Krebs, Angelika. Ethics of Nature: A Map. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1999.
Is nature’s value only instrumental value for human beings or does nature also have intrinsic value? Can traditional anthropocentrism be defended or must we move to a new, physiocentric moral position? This study develops a critical taxonomy or “map” of thirteen arguments for the conservation of nature. It defends the moral intrinsic value of sentient animals, but not of nonsentient nature. The arguments are phrased in a simple, plastic, and concise language.
(Text from de Gruyter)
Further readings:
- Cafaro, Philip. Thoreau's Living Ethics: Walden and the Pursuit of Virtue. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2004.
- Nagle, John C. "The Spiritual Value of Wilderness." Notre Dame Law School Scholarly Works, Paper 604 (2005).
- Chapman, Anne. "The Ways That Nature Matters: The World and the Earth in the Thought of Hannah Arendt." Environmental Values 16, no. 4 (2007): 433–45. doi:10.3197/096327107X243222
- Deane-Drummond, Celia. The Ethics of Nature. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2004.