Environmental Ethicsby Dharmendra Kapri | 28-02-2017 03:50 |
|---|
|
Ethics is the discipline concerned with morality and moral obligations, with emphasis on the determination of right and wrong. Our obligations towards the environment and other species is the environmental ethics. Environmental crisis is, in reality, the crisis of ethics. We are overexercising our right and failing in our duty toward the environment. No doubt, we, being a part of the environment, have a right to draw our requirements from the environment, but certainly not to the extent that degrades the environment and harms other species. It is our duty to save the environment for other species and for our children. Polluting the environment and depleting the natural resources are dangerous and selfish human acts, and are against the principles of ethics. Man should make a sincere effort to repair the environment and renew the natural resources so that all species may survive in nature. This will be a right ethical behavior. Environment ethics should conform to our cultural heritage and religious traditions. Our religions respect environment and wildlife. Trees and animals figure in our scriptures, they have served as topic in art, poetry and dramas, pets have been reared with affection since ancient times, and sadhus have been selecting forests as suitable site for worship. All these facts indicate man's original interest in nature. Environmental ethics demand that man should change his present attitude toward nature. He should learn to live as a part of nature and not as a master of nature. Environment ethics should become a part and parcel of human life. Only this can save the environment and wild life and ourselves too.
|
