Distinguishing between kinds of anthropocentrism and of biocentrism helps to disclose that White’s critique of theistic religions as anthropocentric and despotic miscarries, as does the different critique on the part of Passmore of ‘Greco-Christian arrogance’. The longstanding stewardship tradition of Christianity, Judaism and Islam facilitates an eco-friendly approach to the environment, particularly in its biocentric versions, and can be defended against criticisms from Palmer and Lovelock. Southgate, who misunderstands biocentrism as synonymous with Deep Ecology, favours both co-creation and stewardship; these approaches can be combined with each other and with Bauckham’s theme of the community of God’s creatures. Northcott does well to trace back modern ecological problems to seventeenth-century anti-communal and possessive individualism and the attitudes and practices emerging therefrom, but his communitarian and nature-friendly approach, while rightly understanding humanity as ‘dependent rational animals’ (MacIntyre), needs to become more cosmopolitan if these global problems are to be solved.

INTRODUCTION

Many environmental thinkers maintain that environmental theory, including theories of environmental ethics, and political power have one thing in common: they need to be disaggregated and decentralized. The craving for generality, so disparaged by Wittgensteinian philosophers, becomes a punchbag all over again for many defenders of biodiversity, whether pluralists, situationists, or postmodernists. “Show me a principle,” they effectively say, “and I will show you an exception.” While this sounds like a generalization itself, many apply it undaunted, for example, to purported principles of environmental obligation, stressing that environmental studies are characteristically if not essentially contextual, and are nothing without sensitivity to situations.

A praiseworthy example of this is provided by David Schmidtz's well-argued essay in Environmental Values, “Why Preservationism Doesn't Preserve.” Schmidtz's essay belabors conservationist (or wise-use) principles as well as targeting preservationism in the way that the title leads the reader to expect, and shows how easily the pure pursuit of principle can in both cases undermine the environmental purist's objectives (Schmidtz 1997). The phenomenon is certainly widely recognized of principled people unintentionally undermining their own objectives, whether as efficiency experts, as librarians, or as parents; in the field of biodiversity preservation, a further example might be found in the refusal to countenance the extinction of any species anywhere, whatever the costs to humanity, including its poorer members, the stance that Wilfred Beckerman (1994) has labeled “Strong Sustainability,” and Herman Daly (1995), “Absurdly Strong Sustainability.”

The Royal Institute of Philosophy Conference, on ‘Philosophy and the Natural Environment’, was held at the University of Wales in Cardiff from 20 to 22 July 1993. We are grateful to the Royal Institute of Philosophy for allowing us the privilege of organising its Conference, which attracted 150 participants, 30 from outside the United Kingdom. The success of the Conference was due in no small part to the co-operative efforts of many individuals and organisations, and we wish to place on record our thanks to the officers of the Royal Institute of Philosophy, for their advice; the City of Cardiff, for hosting a reception in Cardiff Castle; the British Council, for entertaining the overseas participants; the staff of the University of Wales, Cardiff, especially the Conference Office, for the professionalism of their organisation; our colleagues and students in Philosophy, for their supererogatory assistance; the speakers, for agreeing to write papers and for writing them on time; and all the participants, for providing the stimulating discussions, both formal and informal, without which there would have been no Conference.

Frederick Ferré was prevented by family circumstances from attending the Conference and reading his paper in person, but he kindly contributed to the discussion by sending an overview of the other papers, which is reprinted here, in addition to his main paper.

The philosophy of nature is at least as old as the presocratics, but has undergone comparative neglect in philosophical circles this century until recently, at least in English-speaking lands. The philosophy of science concentrates on scientific concepts and methods and the interpretation of scientific theories, rather than on the concept of nature itself, while, with significant exceptions (e.g., Hepburn, 1984), aesthetics focuses on the experience of art rather than on that of nature. Meanwhile moral, political and social philosophy has focused on the social environment, but the natural environment has often been lost to view. Indeed it has been argued, with some cogency, that mainstream Western metaphysics, epistemology and ethics have historically been inhospitable to conservation, to environmentalism and to their values (see Hargrove, 1989; Attfield, 1994a).

All this, however, is beginning to change, in Britain as well as overseas. Environmental ethicists have for some years now been arguing for revisions of ethical theory; the Society for Applied Philosophy held its 1986 Annual Conference on environmental and animal welfare themes; and a series of public seminars of that Society on environmental values continues to be held at the University of Lancaster, where the journal Environmental Values is also edited. Yet the 1993 Cardiff Conference of the Royal Institute of Philosophy was the first large philosophical gathering in Britain held to consider the themes of nature, the natural environment, and related issues of value, ethics and society.

Can nature be reconstituted, recreated or rehabilitated? And would the goal of doing so be a desirable one? There again, is wild nature intrinsically valuable, or are parks, gardens and farms sometimes preferable or of greater value? This cluster of questions arises from recent debates about preservation, restoration, wilderness and sustainable development. In discussing them I hope to throw some light on both the concept and the value of nature, and in due course on the attitudes which people should have towards it, the policies which should guide their practice, and thus on the proper role of humanity with regard to the natural world.

To begin with, we need a clear sense of ‘nature’, and thus to turn to John Stuart Mill's celebrated essay on that subject (Mill, 1874). Now when the possibility of nature being restored is at issue, ‘nature’ cannot be used in Mill's first sense, ‘all which is—the powers and properties of all things’. For in this sense there is no possibility of nature being destroyed or damaged, let alone reconstructed. Mill's second sense of ‘nature’, rather, is the relevant one: ‘what takes place without … the voluntary and intentional agency of man [sic]’. Nature (in this sense) can obviously be modified by human activity. Moreover a difficulty already emerges about the possibility of restoring it: how can anything be restored by human agency the essence of which is to be independent of human agency? This is a question to which we shall return.