Morality, Responsibility and the Environment

by Joseph Cregan

I have never seen a greater monster or miracle in the world than myself
- Montaigne

Could, or indeed should, morality marry responsibility? What impact would this ‘walking down the aisle’ have on our obligations to the wider world around us in general and the environment in particular? These are two of the key issues facing us today. As I can make no great claims to being well versed on global environment issues, I will attempt to free up the question by looking solely at the issue of responsibility - a method not in itself devoid of environmental relevance, but definitely not constrained by its limitations.

This issue of responsibility is no clear-cut task. It seems that we live in a society whereby too often we are told of our ‘responsibility’ to this, or our ‘responsibility’ to that. We have all been told since early childhood, since we could comprehend
complex speech, that we have a ‘responsibility’ to certain things in this world, be it to ourselves, to those around us, or indeed to the environment. But what is this word ‘responsibility’? Do we ever fully understand it, conceptually that is? Or are we still
stuck in, and trapped in, a certain childish mentality that needs, and often craves, direction and guidance? Do we all just want these ‘responsibilities’ to be laid out for us to follow blindly, so that we can avoid the difficult questions?

For many years, organised religion assumed this dogmatic role, but today many of us would outright disregard the view that we wish to be led, arguing that we are all fully autonomous beings in relation to determining our concept of responsibility. I often wonder if this is truly the case.

And if so, do we ever really exercise this autonomy? Or is it possible perhaps that responsibility is just a word that the majority have invented to protect their own interests?
Rousseau believed, ‘the strongest is never strong enough to be always the master, unless he transforms strength into right, and obedience into duty’(1).
That is to say, could the idea of responsibility be a case of subjugating the weak before the dominant ideology?

Before we, as individuals, can progress in any way, not simply on the environmental level at hand, we need to confront our interpretation of responsibility.
We need to ask if we really have any sort of moral obligations, or responsibility in general, to preserve and protect the environment. Can we, in good conscience, call those who choose not to heed the warnings about global warming, those who meet the requirements of a ‘frequent flyer’, or those who drive around the corner to buy the newspaper, immoral or irresponsible? One could simply brand them as non-conformists to the environmental cause.

To fully understand our true relationship with the concept of responsibility we urgently need to examine our approach to the Present day:
Whether we choose, for example, to view the present as a transition point to the future, as St. Augustine did, or whether we decide to view the present as a way- out, or ‘Ausgang’, as German philosopher Kant described it when responding to the question, ‘Was ist Aufklarung?’ (What is Enlightenment?)(2).

It is Kant’s view that the present offers us the opportunity to escape external control of the notions and concepts (3) that we hold. It gives us the opportunity to fully question our current standing and re-evaluate it through the use of reason. Man, according to Kant, is living in an immature state that he alone is responsible for, characterised by his lack of authority over himself. Therefore, it must be supposed that he will be able to escape from it only by a change that he himself can bring about. Whether or not man is living in this state of immaturity, however, is subjective.
Foucault, when discussing Kant’s ‘what is enlightenment?’ said that
“it [conscious questioning] must be seen as a process in which men participate collectively and as an act of courage, to be accomplished personally.(4)

Certain philosophical theories address the notion of responsibility in a more direct manner. The field of Ethics, for example, can suggest that moral responsibility often largely relates to action or inaction and their consequences in society.

The theories often refer to our need to create a sense of right and wrong through subjectively determined judgements, and as result, a sense of responsibility.
They would seem to suggest that a moral responsibility to the world and environment around us stems solely from how our actions would and do affect others.
We could therefore conclude that responsibility is just a collection of subjectively determined judgements. That to act in the Right way is to simply protect your or another’s interest in survival. Perhaps then acting in an environmentally friendly manner could be viewed as simply protecting this same interest in survival.
Surely then, the idea of responsibility, as existing purely in itself (independent of our determination), is defunct, and inapplicable.

Kant, however, in his ‘Categorical Imperative’, argues that moral requirements, and here it would be fair to add responsibilities, stem from a core standard of rationality. Therefore to act immorally, or irresponsibly to a certain extent, is to act irrationally. But again, what is it to act immorally or irresponsibly?
Kant answers that morality is not simply a subjective taste or judgement, and that
regardless of how you yourself are willing to be treated, certain universal laws (ie, not
subject dependent (5) relating to morality, and hence possibly responsibilty, exist.
The universal respect of and right to life for example, could be seen as one of these laws. Although not explicitly mentioned by Kant, one could take it as existing in itself. That is to say, stemming from an a priori, rational morality, as Kant alludes to, prior to sense or empirical determination, being ‘true in itself’. (6)

Allowing hypothetically then, as many do, that the right to life is a universal right,
then surely by disregarding pressing environmental issues one denies another the right
to life, or in the very least endangers that life. Therefore, by denying (or endangering)
one’s universal right to life, it could be said one is acting both irresponsibly and
morally reprehensibly, and in opposition to our a priori sense of morality.

