Ethical Response to Climate Change

The attitudes that have contributed to climate change are the same attitudes that are retarding an adequate ethical response to that crisis. With a growing understanding of the planet as a self-contained and evolving ecosystem, we realize that we are derivative from and inescapably dependent upon Earth's ecological systems, that it is not possible to have healthy humans on a sick planet. Putting the health of the planet in peril endangers our own survival. While this new awareness encourages a less anthropocentric and more Earth-friendly human culture, vestiges of the thinking that created climate change continue to guide most of our responses to this global problem. This paper will consider ethical principles that might guide effective responses to climate change as well as certain responses to that crisis that are either misguided or inadequate.