Chapter 25: Environmental Worldviews, Ethics, and Sustainability

Environmental wisdom worldview

We are all part of the community of life and the ecological processes that sustain all life.

Voluntary simplicity

Learn to live with less.

Planetary management worldview

We can and should manage the earth for our own benefit.

Environmental worldviews

How people think the world works and what they think their role should be

Environmental ethics

Beliefs about what behavior is right and what behavior is wrong with regard to the environment

Planetary management worldview

We can and should manage the earth for our own benefit

Stewardship worldview

We have an ethical responsibility to be caring stewards

Environmental wisdom worldview

We are all part of the community of life and the ecological processes that sustain all life

Ecological and climate tipping points

irreversible and should never be crossed

Basic principles of ecology

food webs, nutrient cycling, biodiversity, ecological succession

Anthropocentric

human made or centered

Biocentric

Life-centered. Compare anthropocentric.

Principal of Enoughness

The earth provides enough to satisfy every person's need but not every person's greed.

The No-Problem School

We can solve any environmental, population, or resource problem with more economic growth and development, better management and better technology.

The free-market School

The best way to manage the planet is through minimal government interference and regulation. Everything should be privatized and through competition the free market chooses what to do with it.

Sense of Place

feeling that an area has a distinct and meaningful character

Voluntary Simplicity

a way of life that rejects the high-consumption, materialistic lifestyles of consumer cultures and affirms - minimalism