Date of Award

2016

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelors

Department

Humanities

Second Department

Natural Sciences

First Advisor

Flakne, April

Area of Concentration

Philosophy

Abstract

Conservation biology is an interdisciplinary, normative field in the sector of the natural sciences. Its stated goal is to preserve biodiversity at all levels of organization. Our definition of biodiversity, however, is far from ubiquitous. How we define biodiversity has ethical implication concerning the types of management decisions made and the organisms selected for conservation. Yet, the ethical component of conservation has been generally unexplored in recent literature, confounding our views on what is and is not ethically appropriate within the discipline. This thesis examines how our definition of biodiversity affects the types of practices deemed acceptable in conservation biology and the various ethical positions that influence how we relate to biological entities. Four positions (anthropocentrism, tempered anthropocentrism, biocentrism, and ecocentrism) are analyzed to explore how each contributes to the ethical component of conservation biology. A pragmatic, pluralistic theory of ecocentrism is developed based on the philosophy presented in Aldo Leopold’s The Land Ethic. An argument is then made that this theory should be adopted as the guiding principle for making management decisions throughout the discipline. Finally, a novel analysis of the ethical quality of the Michigan Gray Wolf Recovery Plans from 1997 and 2015 is performed to provide insight into the ethical assumptions that guide the conservation decision making process.

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