Environmental Ethical Issues Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Environmental Ethical Issues - Essay Example â€Å"Environmental ethics is a new sub-discipline of philosophy that deals with the ethical problems surrounding environmental protection.† (Yang, 2006). Environmental ethics calls for attempts on the part of humans to ensure the provision of safe and healthy environment not only for their own generations but also for all the animals and plants on Earth. Environmental issues have not been adequately addressed in the past, given the lack of general awareness and a curiosity to achieve more. We have largely relied on fossil fuels as the fundamental source of energy to fulfill our domestic and industrial needs and have unintentionally caused irreparable damage to the environment through the emission of toxic gases into the air as a result of burning of the fossil fuels causing phenomenon like global warming. Birth of events like Earth Day in 1971 served to increase general awareness about global environmental pollution in masses all over the world which overtly expressed their concerns on the issue and their concerns were addressed in the form of first United Nations Environmental Conference which took place in Stockholm the following year. (Yang, 2006). This conference paved way for further measures that included but were not limited to the development of laws to ensure environmental safety on both national and international level in the years to follow. People began to realize the importance of environmental ethics particularly when philosophers published papers to address this issue. Three papers namely â€Å"Is there a need for a new, an environmental ethic?, Animal liberation and The shallow and the deep, long-range ecology movement† were published by â€Å"Richard Routley, Peter Singer and Arne Naess† respectively in 1973. These authors belonged to different countries and cultural backgrounds and their joint concern over the matter depicted the whole world’s curiosity to