The Environment: Philosophy, Science, and Ethics

摘要

What makes a good scholarly anthology? Should it simply be a collection of quality writings, loosely related, or should it have one, or a very few, interconnected themes substantively discussed from a variety of standpoints, with some of its authors addressing one another? These are the sorts of questions this volume raises. Its title suggests a series of essays that interweave the themes of philosophy, science, and ethics in discussions of a central topic, the environment. In other words, it leads the reader-at least, this reader-to expect strong thematic connections among most of the essays because anthologies (except those by a single author) typically center around some issue or question the contributors perceive as needing analysis or evaluation or contesting. However, taken as a whole, this book does not cohere in that way; the essays, though indeed discussing ideas related to those themes, do not speak to those themes in any sustained or unified way. Some readers might argue that a collection does not need to cohere in this way. However, I believe it should.