ABSTRACT
The central concern of this section is to focus on the interventions in ecological thought which have attempted to think through what it would mean to take streams, rivers, trees, mountains, and ecosystems more seriously within the moral community. Some of the readings push back the ethical horizons of much environmental discussion-they are concerned with identifying the intrinsic value of natural things rather than seeing them as having a value purely in terms of the instrumental needs of people (as resources to be consumed in the pursuit of human ends). This debate emerged in the discussions over the preservation and conservation of wild places. In Reading 4.1, from the naturalist travelogues of John Muir, we witness an approach which combines an aesthetic appreciation of the wide open spaces of the wilderness with a sense of desolation at the avarice of humankind. This is mixed with an appeal to the American people to put some of the wild aside for the future before it is too late (which resulted in the American National Park system). By contrast, Gifford Pinchot (Reading 4.2) presents a case for conservation through the scientific management of natural resources for the welfare of the Union. Whilst Muir wished to leave the wild to its own devices, Pinchot sought to establish the principle of careful stewardship, so that natural resources were used intelligently and rationally as well as efficiently distributed. The squandering of natural resources in wasteful ways was a technical issue rather than a moral one.
