Ray,

I do want to give your questions some thought before responding more
carefully.  I agree that the examples I use are, in one sense, "trivial" as
you say.  It would be helpful to have some sense of what  you are looking
for here, i.e. in terms of non-trivial examples.  But here's a quick
response off the top of my head in order to keep the conversation moving .
. . .

>Thanks for your comments.  I am familiar with your examples.  The problem I
>have with them is that all your examples seem to me to be trivial.  Just as
>was Dr. Johnson when he said that when he kicked a rock his foot hurt.  As
>if that destroyed Bishop Berkeley's immaterialism.
>
>In your examples, it seems to me, there has developed through much dialogue
>a general consensus about the *meaning* of the "reality".

Here it might be helpful to compare our everyday practical knowledge (about
which there is little or no radical doubt) with the epistemic status of our
technical, scientific knowledge.  For instance, there is general agreement
about the physical principles at work that help keep planes reliably flying
up in the air rather than crashing down to the ground.  We trust that the
engineers have done their jobs correctly and have correctly applied the
right engineering formulas to their design of, say, the appropriate wing
size for a 747.  In some ways, however, this seemingly broad consensus
within science that most people *usually* can simply take for granted is
more apparent than actual.  Disagreement also occurs everyday in science,
especially in the borderline areas that bound our generally accepted and
reliable scientific knowledge.  In science, then, the consensus about
knowledge to which you correctly draw our attention is generally about the
uncontested "basics" of knowledge--mass, energy, and the like--about which
there is little or no remaining meaningful dispute (putting aside "quantum
weirdness" concerns for the moment--sorry, C.L.).  And the consensus view
within science is a broadly "realistic" one (in the formal epistemological
sense of the term "realism") and roughly follows along the lines of what I
sketched out in my previous post.

But in terms of ethics and environmental ethics . . .  you are right,
seemingly there is no consensus.  We touched on this topic briefly about a
year ago on this list, during the course of the discussion on "space
ethics."  See e.g. my post
http://www.mailbase.ac.uk/lists/enviroethics/1999-07/0133.html from last
July.

(ha! a bit of Humberto-like "self-referencing" there; now all I need is one
of those "long, self-reknitting beatnik scarves" like Humberto wears and
I'll be all set.  Maybe then J.F. and C.L. will love me too, who knows.)
:-)

(Sure hope that came across as sarcastically humorous, and not as
dishonestly or deceptively "snide."  I meant no harm.) <s>   BTW, has
anybody ever seen a "self-reknitting scarf" before? just curious.

Back to the subject at hand.  In the broader context of ethics in general,
there often appears (to non-ethicists, that is) to be no consensus.  An
entire literature has sprung up in the past twenty years or so within moral
philosophy surrounding the discussion of exactly what the *significance* is
for metaethical theorizing of the various moral "dilemmas," moral disputes,
and widespread moral disagreement that we see every day.  (Do a keyword
search for "moral dilemmas" in your university library catalogue, and
you'll see what I mean.)  This is not a resolved area within moral
philosophy/metaethics, so on the one hand, I'm not sure *anything* I could
say to you in response to your questions above would likely satisfy you on
that score.

On the other hand, there are signs that the discussion about moral dilemmas
and their metaethical significance is starting to fizzle out in the
academic field of ethics; and *I* think (and this is sheer seat of the
pants hunch making on my part, so don't quote me on this--i.e. "imho") an
emerging consensus, or at least something *resembling* a broadly scattered
and pragmatic consensus, is starting to occur within the field of academic
ethics.  Brink's book, for example, combines a moral realism perspective
with regards to the ethical reliability of our normally agreed upon
conceptions of moral "facts" or "truths" (ie. in order to facilitate
objective discussion and moral reasoning about everyday ethical problems)
with the "anti-correspondence theory" and "anti-foundationalist" insights
that have been generated over the past few decades from the
constructivist/subjectivist postmodern post-Kuhnian, etc. etc. etc.
skepticism about historic claims to certainty RE: epistemological
foundations (e.g. God, natural law, nihilism, whatever).  whew, that was a
mouthful. . . .

In other words, I think people are starting to realize that you don't
*have* to have your moral epistemology foundations *absolutely* in place,
set in stone, concretely established, BEFORE you can *do* ethics in the
real world.  There is a grudging and growing acceptance that the world is a
pluralistic, diverse, crazy place, and that the search for the ethically
universalizable "One True Way," in ethics (or in anything else) is unlikely
to result in any kind of foundational moral rule(s) that will hold for "all
of the people, all of the time."

Well, so anyway.  I guess those are just some very quick thoughts in
response, let me know if this helps.

Jim

>
>That does not seem to me to be the case with the basic issues concerning
>environmental ethics.  Do I err?  If so, please give me some examples of
>*basic* issues that match that "trivial" area that I suggest.

well, okay.  P.S.  I guess some *basic* areas of agreement in environmental
ethics have to do with, say, things like polluting: all else being equal,
it's probably best NOT to pollute than it is to pollute.  (Only problem is,
in the real world, "all else" is rarely equal.)  All else being equal, it's
probably better to preserve species, biodiversity, wilderness, etc. than it
is to destroy or consume these things.  Again, "all else being equal"
rarely attains in the real world--the fact of the matter is that human
needs and natural needs conflict.  This is why we have environmental
ethics, then: to help us *think* about what we should do in cases where we
have obvious "plural and conflicting values," as philosopher Michael
Stocker puts it.  This would make another great thread topic at some point,
I think.  Anyway, those are some more quick thoughts off the top of my
head.
jt


>
>Sincerely from this continuing student,
>
>Ray



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