One could indeed contend such ideas, but in order to avoid a ‘toppling
point’ of ecological stability on this planet one must address one’s own ideas of responsibility on a personal and individual level.
We cannot solely rely on elected governments, because for them
as long as environmental “irresponsibility” remains economically viable, then those in positions of power will see to its perpetuation, ironically at seemingly any cost.

I am not one who necessarily believes that we wish to save our natural
environment for its own sake, but that does not diminsh its importance.
I would like to believe that when you or I act in an environmentally detrimental manner, it is not through malice or malevolence but rather through ignorance. Due to a lack of real understanding, or an ‘immaturity’ as Kant described. Even if it is a choice on our part to live in blissful ignorance, that choice in itself is a result of a fundamental ignorance, an ignorance of the dangers of ignorance, if you will.
One that can and should be overcome.

To say that rhetoric can only achieve so much may seem cliched, but it is as pertinent today, not just in environmental terms, as it has ever been. Society needs more than rhetoric - it needs debate, dialogue and action. We need a greater culture of present day study, not just on environmental issues but in everything, so that the importance of the Environment is not lost on occupied, yet ultimately vacant minds. If we promote a greater sense of general self-awareness then the desire to heed certain founded warnings will follow.

I personally believe in an innate rationality that many of us share. Few among us wish to deny ourselves, or another, the right to life, but, according to groups such as the UN-appointed Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (www.ipcc.ch.), that is ostensibly what we are doing, or at least rapidly progressing towards.

In 2000, a map published by the World Bank showed that a one-meter rise in sea level would inundate half of Bangladesh's rice lands. With sea levels predicted to rise by up to one meter this century, Bangladeshis would be forced to migrate in their millions. Rice-growing river floodplains in Asia, including those in India, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia and China, also risk being affected.

In October 1987, in an address to the U.N. General Assembly, Maldives President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom said that his country was threatened by rising sea level. The Maldives, with 311,000 people, was, in his words, "an endangered nation". With most of its 1,196 tiny islands barely two meters above sea level, the Maldives' survival could indeed be threatened with even a one-meter rise in sea level in the event of a storm surge. Fearing such a rise the Tuvaluan government appealed last year to Australia and New Zealand to provide permanent homes for its people. “Bangladesh, with a population of 140 million, will be the largest nation that will be directly affected by a change in sea level rise.” (7)

Whether we, myself included, wish to accept and pay attention to warnings such as these is one issue. But do we have the right not to? That is another question entirely. Perhaps, therefore, our only real ‘reponsibility’, as it stands, is to try and answer this question. If not for others, then at least for ourselves.

Interesting link:
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/ireland/2006/0509/2997934788HM9GEORGIANDUBLIN.html

Refererences

(1) Jean Jacques Rousseau, ‘The Social Contract and Discourses’ p.184. G.D.H.Cole, Everyman, Great Britain, 2003.

(2) Addressed in the German periodical ‘Berlinische Monatschrift’ in November 1784.
The Foucault Reader, P32, Series Editor Paul Rainbow, Penguin Books, London, 1991.

(3) Here, for example, the notion of responsibility.

(4) The Foucault Reader, P35, Series Editor Paul Rainbow, Penguin Books, London, 1991

(5) In direct contrast to the concept of Idealism, which believes that the world is purely dependent on our perception of it.

(6) This Kantian concept, that of something being ‘true in itself’ or ‘really real’ relates largely to Kant’s theories on the ‘Phenonenal’ and ‘Noumenal’ worlds. Kant believed that for many things there existed its ‘true form’, independent of our sense perception, independent of subjective necessity.

However our ability to grasp any of these conceptually, is dependent on, firstly, empirical knowledge - that is, derived from our five senses - and secondly, on deduced judgements. They must be both at the same time, synthetic and a priori judgements: synthetic in the sense that they can be either true or untrue because we realise them to be so, (as a result of facts about the world), and a priori in the sense that they are independent of sense experience. The possibility of such is proposed in Kant’s desire for a ‘Copernican Revolution’, in relation to metaphysics, and which is consequently detailed in his ‘Critique of Pure Reason’.

(7) Conference on Global Warming and the Future of low-lying countries, 2005;

http://www.ams.ubc.ca/clubs/bsa/globalWarming.htm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/1220036.stm

Joseph Cregan is a UCD Erasmus student studying philosophy at the Sorbonne in Paris. He makes no great claims to being of any use whatsoever to anything, except when he is on Wikipedia or reading to the dying flame of a Vanilla-scented candle.