Part 1. Introduction -- Introduction: Navigating the Perfect Moral Storm in Light of a Thirty-Five Year Debate -- Thirty-Five Year Climate Change Policy Debate -- Part 2. Priority Ethical Issues -- Ethical Problems with Cost Arguments -- Ethics and Scientific Uncertainty Arguments -- Atmospheric Targets -- Allocating National Emissions Targets -- Climate Change Damages and Adaptation Costs -- Obligations of Sub-national Governments, Organizations, Businesses, and Individuals -- Independent Responsibility to Act -- Part 3. The Crucial Role of Ethics in Climate (...) Change Policy Making -- Why Has Ethics Failed to Achieve Traction? -- Conclusion: Navigating the Perfect Moral Storm. (shrink)

The National Science Foundation's Second Merit Criterion, or Broader Impacts Criterion , was introduced in 1997 as the result of an earlier Congressional movement to enhance the accountability and responsibility as well as the effectiveness of federally funded projects. We demonstrate that a robust understanding and appreciation of NSF BIC argues for a broader conception of research ethics in the sciences than is currently offered in Responsible Conduct of Research training. This essay advocates augmenting RCR education with training regarding broader (...) impacts. We demonstrate that enhancing research ethics training in this way provides a more comprehensive understanding of the ethics relevant to scientific research and prepares scientists to think not only in terms of responsibly conducted science, but also of the role of science in responding to identified social needs and in adhering to principles of social justice. As universities respond to the mandate from America COMPETES to “provide training and oversight in the responsible and ethical conduct of research”, we urge institutions to embrace a more adequate conception of research ethics, what we call the Ethical Dimensions of Scientific Research, that addresses the full range of ethical issues relevant to scientific inquiry, including ethical issues related to the broader impacts of scientific research and practice. (shrink)

In American Heat, Donald Brown critically analyzes the U.S. response to global warming, inviting readers to examine the implicit morality of the U.S position, and ultimately to help lead the world toward an equitable sharing of the burdens and benefits of protecting the global environment. In short, Brown argues that an ethical focus on global environmental matters is the key to achieving a globally acceptable solution.

Este ensayo analiza –desde unas lentes éticas- las dos conclusiones posibles sobre los resultados de Cancún. Explicará que, aunque todavía queda alguna esperanza de encontrar soluciones globales al cambio climático debido a las decisiones adoptadas en Cancún, uno debe ver Cancún en el contexto de un error de veinte años en el intento de prevenir un cambio climático peligroso.

Those designing sustainable development implementation schemes will inevitably look to scientists to help them understand sustainable development problems. Scientists have already made important contributions to the understanding of many serious environmental problems, such as the causal relationship between certain synthetic chemicals and destruction of the ozone layer. If scientists had not identified the relationship between upper atmospheric ozone concentrations and releases of chloroflorocarbons, government decisionmakers would not have agreed to action limiting their production. However, although causes and effects of some (...) environmental problems are understood well, others are not, such as the timing and magnitude of climate change caused by greenhouse gases. If global environmental problems are serious, there is an obvious and urgent need to increase scientific understanding of which human actions cause environmental degradation and how nations can proceed with needed development programs without causing further environmental damage. (shrink)

Allen Thompson's review of the ClimateEthics article entitled “ A Comprehensive Ethical Analysis of the Copenhagen Accord. ”1 is a welcome response to the objective of ClimteEthics, namely to provo...

Because complex environmental problems are relegated to scientific experts, the ethical questions that are embedded in these problems are often hidden or distorted in scientific and administrative methodology and communication. The administrative process requires that facts and values be separated. Those values that cannot simply be ignored are usually translated into technical economic language and settled in terms of economic costs and benefits. Calls for regulatory reform-i.e., to reduce or eliminate environmental regulation--create additional pressures on analysts that encourage them to (...) focus on quantitative questions at the expense of qualitative ones. Distortion can also result from the use of standard risk assessment procedures and from the improper placement of burden of proof on govemment agencies. The greatest problem, nevertheless, is the narrow scientific training of technical experts which frequently leaves them unprepared to deal with the ethical and value issues in environmental public policy. (shrink)

Allen Thompson's review of the ClimateEthics article entitled “ A Comprehensive Ethical Analysis of the Copenhagen Accord. ”1 is a welcome response to the objective of ClimteEthics, namely to provo...

Preliminary elements of a practical strategy are described to achieve greater traction for ethical principles to guide international efforts to achieve a just global climate change solution. This paper begins with an ethical review of the major elements of United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Conference of Parties 17 outcomes in Durban, South Africa that will be further considered at Conference of Parties 18 in Qatar, December 2012. This analysis then draws conclusions about how to generate greater consideration (...) of the ethical issues that need to be faced if international climate change negotiations have any hope of creating a just global solution to climate change. It will then be argued that the key to obtaining greater traction of ethical principles in climate policy formation is to create greater global awareness of the unjust or ethically unsupportable positions of participants in climate change negotiations, rather than focusing on abstract arguments about what ethics and justice requires. (shrink)

After reviewing the basis for urgency of assuring that nations reduce their ghg emissions to their fair share of safe global emissions, this paper examines the outcome of UNFCCC COP-20 in Lima in regard to getting traction for ethics and justice in national formulation of climate change commitments. In light of what is actually known about how nations have considered ethics and justice in formulating national climate change policies, this paper critically reviews elements of a Lima decision on what information (...) nations must include when they submit their emissions reductions commitments, now known as Intended Nationally Determined Commitments. The paper argues that some developing countries seeking to preserve distinctions between duties of developed versus developing countries set out in the UNFCCC may have inadvertently undermined a mechanism that had some significant potential to improve the compliance of high-emitting nations on the basis of equity and justice. Relying on recent research on the.. (shrink)

At the forefront of international concerns about global legislation and regulation, a host of noted environmentalists and business ethicists examine ethical issues in consumption from the points of view of environmental sustainability, economic development, and free enterprise.

Because complex environmental problems are relegated to scientific experts, the ethical questions that are embedded in these problems are often hidden or distorted in scientific and administrative methodology and communication. The administrative process requires that facts and values be separated. Those values that cannot simply be ignored are usually translated into technical economic language and settled in terms of economic costs and benefits. Calls for regulatory reform-i.e., to reduce or eliminate environmental regulation--create additional pressures on analysts that encourage them to (...) focus on quantitative questions at the expense of qualitative ones. Distortion can also result from the use of standard risk assessment procedures and from the improper placement of burden of proof on govemment agencies. The greatest problem, nevertheless, is the narrow scientific training of technical experts which frequently leaves them unprepared to deal with the ethical and value issues in environmental public policy. (shrink)

A view from deep inside the trenches of environmental policy formation leads me to conclude that, ironically, despite the failure of environmental ethics to penetrate public policy discourses, ethical analyses of environmental problems still appear to be more than ever vitally crucial to improving environmental decision making.