at the 2005 meeting of the Society for EthicsAcross the Curriculum and I have benefited from audience questionsand comments. Thanks are also due to Steve Smith for working with meduring the time that several of these thoughts on moral developmentcame about.

Bibliography

American Psychiatric Association, Diagnostic and Statistical Manualof Mental Disorders: DSM-IV. Washington, D.C.: American Psychia-tric Association, 1997.

Axelrod, Robert. The Evolution of Cooperation. New York: Basic Books,1984.

Baxter, William F. People or Penguins: The Case for Optimal Pollution.New York: Columbia University Press, 1974.

Callicott, J. Baird. "Do Deconstructive Ecology and SociobiologyUndermine Leopold's Land Ethic?" Environmental Ethics 18 (1996):353-72.

. "Environmental Philosophy is Environmental Activism: TheMost Radical and Effective Kind." In Environmental Philosophyand Environmental Activism, ed. Don Marietta and Lester Embree,19-35. Baltimore: Rowman and Littlefield, 1995.

-. In Defense of the Land Ethic: Essays in Environmental Philoso-phy Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 1989.

Churchland, Paul. "The Neural Representation of the Social World." InMind and Morals: Essay on Ethics and Cognitive Science, ed. Larry

173

Charles Starkey

May, Marilyn Friedman, and Andy Clark, 91-108. Cambridge, MA:MIT Press, 1996.

Damasio, Antonio. Descartes' Error. New York: Avon, 1994.De Laplante, Kevin. "Toward a More Expansive Conception of Ecological

Science," Biology and Philosophy 19 (2004): 263-81.Dennett, Daniel. "Cognitive Wheels: The Frame Problem of AI." In The

Robot's Dilemma: The Frame Problem in Artificial Intelligence, ed.Zenon Pylyshyn, 129-51. Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1987.

de Sousa, Ronald. The Rationality of Emotion. Cambridge, MA: MITPress, 1987.

Dretske, Fred J. Knowledge and the Flow of Information. Oxford: BasilBlackwell, 1981.

. "Animal Liberation and Environmental Ethics." In In Defense ofthe Land Ethic: Essays in Environmental Philosophy, ed. J. BairdCallicott, 49-59. Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 1989.

Frank, Robert H. Passons within Reason. New York: W W. Norton, 1988.Gibbard, Alan. Wise Choices, Apt Feelings. New York: Oxford University

Press, 1990.Gibson, J. J. The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception. Boston:

Houghton Mifflin, 1979.Gilligan, Carol. "Moral Orientation and Moral Development." In Women

and Moral Theory, ed. Eva Feder Kittay and Diana T. Meyers, 19-33.New Jersey: Rowman and Littlefield, 1987.

Hoff Summers, Christina. "Filial Morality." JoMrnaZ of Philosophy 83(1986): 439-56.

Kahneman, Daniel, and Amos Tversky. "Choices, Values and Frames." InChoices, Values and Frames, ed. Daniel Kahneman and AmosTversky, 1-16. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

Ketelaar, Timothy, and Peter Todd. "Framing Our Thoughts: EcologicalRationality as Evolutionary Psychology's Answer to the FrameProblem." In Conceptual Challenges in Evolutionary Psychology, ed.Harmon R. Holcomb III, 179-211. Boston: Kluwer Academic Pub-lishers, 2001.

Kohlberg, Lawrence. Essays on Moral Development, Vol. I. San Fran-cisco: Harper & Row, 1981.

Kohlberg, Lawrence. "Moral Stages and Moralization: The Cognitive-Developmental Approach." In Moral Development and Behavior:Theory, Research, and Social Issues, ed. Thomas Lickona, 31-53.New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.

Lehman, Scott. "Do Wildernesses Have Rights?" Environmental Ethics3 (1981): 129-46.

Leopold, Aldo. A Sand County Almanac. New York: Oxford UniversityPress, 1949.

Lutz, Catherine. "Culture and Consciousness: A Problem in the Anthro-pology of Knowledge." In Self and Consciousness: Multiple Perspec-tives, ed. Kessell, Cole and Johnson, 64-86. Hillsdale, NJ: LaurenceErlbaum, 1992.

Markus, Hazel, and Shinobu Kitayama. "Culture and the Self: Implica-tions for Cognition, Emotion, and Motivation." Psychological Review98 (1991): 224-53.

McDowell, John. "Virtue and Reason." Monist 62 (1979): 331-50.Nisbett, Richard, and Lee Ross. "Judgmental Heuristics and Knowl-

edge Structures." In Naturalizing Epistemology, ed. Hilary Kornblith,261-90. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1994.

174


Norton, Bryan. "Environmental Ethics and Weak Anthropocentrism."Environmental Ethics 6 (1984): 131-48.

Panksepp, Jaak. "The Seven Sins of Evolutionary Psychology," Evolutionand Cognition 6 (2000): 108-31.

Piaget, Jean. The Moral Judgment of the Child. London: Routledge andKegan Paul, 1932.

Pinker, Steven. How the Mind Works. New York: W. W. Norton, 1997.Regan, Tom. The Case for Animal Rights. Berkeley: University of

California Press, 2004.Rolston III, Holmes. Environmental Ethics: Duties to and Values in the

Natural World. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1988.Rorty, Amelie. "The Historicity of Psychological Attitudes." In Amelie

Rorty, Mind in Action: Essays in the Philosophy of Mind. Boston:Beacon Press, 1988.

Ruse, Michael. "A Darwinian Naturalist's Perspective on Altruism." InAltruism and Altruistic Love, ed. Stephen Post, Lynne Underwood,Jeffrey Schloss, and William Hurlbut, 151-67. Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press, 2002.

Shorter, Edward. The Making of the Modern Family. New York: BasicBooks, 1975.

Shrader-Frechette, Kristin. "Individualism, Holism, and EnvironmentalEthics." Ethics and the Environment 1 U996): 55-69.

Singer, Peter. Animal Liberation. New York: Avon Books, 1990.Soher, Elliott, and David Sloan Wilson. Unto Others: The Evolution and

Psychology of Unselfish Behavior. Camhridge, MA: Harvard Univer-sity Press, 1999.

Starkey, Charles. "On the Category of Moral Perception." Social Theoryand Practice 32 (2006): 75-96.

Stegner, Wallace. "The Legacy of Aldo Leopold." In Companion to aSand County Almanac: Interpretive and Critical Essays, ed. J.Baird Callicott, 233-45. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press,1988.

Taylor, Paul. "The Ethics of Respect for Nature." Environmental Ethics3 (1981): 197-218.

Toohy, John, and Leda Cosmides. "The Psychological Foundations ofCulture." In The Adapted Mind, ed. Jerome H. Barkow, LedaCosmides, and John Tooby, 19-136. New York: Oxford UniversityPress, 1992.

Wallace, James. Virtues and Vices. Ithaca: Cornell University Press,1978.

Warren, Mary Ann. "The Rights of the Nonhuman World." In EarthEthics: Environmental Ethics, Animal Rights, and PracticalApplications, ed. James P. Sterha, 175—189. Englewood Cliffs, NJ:Prentice-Hall, 1995.

Wyatt-Brown, Bertram. Southern Honor: Ethics and Behavior in the OldSouth. New York: Oxford University Press, 1982.

Zimmerman, Michael. "The Threat of Ecofascism." Social Theory andPractice 21 (1995): 207-38.

175

the land ethic, moral development, and ecological rationality

Documents