Ecospirit: Religions and Philosophies for the Earth

Toward an Ethics of Biodiversity: Science and Theology in Environmentalist Dialogue

 Toward an Ethics of Biodiversity: Science and Theology in Environmentalist Dialogue K E V I N J . O ’ B R I E N INTRODUCTION In an often told and possibly apocryphal story, a member of the Christian clergy anxious to engage in dialogue asked the Marxist physiologist John Haldane what his study of the natural world had taught him about its Creator. Haldane replied that if there is a God, it seems to be one with ‘‘an inordinate fondness for beetles,’’ citing the hundreds of thousands of distinct species of the insects already catalogued and the uncountable others that human beings have never seen. Haldane was likely annoyed by the question, and trying to shock the clergymember out of a followup . But as an environmentalist and a Christian, I am delighted by the exchange—delighted enough, in fact, to take up the questioner’s position myself in this essay. I hope to ask more careful and involved questions, and I hope to receive more detailed and expansive responses, but the fundamental goal of this essay is a dialogue between scientific ecologists and environmentalist moral theologians.1 More specifically, I want to know what role biodiversity plays in the world and how we should respond to it ethically. A more developed and scientific description of biodiversity will come below, but by way of introduction I define the concept broadly as the ‘‘variety of nature,’’ signaling the vast diversity within all species, between them, and among the ecosystems in which they are organized.2 Biodiversity is, in this sense, a way of talking about the world as a whole—in theological terms, the sum of living creation—while emphasizing the vast multiplicity of its expressions and patterns. k e vi n j . o ’ b ri e n 兩 179 In addition to making an assertion about the variety of nature, biodiversity is also commonly used to reference a ‘‘crisis’’ of loss. Just as human beings have come to glimpse the vast diversity of the natural world, we have also begun to reduce biodiversity at a rate unprecedented for at least 65 million years. Indeed, although it is not as commonly referenced as global warming, this ‘‘biodiversity crisis’’ is frequently used to represent environmental degradation more broadly as a generic environmentalist rallying cry. To preserve biodiversity is, in some sense, to preserve life itself.3 So, inherent in the concept of biodiversity are two claims: that life on this planet is vastly diverse, and that this diversity is under threat from our species.4 This essay asks how to respond to these facts, and I will offer two answers. The first is a broad, methodological argument that, however environmentalist moral theologians respond to the concept of biodiversity and the natural world it represents, we must do so in conversation with the scientists who have most carefully defined and monitored it. I make this point in part by articulating a methodology of naturalism, but also by modeling it, developing my own position in dialogue with scientific ecologists who study biodiversity. The second answer is a constructive theological argument about how Christian thinkers should understand the world and humanity’s role in it. My claim is that theologians and theological ethicists must take biodiversity seriously as a place where humanity encounters the rest of creation , and that this means becoming fully aware simultaneously of the immense power our species has established over all other forms of life and of the limitations in our ability to use that power responsibly. The work of this essay is therefore to demonstrate the potential of a genuine dialogue between ecological science and Christian ethics by using such a dialogue to articulate, defend, and explore an ethics of biodiversity . Like the clergymember who nagged the physiologist, I want to learn more about my faith by entering into dialogue with the life sciences . I want to know if God is calling me to an inordinate fondness for biodiversity. THE METHODOLOGICAL TURN TO NATURALISM The most obvious starting places for a theologian thinking about biodiversity are the resources of the Bible and the Christian tradition, which 180 兩 e c os p i ri t can certainly provide substantial insight into the concept. The book of Genesis begins by dividing lifeforms into groups based on when they were created. Reflecting upon the order and interdependence of this creation , the divine character in the story observes...