Topic 1 - significant concepts in issues or debates in religion and ethics

James Lovelock - Environmental issues 1.1.

Gaia Hypothesis

1. Environment on a global level has been changed for the better through history

2. World is self-sustaining and life is perfectly suited

 

4 levels needing balance

1. Biosphere

2. Atmosphere

3. Hydrosphere

4. Lithosphere

 

• Gaia will survive however if we abuse Gaia we risk our own lives

Arne Naess - Environmental issues 1.1.

Deep Ecology

• Human life is just a component of a global ecosystem

• Natural world has intrinsic rather than instrumental value - value outside of benefit for humans this is

 

1. Well-being and flourishing of all life on earth has value in itself.

 

Moving forward

• Reduce population

• Conserve diversity

• Live in small self-reliant communities

 

Eco Sophy

• Ecological harmony

Francis Bacon - Environmental issues 1.1.

Says 'nature is a slave' and that the purpose of science is to control it

Richard Bauckham - environmental issues 1.1.

1. Creation is God's goodness

2. Creation has value

3. Therefore, it is our job to maintain it

St Francis of Assisi  - Environmental issues 1.1.

'If you have men who will exclude any of God's creatures, you will have men who do the same to other men'

Anthony Weston - Environmental issues 1.1.

We should focus on technological solutions

Lynn White - Environmental issues 1.1. y

• On dominion, Lynn argues that we have created an anthropocentric world view that allows us to exploit natural resources

Cornwall Alliance (Robert Nash) - environmental issues 1.1.

1. Stewardship is a god given duty

2. Encourages world leaders to take action

3. Pantheism view (divine reality exists in everything)

4. Intrinsic value of nature

 

• Radical environmentalism

Aquinas and Descartes - Environmental issues 1.1.

On animal rights, they say that they have no soul and only hold instrumental value

Peter Singer - Environmental issues 1.1.

On animal rights, says they DO have intrinsic value and that all species can feel pain so they should be protected

Martin Luther King - Equality 1.2.

• Civil rights leader

• Non-violent resistance

• Assassinated in Memphis

• Noble peace prize 1964

 

Beliefs

• Imago Dei

• Duty of Christian Communities to achieve equality

• No violence - create friends, not enemies

Joni Eareckson Tada - Equality 1.2.

• Disability activist

• 'he has chosen not to heal me, but to hold me'

• Sees condition as a gift

• Demonstrates how suffering can be overcome by faith

• She suffers to draw her closer to God

J.S Mill -Equality 1.2.

• Wrote on liberty in 1859

• Argued for absolute freedom of opinion

• Advocate of women's equality

• Relevant development - Founding of the London society for women's suffrage - (equal voting rights)

Elizabeth Cady Stanton - Equality 1.2.

• Church is a key contributor to sexism

• Advocated in the USA

Pope Paul III - Equality 1.2.

Excommunicated those using slavery in 1500s

Pope Leo XIII - Equality 1.2.

Outlawed slavery in 1888

Rosa Parks - Equality 1.2.

• Started Montgomery bus boycott in December 1955

• Eventually segregation on buses illegal