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reality of why we would choose to regard the protection of ecosystems as
desirable for us.
Thesecondandrelateddif
culty is that ecological processes are not
necessarily benign. Resilience may also, as we have already noted, not be
a desirable property in a system that has undergone a change in state. It
would
tthatweandabroaddiversityofspecies
derive from ecosystems to suggest that we should value ecological pro-
cesses irrespective of whether they provide us with support or remove it
from us. Again, the unavoidable conclusion is that the only realistic way
in which we can
y in the face of the bene
nd value in ecosystems, and therefore the motivation
to protect them, is from an anthropocentric perspective.
2.6 Duties and principles for ecologically
oriented decision-making
I have advanced broad arguments about the need for humanity to forge a
different perspective and to alter its values in light of the changed under-
standing of the natural world. In this
nal section
, I apply these arguments
in proposing a set of principles that might be applied by governments for
determining what actions are consistent with ecological values, and how
those which are judged to be compatible with preserving ecosystem func-
tionality might be implemented.
Aldo Leopold
thing is right when it tends to
preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community
'
s famous maxim that a
'
has
been used as a starting point for many attempts to develop an ecologically
oriented ethics.
129
However, notwithstanding its widespread appeal,
Leopold
'
s maxim does not provide a useful basis for establishing principles
to govern our relations with ecosystems as we now understand them to be.
As our activities inevitably tend to undermine the properties that enable
ecosystems to maintain their state to some degree, the great majority of
what we do would not be regarded as
'
'
right
'
according to Leopold
'
sstate-
'
ment. An adaptation of Leopold
s position that would come closer to what
we now know about ecosystems might adjudge that a thing is right when
it tends to have the least erosive effects on systemic resilience and the
properties which contribute to it when compared with available alterna-
tives. However, this statement, as with Leopold
'
s, presupposes an ability to
129
A. Leopold, A Sand County Almanac (Oxford University Press: New York, 1949)
quoted in Curry,
'
Ecological Ethics
'
,pp.94
-
5.
