EVSP 508 Environmental Ethics Assignment week 5 Comparative Paper Ethical Basis of Worldviews

Select one from the list of suitable environmental issues below:

Animal Rights Biodiversity Food Ethics Invasive species management Land Development Overpopulation Responsibility of Scientists Each one of these issues can relate directly to concepts and themes in environmental ethics.

After selecting the environmental issue you will use, begin to gather information not only on the "state-of-the-knowledge" regarding this issue, which you will need to understand yourself before you can tackle the subject, but more importantly for this course gather scholarly peer-reviewed resources on how environmental ethics interplay with science, policy, and management relating to this issue.

At first, you may have to really dive in and put in some time seeking out peer-reviewed work and finding connections, trying a variety of keywords in your searches.

Be sure to use many of the concepts, themes, authors, and keywords conveyed throughout our readings, lessons, and discussions, and find recent peer-reviewed sources to support your comparative analysis.

So, what are you comparing? After selecting one of the environmental issues from the list above, you will present that issue within the context of four worldview arguments in environmental ethics.

[Please limit this comparative paper to four, though more are covered throughout class.]

Here is a list of suitable worldview arguments for environmentalism:

aesthetics biocentrism care ethics deep ecology duty ethics ecocentrism ecofeminism ecojustice / environmental justice land ethic lifeboat ethics pragmatism religious worldview (each would count as one worldview and you would specify e.g., Indian, Chinese, Buddhist, Jewish, Christianity, Islamic – see Watling) social ecology utilitarian.

This is a broad list, but please select specifically from these worldviews.

Your comparative paper will explain the similarities and differences among these worldview arguments specifically relevant to the selected environmental issue.

Do not paint the descriptions in broad sweeps, but rather specifically focus on the environmental issue selected (e.g., biodiversity, land development).

The field of environmental ethics is too broad to cover all these issues across so many worldview arguments.

Narrow your analysis specifically to the selected environmental issue and to four worldview arguments.

The narrower your issue, the more likely you are to build a solid, scholarly, and complex comparative analysis.

To frame this comparative analysis, you will build a table to include in the paper.

Label it Table 1 and include a caption, formatted in APA style.

For the rows, use the four worldview arguments for environmentalism.

You should include four columns with comparison points in the table (so, five total columns, since the column to the left lists the worldview arguments).

What can you use as the column headers to create a similarly designed comparison for the four worldview arguments? Use your knowledge of the worldview arguments, your understanding of key concepts in environmental ethics, and peer-reviewed research to complete this table.

Some considerations for the columns might be history (e.g., who is responsible for this worldview, when was it presented), connections with theories of ethics (e.g., consequentialism, deontological and rights views, virtue ethics, e.g., see Palmer et al.

[2014]), value theory (e.g., what in nature is valuable, from where does value come from), type of value (e.g., anthropocentric, non-anthropocentric, biocentric, ecocentric, holistic), and/or examples of how the worldview arguments match with the issue you selected (e.g., case study, current event).

The columns will form the basis of your comparison.

The table must fit on one single page. You may need to use the landscape format for the page the table is on. To fit on one page, you must be concise. Do not use full sentences in the table. Do not make the text size so small the reader cannot read it. Fit the entire table including the caption on one page. Format the table in APA style with the label, Table 1, and the caption. Below is an example, but the row labels, column labels, and cell content should be your own work.

Table 1

Include a Caption Stating the Content of the Table

Comparison Point 1

Comparison Point 2

Comparison Point 3

Comparison Point 4

Worldview 1

Worldview 2

Worldview 3

Worldview 4

At the very start of your writing, be sure that you develop a suitable thesis statement and organize the comparative paper to present a coherent and scholarly analysis.

Your paper must clearly demonstrate your mastery of advanced concepts in environmental ethics.

At a minimum, you are expected to include the completed table above, no more than five pages of text (i.e., not including the title page, table, or reference list), and a references section properly formatted in APA style.

The paper must include proper parenthetical citations to credit all sources of information, and sources should be thoroughly vetted and appropriate for a professional audience.

Do not present in the first person.

Be scientific and objective.

Leave personal bias out of the comparative analysis.

The audience needs to have a solid basis for key concepts in environmental ethics as related to the selected environmental issue.

If there is specific technical language involved, explain it to the audience by defining terms and technology (if applicable).

Format the paper in APA style, including paragraph style, headings, etc.

Please review the grading rubric to understand how your comparative analysis will be awarded credit.

Here is an outline of how you should organize the paper:

Introduction – use a first-level heading; what is the issue being addressed and what is its relevance to environmental ethics Worldviews in Environmental Ethics – use a first-level heading; identify the four worldviews selected and define each; cite sources consulted Comparison of Worldviews – use a first-level heading; introduction to comparison, refer the reader to the table, and embed Table 1 here Comparison Point 1 – use a second-level heading; explain the comparison point across the four worldviews; cite sources consulted; repeat for all four comparison points as separate subsections Comparison Point 2 Comparison Point 3 Comparison Point 4 Conclusion – use a first-level heading; recap the thesis; summarize the findings; state the take-home message References – use APA style A Note on Writing Expectations

Please review the Writing@APUS center in the APUS library (https://www.apus.edu/apus-library/resources-services/Writing/writing-center.html).

Your work is expected to be clearly organized and mostly your own writing rather than a series of quotations.

In general, in professional writing avoid direct quotes and instead paraphrase and summarize the research in order to demonstrate your mastery of the topic.

Be sure to take the time to review the sections on: