research about environmental ethics

Log in using your username and password

Search More Search for this keyword Advanced search
Latest content
Current issue
JME Commentaries
BMJ Journals

http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8111-2730 Gabrielle Samuel 1 ,
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7885-9136 Cristina Richie 2
1 Department of Global Health and Social Medicine , King's College London , London , UK
2 Philosophy and Ethics of Technology Department , Delft University of Technology , Delft , Netherlands
Correspondence to Dr Gabrielle Samuel, Global Health and Social Medicine, King's College London - Strand Campus, London, London, UK; gabrielle.samuel{at}kcl.ac.uk

In this paper we argue the need to reimagine research ethics frameworks to include notions of environmental sustainability. While there have long been calls for health care ethics frameworks and decision-making to include aspects of sustainability, less attention has focused on how research ethics frameworks could address this. To do this, we first describe the traditional approach to research ethics, which often relies on individualised notions of risk. We argue that we need to broaden this notion of individual risk to consider issues associated with environmental sustainability. This is because research is associated with carbon emissions and other environmental impacts, both of which cause climate change health hazards. We introduce how bioethics frameworks have considered notions of environmental sustainability and draw on these to help develop a framework suitable for researchers. We provide a case study of data-driven health research to apply our framework.

research ethics

This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported (CC BY 4.0) license, which permits others to copy, redistribute, remix, transform and build upon this work for any purpose, provided the original work is properly cited, a link to the licence is given, and indication of whether changes were made. See: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ .

https://doi.org/10.1136/jme-2022-108489

Statistics from Altmetric.com

Request permissions.

If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

Introduction

Dominant research ethics paradigms often revolve around ethics principles that are concerned with the protection, rights, safety and welfare of individual research participants. These paradigms can be traced back to a number of historical ethics frameworks developed in response to atrocities in biomedical/clinical research in the 20th century, 1 and include the 1968 Declaration of Helsinki 1 and the subsequent 1979 Belmont Report. 2 These frameworks aim to guide physicians and researchers in appropriate clinical research ethics conduct, with relevant ethical principles including the need for research to respect individual research participants in group or individual settings; the need to ensure that research design minimises individual risk while maximising potential societal benefit; and the need to ensure fair practices in the selection of individuals for participation in research studies.

While individualised risk has long been a focus of research ethics frameworks, strong criticism exists around it. In an interconnected world it is difficult to argue that the impacts of individual research treatment would not affect others, particularly in the closer communities of friend and family groups. Carol Gilligan’s work on care ethics 4 and the notion of relational autonomy both point to the networks that impact ethical decision-making within healthcare. Furthermore, concerns have long been raised about the appropriateness of placing individual risk ahead of communitarianism , especially in research areas that are less concerned with individual health, such as global health research. Public health scholars have long pointed to the moral status of the community in research ethics considerations, 5–8 whereby community harms are more than the sum of individual values and interests and relate to questions associated with whether communities will be beneficiaries of the research, or even whether they share the same goals as the researchers. 9–11 Multiple authors have pointed to the abusive practices and problematic studies conducted with tribes, indigenous populations, and minoritised and marginalised communities worldwide over the past decades, which have failed to consider community harms associated with violating widespread trust or taking ownership of a community’s stories. 10 For these reasons Emmanuel and Weijer 9 emphasise the importance of an ethical principle of ‘respect for community’ alongside more individual principles related to risk and exploitation, such that scholars need to devote careful attention to understanding the sociopolitical impact of research on communities as a whole and not only to individuals, 7 12 13 remembering that individuals are part of the whole community.

While concerns about community harm have expanded moral status considerations beyond those focused on individual risk alone, they are anthropocentric and have stopped short of considering environment-related harms associated with the research process. The environmental impact of the medical industry and health research can be measured by carbon emissions and resource use. The carbon emissions of global healthcare activities, including research, make up 4%–5% of the total world emissions. 14 The Lancet reports that the Sustainable Clinical Trials Group calculated nearly 350 000 national and international trials registered on ClinicalTrials.gov ‘using the average…(to) give a carbon consumption of an estimated 27.5 million tonnes, which is just under a third of the total annual carbon emissions of Bangladesh, a country of 163 million people’. 15 The impact of carbon emissions includes not only climate change, but also health hazards like pollution, significant environmental destruction, use of scarce resources, loss of biodiversity and diminished quality of life for humans. 16 People affected by climate change require medical care, which is predicated on medical research. 17 These treatments release more carbon, locking healthcare into a self-destructive cycle whereby medical research, care and treatments cause medical needs. Hence, healthcare research has a special interest in carbon reduction, not only as a matter of international priority, but also as a commitment to health. In this paper we draw on the concept of sustainability to provide an ethical basis for the inclusion of such environmental harms in health research.

Environment and (bio)ethics

In 1927 Fritz Jahr described bioethics (German: bio-ethik ) as ‘the assumption of moral obligations not only towards humans, but towards all forms of life’. 18 Jahr drew on Rudolf Eisler’s Bio-Psychik , declaring: ‘Respect every living being on principle as an end in itself and treat it, if possible, as such!’ (p230). Almost half a century later in 1971, the term ‘bioethics’ appeared in English with a parallel scope when Van Rensselaer Potter used it to describe a life-ethic for an industrialised society in a precarious ecosystem. For Potter, bioethics was rooted in an intrinsically practical approach to ecologically sustainable life, inclusive of the earth and other organisms. 19 20 Despite bioethics’ environmental origins, since Beauchamp and Childress’ 21 1979 proposition of ‘biomedical ethics’, which focused on the patient–physician relationship through four principles of respect for autonomy, beneficence, non-maleficence and justice, ‘bioethics’ has become widespread conflated with ‘biomedical ethics’. This has erased the ecological origins of bioethics while simultaneously giving rise to the ‘new’ discipline of environmental bioethics. 22

Nevertheless, an increasing number of scholars have advocated bioethics readopt a broader perspective that aims to explore the relationships between individuals and the natural environment. 23–29 They reject that the land and ecosystems are just instrumentally valuable—good because of how humans can use them—but rather argue that our moral sentiments need to extend to the biotic community, to the soils, waters, plants and animals that make up our planet 30 since nature is both inherently valuable—good in itself—and because humans are a part of, not separate from, nature. 30 Most widely recognised ethical theories acknowledge interconnectedness (with people and communities), and it makes moral sense to include the biotic community within this moral framework. 31 They call for a systems approach that considers individuals, populations and environmental factors in understanding (health) practices and policies (for instance, see Lee 25 ; also see Richie 32 ).

Some effort has ensued in the research ethics community in this regard. The European Commission’s Ethics for Researchers —designed for researchers who are preparing an application for research funding from the European Union—includes respect for biodiversity, the environment and ecological balance as one of its 12 golden rules to ethical research conduct. 33 Equally, the All European Academies Code of Conduct for Research Integrity points to the need not to ‘waste resources and [expose the] environment to unnecessary harm’ during research. 34 The National Institutes for Health Research (NIHR) Carbon Reduction Guidelines ‘highlight areas where sensible research design can reduce waste without adversely impacting the validity and reliability of research’.[ 2 ] Similarly, the UK’s research funding body, UKRI (UK Research and Innovation), emphasises that ‘public funds should be deployed with due consideration to value for money and environmental impact across all activities’. 35

At the same time, a recent review of international research ethics frameworks by RAND suggests that such environmental concerns are primarily applied in non-human-centric disciplines; within human participant research, harm is generally considered anthropocentrically in human terms only. 36 If moral reflections are to consider the environment, key unanswered questions include how we should give respect to non-human worlds, especially since human endeavours will always inevitably lead to the destruction of at least some of the biotic community and ecosystems, and how this respect should or could be weighed next to humans (p235). 37 [ 3 ] Despite this, moral obligations to the environment still exist, even if they are anthropocentric and instrumentalising for reasons of self-preservation. The planet and its ecosystems sustain us. Without these ecosystems, humans can neither survive nor flourish, 37 and indeed the destruction of our ecosystem has led to a diminished quality of life for billions of people, including early death, increased morbidity and psychological suffering. 38

In the following section we argue that in research ethics frameworks, moral decision-making should extend to the environment. Drawing on the concept of sustainability, we map out what such a research ethics framework would look like.

A research ethics framework based on sustainability

As scholars in healthcare increasingly shift to a broader vision of bioethics and take into account factors associated with non-humans and ecosystems, sustainability has become an important concept. 27 31 32 39–47 Following from the well-cited ‘Brundtland Report’, sustainability is viewed as a forward-looking concept for guiding a wide variety of choices that are grounded on the commitment to the well-being of both current and future populations. 48 , 4

In her work on green bioethics, Richie 26 draws on environmental ethics to propose a green bioethics framework for evaluating the sustainability of medical developments, techniques and procedures. This framework includes four normative principles: distributive justice takes a broad view of the moral community and requires the allocation of basic medical resources before special interest access; resource conservation to provide healthcare needs before healthcare wants; simplicity to reduce dependence on medical interventions; and ethical economics to promote humanistic healthcare instead of financial profit. 26 We draw on this and other frameworks of restraint and justice from environmental bioethics (eg, see Potter and Lisa 49 in Jameton and Pierce 31 ). We modify it to be more aligned with current research ethics frameworks (eg, see Weinbaum et al 36 and Emanuel et al 50 ), thus making it intelligible and persuasive for researchers. In the following sections we map our research ethics framework of five substantive ethics principles: social value, scientific quality, respect for persons, communities and environment, justice, and favourable risk to benefit ratio.

Scientific quality

Proposed research must be conducted in a methodologically rigorous manner, using reliable and valid research design and methods. 51 52 Special attention to possible sample bias or underpowered research is important. Execution of the study is also important to ensure results are valid and answer the research question. A lack of quality leads to wasted resources and time. All research has a carbon footprint even if the results of the study are not published, or unusable for reasons of lack of replicability or lack of reproducibility. Hence, the NIHR suggests a thorough literature review prior to developing a research proposal.[ 5 ]

Social value

Research must be beneficial to the participants, community, society 50 51 and environment. More than just refraining from harming the individual, community, society or environment, it should proactively lead to improvements in health, the environment or well-being, or act as a preliminary step towards this. Anything short of this could expose individuals to harms without there being a worthy pursuit (especially if clinical research), or more broadly divert resources from other valuable pursuits. Since all research requires resources, maximal benefits should be prioritised since the consequence of research is increased carbon emissions and risks of climate change health hazards.

Respect for persons, communities and environment

Respect for persons extends further than respect for autonomy, and considers one’s moral attitude towards others and the actions towards others that result from and exemplify this attitude. 53 Respect for communities allows a broadening of this concept to include a variety of cultural norms, including those which place less emphasis on individual autonomy and autonomous decision-making than is the norm in some cultures. 54 Procedural principles to help with respecting persons and communities include, for example, the need for trustworthiness, transparency, privacy and ownership, accountability, autonomy, engagement, the need for consent, and the right to withdraw. 36 51 53 Respect for the environment includes taking environmental destruction into consideration by considering the environmental impacts associated with the research endeavour, particularly when that destruction occurs in places which may not directly benefit from the outputs, for example, clinical trials in the developing world, or in places where natural resources are used, not replenished and not properly compensated for (eg, harvesting of medicinal plants in a rainforest, mining).

This has historically referred to fair participant selection based on the scientific goals of the proposed research. 50 51 This also refers to the fair treatment of individuals and communities beyond research-based activities to ensure that those individuals or communities who take part in research are those most likely to benefit. It also refers to environment-associated harms and benefits associated with the research endeavour. This adheres to Nancy Fraser’s 54 work on justice, which proposes an ‘all subjected principle’, such that ‘all those who are subject to a given governance structure have moral standing as subjects of justice in relation to it’ and that ‘for any such governance structure, the all subjected principle matches the scope of moral concern to that of subjection’. Brock’s work is useful here too. She sees a role for both state-bound and global justice when considering duties in healthcare. 55 She explains that we should give special attention to those within our own state, but we have a moral obligation to make low or reasonable modifications to our own governance structures because of the negative duty to refrain from harming others. Following this premise, if low or reasonable modifications to our own governance structures would decrease harm caused to others, we have a moral responsibility to make these modifications. This is particularly pertinent for people living in affluent countries and their obligations for those who live in extreme poverty in developing countries, and particularly links to the risk to benefit ratio principle that requires finding the optimum research methodology that allows these risks to be minimised.[ 6 ]

Favourable risk to benefit ratio

This is a key aspect of research ethics frameworks that is also related to principles of proportionality, beneficence and non-maleficence. Historically, a favourable risk to benefit ratio involves weighing the individual risk versus individual and/or collective benefit from the research in a utilitarian way (and more recently assessing community risk/benefit). To be truly utilitarian, and to consider all links within a consequentialist pathway, risk to benefit ratios must include environment-related risks. 31 Jameton and Pierce 31 argue that when these harms are put into the research ethics risk/benefit balance, ‘everyday decisions unquestioned by ethicists and regarded as rational and even praiseworthy may be seen as questionable and possibly maleficent’ (p119). 31

Our proposed principles have direct relevance for health research. In the next section, we present a case study and then apply the principle to demonstrate the feasibility and agility.

Case study: data-driven health research

Health research is becoming increasingly data-intensive. Through the capture and analysis of vast swaths of clinical, imaging and genomic data, other biomarkers, as well as data from wearable devices, social media and environmental exposures, researchers aim to improve detection, diagnosis and treatment of patients and the public. While data-driven health research and any technologies that emerge are viewed as a panacea towards better health and healthcare, they have adverse environmental impacts. This is because they rely on digital infrastructures that are not ‘virtual’ as implied by the metaphors describing them, but have materiality—they involve mining, manufacturing, transport, use and waste, all of which have carbon emissions, and all of which produce toxic and hazardous chemicals as well as other environmental and public health impacts. For health research approaches that rely on artificial intelligence (AI), such as diagnostic tests and healthcare disease prediction, we know that the largest AI models are doubling in necessary compute every 3–4 months, thereby severely outpacing the increasing efficiency of hardware.[ 7 ] Mining and e-waste also have associated environmental, health and well-being harms. 56 58 For example, unregulated resource recovery from e-waste landfills has led to the generation of hazardous by-products shown to be present in those living around informal e-waste sites, at levels vastly exceeding recommended safety levels (see Gabrys 59 and Ngo et al 60 ).

Over the past decades, the digital sector has worked hard to drive efficiency gains.[ 8 ] However, the most recent estimate of the sector’s contribution to global carbon emissions has been calculated between 2.1% and 3.9% global emissions. 61 While health research only comprises a small proportion of all digital technology, health is the fastest growing sector in the datasphere 62 and will become an increasingly important contributor, with proteomics, metabolomics and genomics all data-intensive solutions. Communication and media scholar Mel Hogan emphasised that by 2025, between 100 million and 2 billion human genomes will have been sequenced globally, using some 40 exabytes of data. 63 The UK 100,000 Genomes Project, which has sequenced 100 000 genomes, is 21 petabytes, 64 and by 2025 the UK Biobank database—a leading biobank internationally—is expected to grow to 15 petabytes, an amount of data equivalent to that created annually by the Large Hadron Collider.[ 9 ]

Moreover, as other sectors decrease their environmental impacts, the digital sector, including the digital aspect of health research, will increase consumption as it acts as an enabling technology. Backfire is also a concern, whereby the move towards increased digital efficiency, without constraints, results in more, not less, consumption. For example, app-based ridesharing increases use of vehicles instead of carbon neutral forms of transportation like walking and biking, thus ‘cancelling out 68% to 77% of CO 2 emission reductions and 52% to 73% of aggregated social benefits (including congestion, air quality, carbon dioxide emissions, noise) expected from ridesharing’. 66 While increasing the efficiency of digital technologies has historically been drawn upon as a solution to increased consumption, these efficiency gains are slowing.

The move to renewables is also only a partial solution because of its large dependency on mining, as well as its poor recycling prospects. Finally, while health research promises to lead to better health, there is often a lack of clarity about whose health and whether those who will benefit are those who are already experiencing greater access to healthcare. For those not receiving these benefits, health research may amount to only health risks in the form of environmental impacts. 67

In the following sections we map out how researchers, ethicists and healthcare professionals can think about these issues through our principle-based research ethics framework.

Data should not be collected and analysed without ensuring that the research outputs will be of sufficient quality (considering issues of bias, etc). The storage and processing of data are not harm-free and should only be collected and/or analysed if there is an appropriate reason for doing so, such as translatability to significant medical progress, deep gains in knowledge, and the potential for widespread and just dissemination of any developments.

Research should cobenefit humans, communities, society and environment. Social value could mean prioritising more low-tech research rather than energy-hungry data analyses, especially when low-tech research is likely to produce positive health benefits that are equal or greater than high-tech. For example, addressing social, economic, commercial and political determinants of health is likely less impactful on the environment. This is because it is often based on preventive medicine and low-tech interventions, rather than high-tech, reactive solutions that may only lead to benefit for the few who have access to medical infrastructures and sophisticated medical care.

Respect for persons, communities and the environment

For data-driven health research, respect for persons and communities entails respecting all of those affected by the research. It involves community and individual engagement, the availability of readable and digestible information, transparency on how the data are regulated and the protections in place for individuals and communities whose data may be used, and accountability pathways. 53 This can be collected and published online in an easily searchable database. Moreover, how this is used should be part of open-access articles and reports for the benefit of those in the broader scientific community.

Respect for the environment includes awareness of the environmental impact of the research and taking steps to reduce this. At one level, this could involve, for example, optimising algorithms to ensure they have as minimal impact on resource use and carbon emissions or choosing data centres with considerations of sustainability in mind (eg, if the energy they use to power them is ‘dirty’ or ‘clean’, non-renewable or renewable). A range of calculators can help researchers assess the environmental impact of their data-driven practices, and there are various guidelines and frameworks to assist. 68 At a higher level, as researchers use more data, consumption and environmental impact will increase and this must be considered. Respecting the environment means minimising our data use as much as feasibly possible.

For data-driven health research, this refers to, for example, the fair collection, storage, use, linkage and sharing of data, 53 as well as attention to equity and benefit sharing of research outcomes. Consideration must also be given to environment-related harms. This includes those involved in mining minerals used in digital technologies, manufacturing them and recycling/disposing of them. This also includes aspects of social justice, for example, questioning the inequalities associated with the use of turks to analyse data. Justice must also consider how research results will be used in terms of the long-term implications and carbon expenditures.

Risk to benefit ratios need to include weighing up individual, community and environmental risk against benefit. As historically noted, this decision will include some measure of subjectivity, but overall should focus on minimising harm as much as possible. This can be achieved by, for example, buying repurposed machines where possible, using data centres that are powered by renewables and having appropriate recycling infrastructures for digital technologies. However, reliance on ‘recycling’ still requires resources. Hence, the familiar environmental manta ‘reduce, reuse, recycle’ is relevant: recycling should be the last resort on the path to sustainability, not the default.

As the levels of atmospheric carbon are already over safe levels of 350 parts per million, 69 research must be done parsimoniously in ways that neither suppress scientific invention and creative nor threaten the health of people and the planet. We have mapped out a research ethics framework that allows us to do this.

Ethics statements

Patient consent for publication.

Not required.

World Medical Association
National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research
Kraft SA , et al
Buchanan DR ,
Adashi EY ,
Walters LB ,
Menikoff JA
Gbadegesin S ,
Emmanuel EJ ,
Friesen P ,
Redman B , et al
Tsosie KS ,
Yracheta JM ,
Dickenson D
Nelson RM , et al
Emanuel EJ ,
Karliner J ,
Slotterback S
Adshead F ,
Al-Shahi Salman R ,
Aumonier S , et al
McMichael AJ
Knowlton K ,
Rotkin-Ellman M ,
Geballe L , et al
Van Rensselaer P
Beauchamp T ,
Childress J
↵ Richie C. a brief history of environmental bioethics . AMA J Ethics 2014 ; 16 ( 9 ): 749 – 52 . doi:10.1001/virtualmentor.2014.16.9.mhst2-1409 OpenUrl
Jennings V ,
Jameton A ,
European Commission
Weinbaum C ,
Landree E ,
Blumenthal MS
Cunsolo A ,
ten Have H ,
Lucivero F ,
Lucassen AM
Health Care without Harm
Buettner PG ,
Eckelman MJ ,
Mortimer F ,
Isherwood J ,
Wilkinson A , et al
Social Care Institute for Excellence
Oxford University Press
Potter VR ,
Wendler D ,
Tsoka-Gwegweni JM ,
Wassenaar DR
Owen Schaefer G ,
Mancini L ,
Eslava NA ,
Traverso M , et al
Dorninger C ,
Wieland H , et al
Watchalayann P ,
Nguyen DB , et al
Freitag C ,
Berners-Lee M ,
Widdicks K , et al
Reinsel D ,
Somavilla L
Coulombel N ,
Boutueil V ,
Liu L , et al
Hardcastle F ,
Grealey J ,
Lannelongue L ,

Funding This work received funding from Wellcome (222180/Z/20/Z).

Competing interests None declared.GS is the guarantor. CR's research was partially funded by the Technology University of Delft/ Erasmus Medical College Convergence ethics project.

Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; internally peer reviewed.

↵ Such as World War II, the Tuskegee Syphilis Study and the Henrietta Lacks case. The Tuskegee Syphilis Study was a longitudinal study conducted by the US Public Health Service in Tuskegee, Alabama, in which approximately 600 African Americans participated between 1932 and 1972. In 1972 it was revealed that the participants had received a dishonest explanation for their involvement in the research, and despite existing treatment for their condition—penicillin—they had been prevented from getting this treatment so that the research could continue. Lacks was an African American woman whose biospecimens were collected during a cervical cancer biopsy and later developed into the profitable HeLa cell line without her consent. 3

↵ See https://www.nihr.ac.uk/documents/the-nihr-carbon-reduction-guidelines/21685 .

↵ Holmes Rolston III discusses that obligations to protect non-human worlds are perhaps better understood at the species and ecosystem level. 30 He also provides more detail on the various ways in which value is ascribed to non-humans.

↵ In this report, sustainable development is defined as ‘meet(ing) the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’.

↵ https://www.nihr.ac.uk/documents/the-nihr-carbon-reduction-guidelines/21685 .

↵ Also see Mancini et al 56 and Hickel et al . 57

↵ Open AI, “AI and Compute,” May 16, 2018, at https://openai.com/blog/ai-and-compute/ .

↵ Mainly for business reasons, but more recently to address considerations of the environment. 65

↵ https://www.ukbiobank.ac.uk/learn-more-about-uk-biobank/news/uk-biobank-creates-cloud-based-health-data-analysis-platform-to-unleash-the-imaginations-of-the-world-s-best-scientific-minds .

Read the full text or download the PDF:

National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences

Your environment. your health., what is ethics in research & why is it important, by david b. resnik, j.d., ph.d..

December 23, 2020

The ideas and opinions expressed in this essay are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of the NIH, NIEHS, or US government.

When most people think of ethics (or morals), they think of rules for distinguishing between right and wrong, such as the Golden Rule ("Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"), a code of professional conduct like the Hippocratic Oath ("First of all, do no harm"), a religious creed like the Ten Commandments ("Thou Shalt not kill..."), or a wise aphorisms like the sayings of Confucius. This is the most common way of defining "ethics": norms for conduct that distinguish between acceptable and unacceptable behavior.

Most people learn ethical norms at home, at school, in church, or in other social settings. Although most people acquire their sense of right and wrong during childhood, moral development occurs throughout life and human beings pass through different stages of growth as they mature. Ethical norms are so ubiquitous that one might be tempted to regard them as simple commonsense. On the other hand, if morality were nothing more than commonsense, then why are there so many ethical disputes and issues in our society?

Alternatives to Animal Testing

Alternative test methods are methods that replace, reduce, or refine animal use in research and testing

Learn more about Environmental science Basics

One plausible explanation of these disagreements is that all people recognize some common ethical norms but interpret, apply, and balance them in different ways in light of their own values and life experiences. For example, two people could agree that murder is wrong but disagree about the morality of abortion because they have different understandings of what it means to be a human being.

Most societies also have legal rules that govern behavior, but ethical norms tend to be broader and more informal than laws. Although most societies use laws to enforce widely accepted moral standards and ethical and legal rules use similar concepts, ethics and law are not the same. An action may be legal but unethical or illegal but ethical. We can also use ethical concepts and principles to criticize, evaluate, propose, or interpret laws. Indeed, in the last century, many social reformers have urged citizens to disobey laws they regarded as immoral or unjust laws. Peaceful civil disobedience is an ethical way of protesting laws or expressing political viewpoints.

Another way of defining 'ethics' focuses on the disciplines that study standards of conduct, such as philosophy, theology, law, psychology, or sociology. For example, a "medical ethicist" is someone who studies ethical standards in medicine. One may also define ethics as a method, procedure, or perspective for deciding how to act and for analyzing complex problems and issues. For instance, in considering a complex issue like global warming , one may take an economic, ecological, political, or ethical perspective on the problem. While an economist might examine the cost and benefits of various policies related to global warming, an environmental ethicist could examine the ethical values and principles at stake.

See ethics in practice at NIEHS

Read latest updates in our monthly Global Environmental Health Newsletter

Many different disciplines, institutions , and professions have standards for behavior that suit their particular aims and goals. These standards also help members of the discipline to coordinate their actions or activities and to establish the public's trust of the discipline. For instance, ethical standards govern conduct in medicine, law, engineering, and business. Ethical norms also serve the aims or goals of research and apply to people who conduct scientific research or other scholarly or creative activities. There is even a specialized discipline, research ethics, which studies these norms. See Glossary of Commonly Used Terms in Research Ethics and Research Ethics Timeline .

There are several reasons why it is important to adhere to ethical norms in research. First, norms promote the aims of research , such as knowledge, truth, and avoidance of error. For example, prohibitions against fabricating , falsifying, or misrepresenting research data promote the truth and minimize error.

Join an NIEHS Study

See how we put research Ethics to practice.

Visit Joinastudy.niehs.nih.gov to see the various studies NIEHS perform.

Second, since research often involves a great deal of cooperation and coordination among many different people in different disciplines and institutions, ethical standards promote the values that are essential to collaborative work , such as trust, accountability, mutual respect, and fairness. For example, many ethical norms in research, such as guidelines for authorship , copyright and patenting policies , data sharing policies, and confidentiality rules in peer review, are designed to protect intellectual property interests while encouraging collaboration. Most researchers want to receive credit for their contributions and do not want to have their ideas stolen or disclosed prematurely.

Third, many of the ethical norms help to ensure that researchers can be held accountable to the public . For instance, federal policies on research misconduct, conflicts of interest, the human subjects protections, and animal care and use are necessary in order to make sure that researchers who are funded by public money can be held accountable to the public.

Fourth, ethical norms in research also help to build public support for research. People are more likely to fund a research project if they can trust the quality and integrity of research.

Finally, many of the norms of research promote a variety of other important moral and social values , such as social responsibility, human rights, animal welfare, compliance with the law, and public health and safety. Ethical lapses in research can significantly harm human and animal subjects, students, and the public. For example, a researcher who fabricates data in a clinical trial may harm or even kill patients, and a researcher who fails to abide by regulations and guidelines relating to radiation or biological safety may jeopardize his health and safety or the health and safety of staff and students.

Codes and Policies for Research Ethics

Given the importance of ethics for the conduct of research, it should come as no surprise that many different professional associations, government agencies, and universities have adopted specific codes, rules, and policies relating to research ethics. Many government agencies have ethics rules for funded researchers.

National Institutes of Health (NIH)
National Science Foundation (NSF)
Food and Drug Administration (FDA)
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
US Department of Agriculture (USDA)
Singapore Statement on Research Integrity
American Chemical Society, The Chemist Professional’s Code of Conduct
Code of Ethics (American Society for Clinical Laboratory Science)
American Psychological Association, Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct
Statement on Professional Ethics (American Association of University Professors)
Nuremberg Code
World Medical Association's Declaration of Helsinki

Ethical Principles

The following is a rough and general summary of some ethical principles that various codes address*:

Strive for honesty in all scientific communications. Honestly report data, results, methods and procedures, and publication status. Do not fabricate, falsify, or misrepresent data. Do not deceive colleagues, research sponsors, or the public.

Objectivity

Strive to avoid bias in experimental design, data analysis, data interpretation, peer review, personnel decisions, grant writing, expert testimony, and other aspects of research where objectivity is expected or required. Avoid or minimize bias or self-deception. Disclose personal or financial interests that may affect research.

Keep your promises and agreements; act with sincerity; strive for consistency of thought and action.

Carefulness

Avoid careless errors and negligence; carefully and critically examine your own work and the work of your peers. Keep good records of research activities, such as data collection, research design, and correspondence with agencies or journals.

Share data, results, ideas, tools, resources. Be open to criticism and new ideas.

Transparency

Disclose methods, materials, assumptions, analyses, and other information needed to evaluate your research.

Accountability

Take responsibility for your part in research and be prepared to give an account (i.e. an explanation or justification) of what you did on a research project and why.

Intellectual Property

Honor patents, copyrights, and other forms of intellectual property. Do not use unpublished data, methods, or results without permission. Give proper acknowledgement or credit for all contributions to research. Never plagiarize.

Confidentiality

Protect confidential communications, such as papers or grants submitted for publication, personnel records, trade or military secrets, and patient records.

Responsible Publication

Publish in order to advance research and scholarship, not to advance just your own career. Avoid wasteful and duplicative publication.

Responsible Mentoring

Help to educate, mentor, and advise students. Promote their welfare and allow them to make their own decisions.

Respect for Colleagues

Respect your colleagues and treat them fairly.

Social Responsibility

Strive to promote social good and prevent or mitigate social harms through research, public education, and advocacy.

Non-Discrimination

Avoid discrimination against colleagues or students on the basis of sex, race, ethnicity, or other factors not related to scientific competence and integrity.

Maintain and improve your own professional competence and expertise through lifelong education and learning; take steps to promote competence in science as a whole.

Know and obey relevant laws and institutional and governmental policies.

Animal Care

Show proper respect and care for animals when using them in research. Do not conduct unnecessary or poorly designed animal experiments.

Human Subjects protection

When conducting research on human subjects, minimize harms and risks and maximize benefits; respect human dignity, privacy, and autonomy; take special precautions with vulnerable populations; and strive to distribute the benefits and burdens of research fairly.

* Adapted from Shamoo A and Resnik D. 2015. Responsible Conduct of Research, 3rd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press).

Ethical Decision Making in Research

Although codes, policies, and principles are very important and useful, like any set of rules, they do not cover every situation, they often conflict, and they require interpretation. It is therefore important for researchers to learn how to interpret, assess, and apply various research rules and how to make decisions and act ethically in various situations. The vast majority of decisions involve the straightforward application of ethical rules. For example, consider the following case:

The research protocol for a study of a drug on hypertension requires the administration of the drug at different doses to 50 laboratory mice, with chemical and behavioral tests to determine toxic effects. Tom has almost finished the experiment for Dr. Q. He has only 5 mice left to test. However, he really wants to finish his work in time to go to Florida on spring break with his friends, who are leaving tonight. He has injected the drug in all 50 mice but has not completed all of the tests. He therefore decides to extrapolate from the 45 completed results to produce the 5 additional results.

Many different research ethics policies would hold that Tom has acted unethically by fabricating data. If this study were sponsored by a federal agency, such as the NIH, his actions would constitute a form of research misconduct , which the government defines as "fabrication, falsification, or plagiarism" (or FFP). Actions that nearly all researchers classify as unethical are viewed as misconduct. It is important to remember, however, that misconduct occurs only when researchers intend to deceive : honest errors related to sloppiness, poor record keeping, miscalculations, bias, self-deception, and even negligence do not constitute misconduct. Also, reasonable disagreements about research methods, procedures, and interpretations do not constitute research misconduct. Consider the following case:

Dr. T has just discovered a mathematical error in his paper that has been accepted for publication in a journal. The error does not affect the overall results of his research, but it is potentially misleading. The journal has just gone to press, so it is too late to catch the error before it appears in print. In order to avoid embarrassment, Dr. T decides to ignore the error.

Dr. T's error is not misconduct nor is his decision to take no action to correct the error. Most researchers, as well as many different policies and codes would say that Dr. T should tell the journal (and any coauthors) about the error and consider publishing a correction or errata. Failing to publish a correction would be unethical because it would violate norms relating to honesty and objectivity in research.

There are many other activities that the government does not define as "misconduct" but which are still regarded by most researchers as unethical. These are sometimes referred to as " other deviations " from acceptable research practices and include:

Publishing the same paper in two different journals without telling the editors
Submitting the same paper to different journals without telling the editors
Not informing a collaborator of your intent to file a patent in order to make sure that you are the sole inventor
Including a colleague as an author on a paper in return for a favor even though the colleague did not make a serious contribution to the paper
Discussing with your colleagues confidential data from a paper that you are reviewing for a journal
Using data, ideas, or methods you learn about while reviewing a grant or a papers without permission
Trimming outliers from a data set without discussing your reasons in paper
Using an inappropriate statistical technique in order to enhance the significance of your research
Bypassing the peer review process and announcing your results through a press conference without giving peers adequate information to review your work
Conducting a review of the literature that fails to acknowledge the contributions of other people in the field or relevant prior work
Stretching the truth on a grant application in order to convince reviewers that your project will make a significant contribution to the field
Stretching the truth on a job application or curriculum vita
Giving the same research project to two graduate students in order to see who can do it the fastest
Overworking, neglecting, or exploiting graduate or post-doctoral students
Failing to keep good research records
Failing to maintain research data for a reasonable period of time
Making derogatory comments and personal attacks in your review of author's submission
Promising a student a better grade for sexual favors
Using a racist epithet in the laboratory
Making significant deviations from the research protocol approved by your institution's Animal Care and Use Committee or Institutional Review Board for Human Subjects Research without telling the committee or the board
Not reporting an adverse event in a human research experiment
Wasting animals in research
Exposing students and staff to biological risks in violation of your institution's biosafety rules
Sabotaging someone's work
Stealing supplies, books, or data
Rigging an experiment so you know how it will turn out
Making unauthorized copies of data, papers, or computer programs
Owning over $10,000 in stock in a company that sponsors your research and not disclosing this financial interest
Deliberately overestimating the clinical significance of a new drug in order to obtain economic benefits

These actions would be regarded as unethical by most scientists and some might even be illegal in some cases. Most of these would also violate different professional ethics codes or institutional policies. However, they do not fall into the narrow category of actions that the government classifies as research misconduct. Indeed, there has been considerable debate about the definition of "research misconduct" and many researchers and policy makers are not satisfied with the government's narrow definition that focuses on FFP. However, given the huge list of potential offenses that might fall into the category "other serious deviations," and the practical problems with defining and policing these other deviations, it is understandable why government officials have chosen to limit their focus.

Finally, situations frequently arise in research in which different people disagree about the proper course of action and there is no broad consensus about what should be done. In these situations, there may be good arguments on both sides of the issue and different ethical principles may conflict. These situations create difficult decisions for research known as ethical or moral dilemmas . Consider the following case:

Dr. Wexford is the principal investigator of a large, epidemiological study on the health of 10,000 agricultural workers. She has an impressive dataset that includes information on demographics, environmental exposures, diet, genetics, and various disease outcomes such as cancer, Parkinson’s disease (PD), and ALS. She has just published a paper on the relationship between pesticide exposure and PD in a prestigious journal. She is planning to publish many other papers from her dataset. She receives a request from another research team that wants access to her complete dataset. They are interested in examining the relationship between pesticide exposures and skin cancer. Dr. Wexford was planning to conduct a study on this topic.

Dr. Wexford faces a difficult choice. On the one hand, the ethical norm of openness obliges her to share data with the other research team. Her funding agency may also have rules that obligate her to share data. On the other hand, if she shares data with the other team, they may publish results that she was planning to publish, thus depriving her (and her team) of recognition and priority. It seems that there are good arguments on both sides of this issue and Dr. Wexford needs to take some time to think about what she should do. One possible option is to share data, provided that the investigators sign a data use agreement. The agreement could define allowable uses of the data, publication plans, authorship, etc. Another option would be to offer to collaborate with the researchers.

The following are some step that researchers, such as Dr. Wexford, can take to deal with ethical dilemmas in research:

What is the problem or issue?

It is always important to get a clear statement of the problem. In this case, the issue is whether to share information with the other research team.

What is the relevant information?

Many bad decisions are made as a result of poor information. To know what to do, Dr. Wexford needs to have more information concerning such matters as university or funding agency or journal policies that may apply to this situation, the team's intellectual property interests, the possibility of negotiating some kind of agreement with the other team, whether the other team also has some information it is willing to share, the impact of the potential publications, etc.

What are the different options?

People may fail to see different options due to a limited imagination, bias, ignorance, or fear. In this case, there may be other choices besides 'share' or 'don't share,' such as 'negotiate an agreement' or 'offer to collaborate with the researchers.'

How do ethical codes or policies as well as legal rules apply to these different options?

The university or funding agency may have policies on data management that apply to this case. Broader ethical rules, such as openness and respect for credit and intellectual property, may also apply to this case. Laws relating to intellectual property may be relevant.

Are there any people who can offer ethical advice?

It may be useful to seek advice from a colleague, a senior researcher, your department chair, an ethics or compliance officer, or anyone else you can trust. In the case, Dr. Wexford might want to talk to her supervisor and research team before making a decision.

After considering these questions, a person facing an ethical dilemma may decide to ask more questions, gather more information, explore different options, or consider other ethical rules. However, at some point he or she will have to make a decision and then take action. Ideally, a person who makes a decision in an ethical dilemma should be able to justify his or her decision to himself or herself, as well as colleagues, administrators, and other people who might be affected by the decision. He or she should be able to articulate reasons for his or her conduct and should consider the following questions in order to explain how he or she arrived at his or her decision:

Which choice will probably have the best overall consequences for science and society?
Which choice could stand up to further publicity and scrutiny?
Which choice could you not live with?
Think of the wisest person you know. What would he or she do in this situation?
Which choice would be the most just, fair, or responsible?

After considering all of these questions, one still might find it difficult to decide what to do. If this is the case, then it may be appropriate to consider others ways of making the decision, such as going with a gut feeling or intuition, seeking guidance through prayer or meditation, or even flipping a coin. Endorsing these methods in this context need not imply that ethical decisions are irrational, however. The main point is that human reasoning plays a pivotal role in ethical decision-making but there are limits to its ability to solve all ethical dilemmas in a finite amount of time.

Promoting Ethical Conduct in Science

Do U.S. research institutions meet or exceed federal mandates for instruction in responsible conduct of research? A national survey

Read about U.S. research instutuins follow federal manadates for ethics in research

Learn more about NIEHS Research

Most academic institutions in the US require undergraduate, graduate, or postgraduate students to have some education in the responsible conduct of research (RCR) . The NIH and NSF have both mandated training in research ethics for students and trainees. Many academic institutions outside of the US have also developed educational curricula in research ethics

Those of you who are taking or have taken courses in research ethics may be wondering why you are required to have education in research ethics. You may believe that you are highly ethical and know the difference between right and wrong. You would never fabricate or falsify data or plagiarize. Indeed, you also may believe that most of your colleagues are highly ethical and that there is no ethics problem in research..

If you feel this way, relax. No one is accusing you of acting unethically. Indeed, the evidence produced so far shows that misconduct is a very rare occurrence in research, although there is considerable variation among various estimates. The rate of misconduct has been estimated to be as low as 0.01% of researchers per year (based on confirmed cases of misconduct in federally funded research) to as high as 1% of researchers per year (based on self-reports of misconduct on anonymous surveys). See Shamoo and Resnik (2015), cited above.

Clearly, it would be useful to have more data on this topic, but so far there is no evidence that science has become ethically corrupt, despite some highly publicized scandals. Even if misconduct is only a rare occurrence, it can still have a tremendous impact on science and society because it can compromise the integrity of research, erode the public’s trust in science, and waste time and resources. Will education in research ethics help reduce the rate of misconduct in science? It is too early to tell. The answer to this question depends, in part, on how one understands the causes of misconduct. There are two main theories about why researchers commit misconduct. According to the "bad apple" theory, most scientists are highly ethical. Only researchers who are morally corrupt, economically desperate, or psychologically disturbed commit misconduct. Moreover, only a fool would commit misconduct because science's peer review system and self-correcting mechanisms will eventually catch those who try to cheat the system. In any case, a course in research ethics will have little impact on "bad apples," one might argue.

According to the "stressful" or "imperfect" environment theory, misconduct occurs because various institutional pressures, incentives, and constraints encourage people to commit misconduct, such as pressures to publish or obtain grants or contracts, career ambitions, the pursuit of profit or fame, poor supervision of students and trainees, and poor oversight of researchers (see Shamoo and Resnik 2015). Moreover, defenders of the stressful environment theory point out that science's peer review system is far from perfect and that it is relatively easy to cheat the system. Erroneous or fraudulent research often enters the public record without being detected for years. Misconduct probably results from environmental and individual causes, i.e. when people who are morally weak, ignorant, or insensitive are placed in stressful or imperfect environments. In any case, a course in research ethics can be useful in helping to prevent deviations from norms even if it does not prevent misconduct. Education in research ethics is can help people get a better understanding of ethical standards, policies, and issues and improve ethical judgment and decision making. Many of the deviations that occur in research may occur because researchers simply do not know or have never thought seriously about some of the ethical norms of research. For example, some unethical authorship practices probably reflect traditions and practices that have not been questioned seriously until recently. If the director of a lab is named as an author on every paper that comes from his lab, even if he does not make a significant contribution, what could be wrong with that? That's just the way it's done, one might argue. Another example where there may be some ignorance or mistaken traditions is conflicts of interest in research. A researcher may think that a "normal" or "traditional" financial relationship, such as accepting stock or a consulting fee from a drug company that sponsors her research, raises no serious ethical issues. Or perhaps a university administrator sees no ethical problem in taking a large gift with strings attached from a pharmaceutical company. Maybe a physician thinks that it is perfectly appropriate to receive a $300 finder’s fee for referring patients into a clinical trial.

If "deviations" from ethical conduct occur in research as a result of ignorance or a failure to reflect critically on problematic traditions, then a course in research ethics may help reduce the rate of serious deviations by improving the researcher's understanding of ethics and by sensitizing him or her to the issues.

Finally, education in research ethics should be able to help researchers grapple with the ethical dilemmas they are likely to encounter by introducing them to important concepts, tools, principles, and methods that can be useful in resolving these dilemmas. Scientists must deal with a number of different controversial topics, such as human embryonic stem cell research, cloning, genetic engineering, and research involving animal or human subjects, which require ethical reflection and deliberation.

A-Z Publications

Annual Review of Environment and Resources

Volume 39, 2014, review article, environmental ethics.

Clare Palmer 1 , Katie McShane 2 , and Ronald Sandler 3
View Affiliations Hide Affiliations Affiliations: 1 Department of Philosophy, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas 77845; email: [email protected] 2 Department of Philosophy, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado 80523-1781; email: [email protected] 3 Department of Philosophy and Religion, Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts 02115; email: [email protected]
Vol. 39:419-442 (Volume publication date October 2014) https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-environ-121112-094434
First published as a Review in Advance on August 13, 2014
© Annual Reviews

Environmental ethics—the study of ethical questions raised by human relations with the nonhuman environment—emerged as an important subfield of philosophy during the 1970s. It is now a flourishing area of research. This article provides a review of the secular, Western traditions in the field. It examines both anthropocentric and nonanthropocentric claims about what has value, as well as divergent views about whether environmental ethics should be concerned with bringing about best consequences, respecting principles and rights, or embodying environmental virtues. The article also briefly considers two critical traditions—ecofeminism and environmental pragmatism—and explores some of the difficult environmental ethics questions posed by anthropogenic climate change.

Article metrics loading...

Full text loading...

Literature Cited

Preston CJ . 1. 2005 . Epistemology and environmental philosophy. Special issue. Ethics Environ. 10 : 2 1– 216 [Google Scholar]
Odenbaugh J . 2. 2007 . Seeing the forest and the trees. Philos. Sci. 74 : 628– 41 [Google Scholar]
Carlson A . 3. 2008 . Nature and Landscape: An Introduction to Environmental Aesthetics New York: Columbia Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Jenkins W , Chapple C . 4. 2011 . Religion and environment. Annu. Rev. Environ. Resour. 36 : 441– 63 [Google Scholar]
Kelbessa W . 5. 2005 . The rehabilitation of indigenous environmental ethics in Africa. Diogenes 52 : 3 17– 34 [Google Scholar]
James SP , Cooper D . 6. 2008 . Buddhism and the environment. Special edition. Contemp. Buddhism 8 : 2 93– 108 [Google Scholar]
Brown C , Toadvine T . 7. 2003 . Eco-Phenomenology: Back to the Earth Itself Albany: State Univ. N.Y. Press [Google Scholar]
Foltz B , Frodeman B . 8. 2004 . Rethinking Nature: Essays in Environmental Philosophy Bloomington: Indiana Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Westra L , Robinson T . 9. 1997 . The Greeks and the Environment Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield [Google Scholar]
Leopold A . 10. 1968 [1949] . A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here and There Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press, 2nd ed.. [Google Scholar]
Taylor P . 11. 1986 . Respect for Nature Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Rolston H . 12. 1986 . Philosophy Gone Wild New York: Prometheus [Google Scholar]
Elliot R , Gare A . 13. 1983 . Environmental Philosophy: A Collection of Readings Milton Keynes, UK: Open Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Des Jardins JR . 14. 1993 . Environmental Ethics: An Introduction to Environmental Philosophy Belmont, CA: Wadsworth [Google Scholar]
VanDeVeer D , Pierce C . 15. 1993 . The Environmental Ethics and Policy Book Belmont, CA: Wadsworth [Google Scholar]
Minteer BA . 16. 2012 . Refounding Environmental Ethics: Pragmatism, Principle, and Practice Philadelphia: Temple Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
O'Neill J . 17. 1992 . The varieties of intrinsic value. Monist 75 : 2 119– 37 [Google Scholar]
Jamieson D . 18. 2008 . Ethics and the Environment: An Introduction Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
McShane K . 19. 2007 . Why environmental ethics shouldn't give up on intrinsic value. Environ. Ethics 29 : 1 43– 61 [Google Scholar]
Attfield R . 20. 1995 . Value, Obligation, and Meta-Ethics Amsterdam: Rodopi [Google Scholar]
Norton BG . 21. 1987 . Why Preserve Natural Variety? Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Rolston H . 22. 1988 . Environmental Ethics Philadelphia: Temple Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Weston A . 23. 1985 . Beyond intrinsic value: pragmatism in environmental ethics. Environ. Ethics 7 : 4 321– 39 [Google Scholar]
Maguire LA , Justus J . 24. 2008 . Why intrinsic value is a poor basis for conservation decisions. BioScience 58 : 10 910– 11 [Google Scholar]
Fox W . 25. 1993 . What does the recognition of intrinsic value entail?. Trumpeter 10 : 3 http://trumpeter.athabascau.ca/index.php/trumpet/article/view/379/601 [Google Scholar]
Callicott JB . 26. 1992 . Can a theory of moral sentiments support a genuinely normative environmental ethic?. Inquiry 35 : 183– 98 [Google Scholar]
Warren MA . 27. 2000 . Moral Status: Obligations to Persons and Other Living Things Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Goodpaster KE . 28. 1978 . On being morally considerable. J. Philos. 75 : 6 308– 25 [Google Scholar]
White L Jr . 29. 1967 . The historic roots of our ecologic crisis. Science 155 : 3767 1203– 7 [Google Scholar]
Naess A . 30. 1973 . The shallow and the deep, long-range ecology movement. A summary. Inquiry 16 : 1 95– 100 [Google Scholar]
Devall B , Sessions G . 31. 1985 . Deep Ecology: Living as if Nature Mattered Salt Lake City, UT: Gibbs Smith [Google Scholar]
Norton BG . 32. 1991 . Towards Unity Among Environmentalists New York: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Singer P . 33. 1975 . Animal Liberation: A New Ethics for Our Treatment of Animals New York: Avon [Google Scholar]
Regan T . 34. 1983 . The Case for Animal Rights Berkeley: Univ. Calif. Press [Google Scholar]
Cahen H . 35. 1988 . Against the moral considerability of ecosystems. Environ. Ethics 10 : 3 195– 216 [Google Scholar]
Thompson J . 36. 1990 . A refutation of environmental ethics. Environ. Ethics 12 : 147– 60 [Google Scholar]
Johnson L . 37. 1991 . A Morally Deep World Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Nelson M . 38. 1993 . A defense of environmental ethics: a reply to Janna Thompson. Environ. Ethics 45 : 245– 57 [Google Scholar]
Sandler R . 39. 2013 . The Ethics of Species London: Cambridge Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Callicott JB . 40. 1980 . Animal liberation: a triangular affair. Environ. Ethics 2 : 311– 28 [Google Scholar]
Varner G . 41. 1998 . In Nature's Interests? Interests, Animal Rights and Environmental Ethics Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
42. US Environ. Prot. Agency (EPA) 2013 . Plan EJ 2014 Progress Report Washington, DC: EPA http://www.epa.gov/compliance/ej/resources/policy/plan-ej-2014/plan-ej-progress-report-2014.pdf [Google Scholar]
Camacho D . 43. 1998 . Environmental Injustices, Political Struggles: Race, Class, and the Environment Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Bullard RD , Mohai P , Saha R , Wright B . 44. 2007 . Toxic Wastes and Race at Twenty: 1989–2007 Cleveland, OH: United Church Christ [Google Scholar]
Westra L , Lawson B . 45. 2001 . Faces of Environmental Racism: Confronting Issues of Global Justice Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2nd ed.. [Google Scholar]
Sandler R , Pezzullo PC . 46. 2007 . Environmental Justice and Environmentalism Cambridge, MA: MIT Press [Google Scholar]
Schlosberg D . 47. 2007 . Environmental Justice: Theories, Movements and Nature New York: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Shrader-Frechette K . 48. 2002 . Environmental Justice: Creating Equality, Reclaiming Democracy Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Bryant B . 49. 1995 . Environmental Justice: Issues, Policies, and Solutions Washington, DC: Island [Google Scholar]
Guha R . 50. 1989 . Radical American environmentalism and wilderness preservation: a third world critique. Environ. Ethics 11 : 71– 83 [Google Scholar]
Shiva V . 51. 1999 . Biopiracy: The Plunder of Nature and Knowledge Cambridge, MA: South End [Google Scholar]
Hassoun N . 52. 2012 . The problem of debt-for-nature swaps from a human rights perspective. J. Appl. Philos. 29 : 4 359– 77 [Google Scholar]
Gardiner S . 53. 2009 . The Perfect Moral Storm: The Ethical Tragedy of Climate Change New York: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Singer P . 54. 2004 . One World: The Ethics of Globalization New Haven, CT: Yale Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
55. World Comm. Environ. Dev 1987 . Our Common Future. New York: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Thompson PB . 56. 2012 . Sustainability: ethical foundations. Nat. Educ. Knowledge 3 : 10 11 http://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/sustainability-ethical-foundations-71373239 [Google Scholar]
Norton BG . 57. 2005 . Sustainability: A Philosophy of Adaptive Ecosystem Management Chicago: Univ. Chicago Press [Google Scholar]
Thompson PB . 58. 2010 . The Agrarian Vision: Sustainability and Environmental Ethics Lexington: Univ. Ky. Press [Google Scholar]
Posner E , Sunstein C . 59. 2008 . Climate change justice. Georget. Law J. 96 : 1565– 612 [Google Scholar]
Caney S . 60. 2012 . Just emissions. Philos. Public Aff. 40 : 4 255– 300 [Google Scholar]
Broome J . 61. 2012 . Climate Matters New York: Norton [Google Scholar]
Parfit D . 62. 1984 . Reasons and Persons Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Mulgan T . 63. 2006 . Future People New York: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Roberts M , Wasserman D . 64. 2009 . Harming Future Persons New York: Springer [Google Scholar]
65. U.N. Food Agric. Organ. (UNFAO) 2012 . State of the World Fisheries and Aquaculture Rome: Food Agric. Organ. U.N. [Google Scholar]
Haberl H , Erb KH , Krausmann F , Gaube V , Bondeau A . 66. et al. 2007 . Quantifying and mapping the human appropriation of net primary production in Earth's terrestrial ecosystems. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 104 : 31 12942– 47 [Google Scholar]
Singer P . 67. 1979 . Killing humans and killing animals. Inquiry 22 : 145– 56 [Google Scholar]
Palmer C . 68. 2010 . Animal Ethics in Context New York: Columbia Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Donaldson S , Kymlicka W . 69. 2011 . Zoopolis: A Political Theory of Animal Rights New York: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Carruthers P . 70. 1992 . The Animals Issue London: Cambridge Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Cohen C . 71. 1986 . The case for the use of animals in biomedical research. N. Engl. J. Med. 315 : 14 865– 70 [Google Scholar]
Nobis N . 72. 2004 . Carl Cohen's ‘kind’ argument for animal rights and against animal rights. J. Appl. Philos. 21 : 1 43– 59 [Google Scholar]
Schweitzer A . 73. 1987 [1923] . The Philosophy of Civilization New York: Prometheus [Google Scholar]
Attfield R . 74. 1987 . A Theory of Value and Obligation Beckenham, UK: Croom Helm [Google Scholar]
Agar N . 75. 2001 . Life's Intrinsic Value New York: Columbia Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Schmidtz D . 76. 1998 . Are all species equal?. J. Appl. Philos. 15 : 57– 67 [Google Scholar]
Sterba JP . 77. 1998 . A biocentrist strikes back. Environ. Ethics 20 : 361– 76 [Google Scholar]
Callicott JB . 78. 1989 . In Defense of the Land Ethic: Essays in Environmental Philosophy Albany: State Univ. N.Y. Press [Google Scholar]
Norton BG . 79. 1988 . The constancy of Leopold's land ethic. Conserv. Biol. 2 : 1 93– 102 [Google Scholar]
Callicott JB . 80. 1987 . Companion to ‘A Sand County Almanac’: Interpretive and Critical Essays Madison: Univ. Wis. Press [Google Scholar]
Sagoff M . 81. 2013 . What does environmental protection protect?. Ethics Policy Environ. 16 : 3 239– 57 [Google Scholar]
Costanza R , Norton BG , Haskell BD . 82. 1992 . Ecosystem Health: New Goals for Environmental Management Washington, DC: Island [Google Scholar]
Westra L . 83. 1994 . An Environmental Proposal for Ethics: The Principle of Integrity Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield [Google Scholar]
Jamieson D . 84. 1995 . Ecosystem health: some preventive medicine. Environ. Values 4 : 333– 44 [Google Scholar]
McShane K . 85. 2004 . Ecosystem health. Environ. Ethics 26 : 3 227– 45 [Google Scholar]
Soulé M . 86. 1985 . What is conservation biology?. BioScience 35 : 11 727– 34 [Google Scholar]
Katz E . 87. 1992 . The big lie: human restoration of nature. Res. Philos. Technol. 12 : 231– 41 [Google Scholar]
Bradley B . 88. 2001 . The value of endangered species. J. Value Inq. 35 : 43– 58 [Google Scholar]
Maier DS . 89. 2012 . What's So Good About Biodiversity? A Call for Better Reasoning About Nature's Value Dordrecht, Neth.: Springer [Google Scholar]
Preston CJ . 90. 2011 . Re-thinking the unthinkable: environmental ethics and the presumptive argument against geoengineering. Environ. Values 20 : 457– 79 [Google Scholar]
Elliot R . 91. 1982 . Faking nature. Inquiry 25 : 81– 93 [Google Scholar]
Hettinger N , Throop W . 92. 1999 . Refocusing ecocentrism. Environ. Ethics 21 : 1 3– 21 [Google Scholar]
Callicott JB , Nelson MP . 93. 1999 . The Great New Wilderness Debate Athens: Univ. Georgia Press [Google Scholar]
Kareiva P , Marvier M . 94. 2012 . What is conservation science?. BioScience 62 : 11 962– 69 [Google Scholar]
McKibben B . 95. 1989 . The End of Nature New York: Random House [Google Scholar]
Carter A . 96. 2005 . Inegalitarian biocentric consequentialism, the minimax implication and multidimensional value theory: a brief proposal for a new direction in environmental ethics. Utilitas 17 : 1 62– 84 [Google Scholar]
Singer P . 97. 1989 . All animals are equal. Animal Rights and Human Obligations T Regan, P Singer 148– 62 Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall [Google Scholar]
Holbrook D . 98. 1997 . The consequentialist side of environmental ethics. Environ. Values 6 : 1 87– 96 [Google Scholar]
McMahan J . 99. 2010 . The meat eaters. New York Times Sept. 19. http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/19/the-meat-eaters/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0 [Google Scholar]
Sagoff M . 100. 1984 . Animal liberation and environmental ethics: bad marriage, quick divorce. Osgoode Hall Law J. 22 : 297– 307 [Google Scholar]
Hayward T . 101. 2005 . Constitutional Environmental Rights Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Francione G . 102. 2000 . Introduction to Animal Rights: Your Child or the Dog? Philadelphia: Temple Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Cochrane A . 103. 2012 . Animal Rights Without Liberation New York: Columbia Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Hill TE Jr . 104. 1983 . Ideals of human excellence and preserving natural environments. Environ. Ethics 5 : 3 211– 24 [Google Scholar]
Sandler R . 105. 2007 . Character and Environment: A Virtue-Oriented Approach to Environmental Ethics New York: Columbia Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Sandler R , Cafaro P . 106. 2005 . Environmental Virtue Ethics Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield [Google Scholar]
van Wensveen L . 107. 2000 . Dirty Virtues: The Emergence of Ecological Virtue Ethics Amherst, NY: Prometheus [Google Scholar]
Warren K . 108. 1993 . Introduction. Environmental Philosophy: From Animal Rights to Radical Ecology ME Zimmerman, JB Callicott, J Clark, KJ Warren, IJ Klaver, J Clark 253– 67 Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall [Google Scholar]
Ruether RR . 109. 1975 . New Woman, New Earth: Sexist Ideologies and Human Liberation New York: Seabury [Google Scholar]
Plumwood V . 110. 1991 . Nature, self and gender: feminism, environmental philosophy and the critique of rationalism. Hypatia 6 : 1 3– 27 [Google Scholar]
Kheel M . 111. 1993 . From heroic to holistic ethics: the ecofeminist challenge. Ecofeminism: Women, Animals, Nature G Gaard 243– 71 Philadelphia: Temple Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Plumwood V . 112. 1993 . Feminism and the Mastery of Nature London: Routledge [Google Scholar]
Light A , Katz E . 113. 1996 . Environmental Pragmatism New York: Routledge [Google Scholar]
Norton BG . 114. 1997 . Convergence and contextualism: some clarifications and a reply to Steverson. Environ. Ethics 19 : 1 87– 99 [Google Scholar]
Light A . 115. 2002 . Contemporary environmental ethics: from metaethics to public philosophy. Metaphilosophy 33 : 4 426– 49 [Google Scholar]
Ferkany M , Whyte K . 116. 2012 . The importance of participatory virtues in the future of environmental education. J. Agric. Environ. Ethics 25 : 3 419– 34 [Google Scholar]
O'Neill J . 117. 1993 . Ecology, Policy and Politics London: Routledge [Google Scholar]
Attfield R . 118. 2011 . Climate change, environmental ethics, and biocentrism. Climate Change and Environmental Ethics VP Nanda 31– 41 New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction [Google Scholar]
Sarkar S . 119. 2005 . Biodiversity and Environmental Philosophy Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Basl J , Sandler R . 120. 2013 . Designer Biology: The Ethics of Intensively Engineering Biological and Ecological Systems Lanham, MD: Lexington [Google Scholar]
Streiffer R , Basl J . 121. 2013 . The ethics of agricultural animal biotechnology. Ethics and Emerging Technologies R Sandler 501– 5 New York: Palgrave Macmillan [Google Scholar]
Preston CJ . 122. 2008 . Synthetic biology: drawing a line in Darwin's sand. Environ. Values 17 : 1 23– 39 [Google Scholar]
Comstock G . 123. 2001 . Vexing Nature? On the Ethical Case Against Agricultural Biotechnology Dordrecht, Neth.: Springer [Google Scholar]
Thompson PB . 124. 2013 . Artificial meat. Ethics and Emerging Technologies R Sandler 516– 30 New York: Palgrave Macmillan [Google Scholar]
Light A . 125. 2000 . Ecological restoration and the culture of nature: a pragmatic perspective. Restoring Nature: Perspectives from the Humanities and Social Sciences P Gobster, B Hull 49– 70 Washington, DC: Island [Google Scholar]
Throop W . 126. 2012 . Environmental virtues and the aims of restoration. See Ref. 149 47– 62
Higgs E . 127. 2012 . History, novelty and virtue in ecological restoration. See Ref. 149 81– 102
Sandler R . 128. 2012 . Global warming and virtues of ecological restoration. See Ref. 149 63– 80
Light A . 129. 2012 . The death of restoration. See Ref. 149 105– 24
Nolt J . 130. 2011 . Nonanthropocentric climate ethics. WIREs Clim. Change 2 : 701– 11 [Google Scholar]
McCoy ED , Berry K . 131. 2008 . Using an ecological ethics framework to make decisions about the relocation of wildlife. Sci. Eng. Ethics 14 : 505– 21 [Google Scholar]
Camacho A . 132. 2010 . Assisted migration: redefining nature and natural resource law under climate change. Yale J. Regul. 27 : 171– 255 [Google Scholar]
Aubin I , Garbe CM , Colombo S , Drever CR , McKenney DW . 133. et al. 2011 . Why we disagree about assisted migration: ethical implications of a key debate regarding the future of Canada's forest. For. Chron. 87 : 755– 65 [Google Scholar]
Albrecht G , Brooke C , Bennett D , Garnett S . 134. 2013 . The ethics of assisted colonization in the age of anthropogenic climate change. J. Agric. Environ. Ethics 26 : 827– 45 [Google Scholar]
Ricciardi A , Simberloff D . 135. 2008 . Why assisted migration is not a viable conservation strategy. Trends Ecol. Evol. 24 : 248– 53 [Google Scholar]
Sandler R . 136. 2010 . The value of species and the ethical foundations of assisted colonization. Conserv. Biol. 24 : 2 424– 31 [Google Scholar]
Buma B . 137. 2013 . Don't give up just yet: maintaining species, services and systems in a changing world. Ethics, Policy Environ. 16 : 33– 36 [Google Scholar]
Larson B , Palmer C . 138. 2013 . Assisted migration is no panacea, but let's not discount it either. Ethics, Policy Environ. 16 : 16– 18 [Google Scholar]
Jamieson D . 139. 1996 . Ethics and intentional climate change. Clim. Change 33 : 323– 36 [Google Scholar]
Hamilton C . 140. 2013 . The ethical foundations of climate engineering. Climate Change Geoengineering: Philosophical Perspectives, Legal Issues and Governance Frameworks W Burns, A Strauss 39– 58 London: Cambridge Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Tuana N . 141. 2013 . The ethical dimensions of geoengineering: solar radiation management through sulfur particle injection. Geoengineering our climate? Ethics, policy and governance. Work. Pap. 2, Geoeng. Our Clim. Work. Pap. Opin. Artic. Ser., Penn State Univ. Press http://geoengineeringourclimate.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/tuana-2013-ethics-of-geoengineering-click-for-download.pdf [Google Scholar]
Hale B . 142. 2012 . The world that would have been: moral hazard arguments against geoengineering. See Ref. 147 113– 32
Davies G . 143. 2010 . Geoengineering: a critique. Clim. Law 1 : 3 429– 41 [Google Scholar]
Svoboda T , Keller K , Goes M , Tuana N . 144. 2011 . Sulfate aerosol geoengineering: the question of justice. Public Aff. Q. 25 : 3 157– 80 [Google Scholar]
Preston CJ . 145. 2012 . Solar radiation management and vulnerable populations: the moral deficit and its prospects. See Ref. 147 77– 94
Hamilton C . 146. 2013 . No, we should not just ‘at least do the research.’. Nature 496 : 7444 139 [Google Scholar]
Preston CJ . 147. 2012 . Engineering the Climate: The Ethics of Solar Radiation Management Lanham, MD: Lexington [Google Scholar]
Gardiner S . 148. 2010 . Is arming the future with geoengineering really the lesser evil? Some doubts about intentionally manipulating the climate system. Climate Ethics: Essential Readings S Gardiner, S Caney, D Jamieson 284– 314 New York: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
Article Type: Review Article

Most Read This Month

Most cited most cited rss feed, adaptive governance of social-ecological systems, dynamics of land-use and land-cover change in tropical regions, climate change and food systems, wetland resources: status, trends, ecosystem services, and restorability, global water pollution and human health, adaptation to environmental change: contributions of a resilience framework, i ndustrial s ymbiosis : literature and taxonomy, environmental governance, c arbon d ioxide e missions from the g lobal c ement i ndustry 1, global biogeochemical cycling of mercury: a review.

Redefining ethics and ethics research directions for environmental studies/sciences from student evaluations

Original Article
Published: 08 July 2022
Volume 12 , pages 739–755, ( 2022 )

Cite this article

Dianne Quigley 1 ,
David Sonnenfeld 2 ,
Phil Brown 3 &
Tracie Ferreira 4

307 Accesses

Explore all metrics

The Northeast Ethics Education Partnership (NEEP), jointly coordinated by Brown University and SUNY-ESF from 2010 to 2017, organized and implemented short- and long-course training on research ethics and cultural competence to graduate students at four universities in the fields of environmental sciences/studies and engineering. This article provides findings from student evaluations of these ethics trainings which inform areas that students found useful to their careers, particularly for learning about their respective disciplines’ moral standards, codes, and ethical theories. In the post-assessment evaluations, NEEP findings indicate that collective concerns about environmental research will involve more study and analysis of moral reasoning for balancing the needs of diverse stakeholders and nonhuman life forces. Additionally, students believed that ethical research approaches will require much more attention to complexity and multiple dimensions of research impacts to humans, land and species. These findings support more extended development of new standards and norms for individual researcher ethics, for substantive ethics, and for political ethics as part of applied ethics in environmental studies and sciences. More interdisciplinary collaboration and ethical analysis of field and case studies are recommended for this development.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Subscribe and save.

Get 10 units per month
Download Article/Chapter or eBook
1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
Cancel anytime

Price includes VAT (Russian Federation)

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Rent this article via DeepDyve

Institutional subscriptions

Should Justice for People Come Before Justice for the Environment? Examining Students’ Reflections on Environmental Ethics

What is the future of ethics teaching in the environmental sciences

Explore related subjects.

Medical Ethics
Artificial Intelligence

Availability of data and material

Code availability.

Allchin DK (2019) From Leopold's “Land Ethic” to Ecological Hubris. Amer Biol Teach 81(4):291–293. https://doi.org/10.1525/abt.2019.81.4.291

Arquette M, Cole M, Cook K, LaFrance B, Peters M, Ransom J, Sargent E, Smoke V, Stairs A (2002) Holistic risk-based environmental decision making: a native perspective. Environ Health Perspect 110(Suppl 2):259–64. https://doi.org/10.1289/ehp.02110s2259

Bannister K (2018) From ethical codes to ethics as praxis an invitation. Ethnobiol Lett 9(1):30–43

Article Google Scholar

Biros MH, Hauswald M, Baren J (2010) Procedural versus practical ethics. Acad Emerg Med 17(9). https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1553-2712.2010.00863

Burnett B, McArdle F (2011) Multiculturalism, education for sustainable development (ESD) and the shifting discursive landscape of social inclusion. Discourse: Stud Cult Politics Educ 32(1):43–56

Cherniss J (2016) An ethos of politics between realism and idealism: Max Weber’s enigmatic political ethics. J Polit 78(3). https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/684998

Corburn J (2005) Street science. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA

Book Google Scholar

Curzer HJ, Wallace MC, Perry G, Muhlberger PJ, Perry D (2013) The ethics of wildlife research, the nine R theory. ILAR J 54(1):52–7

Article CAS Google Scholar

Dallmeyer D (2005) Values at sea. University of Georgia Press, Athens, GA

Google Scholar

Espinosa A, Walker J (2011) "Rethinking sustainable development," World scientific book chapters. In: A complexity approach to sustainability theory and application, chapter 5. World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., pp 187–247

Frohmberg E, Goble R, Sanchez V, Quigley D (2000) The assessment of radiation exposures in Native American communities from nuclear weapons testing in Nevada. Risk Anal 20(1):101–11

Gay WC (2019) Dewey’s political ethics as applied philosophy that advances international peace, Chap 11, In: Nonviolence: critiquing assumptions, examining frameworks. Value Inq Book Ser 9/18/2018, 324. pp 159–170. 12p

Hall T, Engebretson J, O’Rourke M, Piso Z, Whyte K, Valles S (2017) The need for social ethics in interdisciplinary environmental science graduate programs: results from a nation-wide survey in the United States. Sci Eng Ethics 23:565–588

Hunt MR, Godard B (2013) Beyond procedural ethics: foregrounding questions of justice in global health research ethics training for students. Glob Public Health 8(6):713–724. https://doi.org/10.1080/17441692.2013.796400

International Association of Society and Natural Resources (IASNR) (2016) Code of Ethics. https://www4.iasnr.org/about-iasnr-2

International Society of Ethnobiology (SoE) (2006) Code of Ethics (with 2008 additions) http://ethnobiology.net/code-of-ethics

Ives C, Bekessy SA (2015) The ethics of offsetting nature. Front Ecol Environ 13(10):568–573

Kirkpatrick DL (1996) Great Ideas Revisited. Train Dev 50:54–59

Klopotan AI, Vinković A, N (2020) Do business ethics and ethical decision making still matter: perspective of different generational cohorts. Bus Syst Res 11(1):31–43

Kopnina H, Meijers F (2014) Education for sustainable development (ESD) exploring theoretical and practical challenges. Neth Int J Sustain High Educ 15(2):188–207

Longstaff H, Khram VO, Portales-Casamar E, Illes J (2015) Sharing with more caring: coordinating and improving the ethical governance of data and biomaterials obtained from children. PLoS ONE 10(7):e013052

Luno AR (2021) Personal and political ethics. https://www.eticaepolitica.net/eticapolitica/PoliticalEthics.pdf , unpublished manuscript

Maunder MN, Piner KR (2015) Fisheries stock assessment: many issues still remain. ICES J Mar Sci 72(1):7–18

McIntosh, Higgs TC, Mumford M, Connelly S, DuBois J (2018) Continuous evaluation in ethics education. case study. Sci Eng Ethics 24(2):727–754

Mello MM, Wolf LE (2010) The Havasupai Indian tribe case – lessons for research involving stored biologic samples. N Engl J Med 363(3):204–7

Minteer BA, Collins JP (2005) Ecological ethics: building a new tool kit for ecologists and biodiversity managers. Conserv Biol 19(6):1803–1812

Mukerjee R (1950) Bridging social and individual ethics. Soc Forces 28(3):262–270

National Association for Environmental Professionals (NAEP) (2022) Code of Ethics, updated August 2018. At https://www.naep.org/code-of-ethics

Nelson WA (2006) Defining ethics. Healthcare Executive, July/August, https://www.ache.org/-/media/ache/about-ache/ja15_ethic_reprint.pdf

Pearl R (2018) Shame, scandal plague healthcare providers in 2018. Forbes Magazine, Healthcare. https://www.forbes.com/sites/robertpearl/2018/12/10/shame-scandal/?sh=3be698906807 . Accessed 30 December 2020

Quigley D (2015) Promoting human subjects training for place-based communities and cultural groups in environmental research – curriculum approaches for graduate student/faculty training. Sci Eng Ethics, Springer 21(1):209–226

Quigley D (2016) Applying place to research ethics and cultural competence/humility training. J Acad Ethics 14:19–33

Quigley D (2016) Building cultural competence in environmental studies and natural resource sciences. Soc Nat Resour 29(6):725–737

Quigley D, Sonnenfeld D, Brown P, Silka L, Tian Q, He L (2016) Research ethics training on place-based communities and cultural groups. J Environ Stud Sci 6(3):479–489

Quigley D, Levine A, Sonnenfeld D, Brown P, Tian Q, Wei X (2019) Survey on using ethical principles in environmental field research with place-based communities. Sci Eng Ethics 25:477–517. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-017-9981-4

Ruse M (2020) Building blocks of morality. HTS Teologiese Stud/Theological Stud 76(1). https://hts.org.za/index.php/hts/article/view/6057/16604

Society for Conservation Biology (2004) Code of Ethic. https://conbio.org/about-scb/who-we-are/code-of-ethics

Steele LS, Mulhearn TJ, Medeiros KE, Watts LL, Connelly S, Mumford MD (2016) How do we know what works? A review and critique of current practices in ethics training evaluation. Account Res 23(6):319-350

Stevens SM, Dowie (2010) Conservation refugees: the hundred-year conflict between global conservation and native peoples. Hum Ecol 38:459–461

Stinson DW (2017) In search of defining ethics in (mathematics). J Urban Math Educ 10(1):1–6

Turner MR, Watts LL, Steele LM, Mulhearn TJ, Torrence BS, Todd EM, Mumford MD, Connelly SS, DuBois J (2018) How did you like this course? Ethics Behav 28(6):483–496

United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) Convention of Biological Diversity. (2007) Ecosystem Approach. https://www.cbd.int/ecosystem/principles.shtml

Warner T, Weiss RI, Roberts L (2004) Scientific integrity, fidelity, and conflicts of interest in research. Curr Opin Psychiatry 17:381–385. https://doi.org/10.1097/01.yco.0000139974.45189.96

Wheeler S (2013) Planning for sustainability. Routledge

Winkler EC, Gruen RL (2005) First principles: substantive ethics for healthcare organizations. J Healthcare Manag 50(2):109-19; discussion 119-20

Download references

Acknowledgements

NEEP acknowledges the funding support of NSF Ethics Education in Science and Engineering (Grant No. GEO-1338751). NEEP also acknowledges Julianne Hanavan, PhD, for evaluation design and interpretation.

National Science Foundation in Ethics Education in Science and Engineering (grant no. GEO-1338751).

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Northeast Ethics Education Partnership, c/o School of Environmental Sciences and Forestry, State University of New York, One Forestry Drive, Syracuse, NY, 13210, USA

Dianne Quigley

School of Environmental Sciences and Forestry, State University of New York, One Forestry Drive, Syracuse, NY, 13210, USA

David Sonnenfeld

Northeastern University, 360 Huntington Avenue, 318NV, Boston, MA, 02115, USA

Bioengineering Dept., UMass Dartmouth, 285 Old Westport Rd, Dartmouth, MA, USA

Tracie Ferreira

You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Dianne Quigley .

Ethics declarations

Ethics approval.

Consent for participants not required for aggregate evaluation responses.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

Publisher's note.

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Quigley, D., Sonnenfeld, D., Brown, P. et al. Redefining ethics and ethics research directions for environmental studies/sciences from student evaluations. J Environ Stud Sci 12 , 739–755 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13412-022-00776-8

Download citation

Accepted : 22 June 2022

Published : 08 July 2022

Issue Date : December 2022

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s13412-022-00776-8

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

Research ethics
Defining ethics
Student evaluations
Ethics training
Environmental studies
Engineering ethics
Find a journal
Publish with us
Track your research

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Publications
Account settings

Preview improvements coming to the PMC website in October 2024. Learn More or Try it out now .

Advanced Search
Journal List
BMJ Open Access
PMC10313991

Reimagining research ethics to include environmental sustainability: a principled approach, including a case study of data-driven health research

Gabrielle samuel.

1 Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, King's College London, London, UK

Cristina Richie

2 Philosophy and Ethics of Technology Department, Delft University of Technology, Delft, Netherlands

Introduction

Environment and (bio)ethics

A research ethics framework based on sustainability

Scientific quality

Social value

Respect for persons, communities and environment

Favourable risk to benefit ratio

Our proposed principles have direct relevance for health research. In the next section, we present a case study and then apply the principle to demonstrate the feasibility and agility.

Case study: data-driven health research

In the following sections we map out how researchers, ethicists and healthcare professionals can think about these issues through our principle-based research ethics framework.

Respect for persons, communities and the environment

Funding: This work received funding from Wellcome (222180/Z/20/Z).

Competing interests: None declared.GS is the guarantor. CR's research was partially funded by the Technology University of Delft/ Erasmus Medical College Convergence ethics project.

Provenance and peer review: Not commissioned; internally peer reviewed.

Such as World War II, the Tuskegee Syphilis Study and the Henrietta Lacks case. The Tuskegee Syphilis Study was a longitudinal study conducted by the US Public Health Service in Tuskegee, Alabama, in which approximately 600 African Americans participated between 1932 and 1972. In 1972 it was revealed that the participants had received a dishonest explanation for their involvement in the research, and despite existing treatment for their condition—penicillin—they had been prevented from getting this treatment so that the research could continue. Lacks was an African American woman whose biospecimens were collected during a cervical cancer biopsy and later developed into the profitable HeLa cell line without her consent. 3

See https://www.nihr.ac.uk/documents/the-nihr-carbon-reduction-guidelines/21685 .

Holmes Rolston III discusses that obligations to protect non-human worlds are perhaps better understood at the species and ecosystem level. 30 He also provides more detail on the various ways in which value is ascribed to non-humans.

In this report, sustainable development is defined as ‘meet(ing) the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’.

https://www.nihr.ac.uk/documents/the-nihr-carbon-reduction-guidelines/21685 .

Also see Mancini et al 56 and Hickel et al . 57

Open AI, “AI and Compute,” May 16, 2018, at https://openai.com/blog/ai-and-compute/ .

Mainly for business reasons, but more recently to address considerations of the environment. 65

https://www.ukbiobank.ac.uk/learn-more-about-uk-biobank/news/uk-biobank-creates-cloud-based-health-data-analysis-platform-to-unleash-the-imaginations-of-the-world-s-best-scientific-minds .

Ethics statements

Patient consent for publication.

Not required.

This page has been archived and is no longer updated

Sustainability Science: Ethical Foundations and Emerging Challenges

Sustainability has become a critical goal for contemporary humanity, and sustainability science (reviewed by Kajikawa 2008) is widely viewed as the primary means for achieving sustainability. But it remains unclear how exactly science serves these goals. For example, for many ecologists, achieving sustainability means documenting and protecting the health of ecosystems, while for many environmental engineers, achieving sustainability means finding ways to satisfy human needs more efficiently. The confusion may be the product of a failure to appreciate the ethical dimensions of sustainability. For example, if sustainability is motivated primarily by a non-anthropocentric ethic, documenting and protecting the health of ecosystems might be the appropriate role for science, but if sustainability is motivated primarily by an anthropocentric ethic, finding ways to satisfy human needs more efficiently might be the appropriate role for science — and focusing on ecosystem health might be a waste of time and effort.

Sustainability science has a complicated relationship with ethics. Originally, the ethical dimension of sustainability received broad attention. An early development in the history of sustainability thought — marked by the term "sustainable development" — was the appreciation that sustainability involved concern for both ecosystem health and economic development. From this, a distinction developed between what is known as weak sustainability and strong sustainability (Beckerman 1994, Daly et al . 1995). Weak sustainability is generally concerned with sustaining human welfare and thought to be more commensurable with economic principles. Strong sustainability is generally concerned with sustaining natural capital and thought to be more aligned with traditional conservation values. More recently, the place of ethics within sustainability science has been more contested.

On the one hand, sustainability has largely been reduced to a scientific endeavor, making "sustainability science" a somewhat redundant term. In fact, the rise of sustainability science has led some to conclude that the ethical dimensions of sustainability have become obsolete (Thompson 2007; see also Jamieson 1998, Davison 2001). This perspective considers the ethical aspects of sustainability too general and vague for useful application to any specific problem, while the scientific aspects seem effective at precisely defining problems and developing solutions, regardless of the varied details characterizing sustainability problems. One objection to this perspective is that sustainability ought to entail understanding the "end goals of sustainability" (or sustainability's ethical dimension) and the "means by which to achieve sustainability" (sustainability's scientific dimension) (Vucetich & Nelson 2010). The ethical dimension of sustainability is inescapable though under-treated. Moreover, claiming sustainability's ethical dimension should be ignored for being too vague for effective application to specific cases in sustainability is like claiming that ethics, in general, should be ignored for being too vague.

This elimination of ethics from sustainability discourse — particularly in the mode of sustainability science — can also be glimpsed in recent university hiring practices and sustainability funding. For example, between 2008 and 2010, universities in the U.S. hired at least 59 academics in the field of sustainability-none had expertise in the ethical dimensions of sustainability (Figure 1). In 2010, the U. S. National Science Foundation had an interdisciplinary funding program devoted to environmental sustainability. That program's 570 word synopsis makes no reference to the ethical dimension of sustainability, but concluded "All proposed research should be driven by engineering principles, and be presented explicitly in an environmental sustainability context." Moreover, the word "ethic" appeared in the title, keywords, or abstract of just one of the 119 projects funded since this program's inception (Vucetich & Nelson 2010).

On the other hand, some sustainability science scholars, such as William Clark, seem comfortable with sustainability science as inclusive of ethics and philosophy. In a recent lecture, Clark (2007a) laid out the main "core questions" of sustainability science. Three of these four categories, "analytic" and "strategic," evoke profound philosophical sentiments. One of these categories, "normative," is purely philosophical or ethical. In fact, in a recent interview, when asked what is the most important question in conservation and sustainability science, Clark (2006) responded, "What is, and ought to be, the human use of the Earth? In other words, sustainability is primarily — and perhaps most importantly — about our moral relationships with the world — i.e., about ethics. And Clark (2003) has elsewhere recognized the science — humanities link in sustainability by pointing out "sustainability science focuses on the dynamic interactions between nature and society."

If there is no escaping the ethical and philosophical dimensions and foundations of sustainability, this in turn implies that science alone cannot help us become sustainable. Consider the very definition of sustainability. Refocusing attention on the ethical dimension of sustainability can be accomplished by defining sustainability as "meeting human needs in a socially — just manner without depriving ecosystems of their health." Such a definition is closely related to other widely appreciated definitions of sustainability (e.g., World Commission on Environment and Development 1987, Callicott & Mumford 1997, National Research Council 1999). From this definition rise five critical dimensions of sustainability, each related to sustainability's ethical dimension (Figure 2). Giving careful attention to this definition also provides useful guidance for how we can tend the ethical dimension of sustainability. For example, consider the concepts 'human needs' and 'ecosystem health.' Depending on how societies understand these concepts, sustainability could mean anything from "exploit as much as desired without infringing on future ability to exploit as much as desired" to "exploit as little as necessary to maintain a meaningful life." These plainly represent different motivations, and they would clearly result in different worlds. Nevertheless, either could be considered sustainable depending on the meaning of normative concepts that define sustainability. Ultimately, seven of the eleven words (excluding articles) in our definition of sustainability are tied to fundamentally normative concepts. Hence, failure to include ethics within sustainability discourse will perpetuate our confusions about the role of science in sustainability.

With the above principles in mind, consider a very general concern of sustainability. In recent years humanity produced and used something on the order of 12 terawatts (TW) of energy annually. From the perspective of sustainability we might ask, are the Earth's ecosystems healthy so long as they continue to produce 12 TW of electricity, or are they healthy if they possess an undiminished variety of flourishing habitats and species, but perhaps cannot produce 12 TW of energy? That is, do human needs define ecosystem health, or does ecosystem health define the limits of human needs?

Related questions arise for every specific interest of sustainability science. Consider the development of biofuels. Knowing whether the creation of biofuels deprive ecosystems of their health requires science's ability to describe — in objective terms — the effect of biofuels on ecosystems. However, knowing the affect of biofuels on ecosystem health also requires answering questions like: Is concern for ecosystem health motivated only by concern for human welfare, and therefore ecosystem health defined primarily by a landscape's ability to perpetually produce biofuels? Or is concern for ecosystem health motivated by the intrinsic value of ecosystems? — in which case, some other standard is required for judging ecosystem health. What should that standard be? An obvious answer is that ecosystem health could be judged by the amount of human impact. This answer contains critical wisdom, but it is also associated with problems well recognized by environmental philosophers. For example, such an answer presupposes that humans and nature are metaphysically distinct. So, while the on-going debate between biofuel critics — such as David Pimental — and supporters of biofuels seems to be primarily a scientific or empirical matter (are biofuels cost-effective?), this debate should also force us to ask more philosophical and ethical questions. As currently structured, the debate presupposes — without reflection or defense — that our problem is simply finding a new source of energy to replace the coming loss of inexpensive fossil fuels. Upon closer examination, however, it may turn out that our problem, and therefore the "solution" to our problem, may in fact be more nuanced than we at first thought — that it might be fundamentally about our (inappropriate) relationship with nature, a relationship where we see nature as distinct from humans, and merely a means to human ends.

Similar questions arise with the consideration of genetically-modified organisms, eco-tourism, wind power, and the sustainable harvest of plant or animal populations, to name just a few. The critical point is that we cannot understand the role of sustainability science, and hence achieve sustainability, unless we understand the meaning of sustainability, and we cannot understand the meaning of sustainability unless we answer questions like those described above. But we cannot answer such questions without a committed collaboration between sustainability science and environmental philosophy — something that currently does not exist.

These examples focused on the relationship between sustainability science and ecosystem health. Similar fundamental issues of an ethical nature arise when considering how sustainability science relates to social justice and human needs (i.e., the other key components of sustainability). The history of sustainability provides an example. In the 1970s, technology and economic incentives led to more efficient home heating and insulation in the United States. What did we do with that ability? Instead of using less energy we built larger houses, because we could now heat larger houses more affordably. This is an example of a phenomenon known as Jevon's paradox. Technology increases our ability to exploit the environment and the efficiency of exploitation, but it does not determine how we ought to exercise that ability and efficiency. Does sustainability science— either individual practitioners or entire agencies — have a moral obligation to develop sustainable technologies and knowledge that explicitly accounts for the human tendency to manifest Jevon's paradox? This question is related to the "human need" component of sustainability's definition.

Sustainability science is sometimes characterized as being "problem focused." Again, William Clark (2007b) characterizes sustainability science as "use inspired research," likened to "health and agricultural science," and primarily motivated by, and focused on, solving "problems." In fact, Clark goes so far as to suggest sustainability science is "defined by the problems it addresses rather than by the disciplines it employs." Now consider the loss of Earth's biodiversity. Such loss is only a problem if it infringes in some significant way upon that which matters morally. Given that we readily agree human well-being matters, and given the loss of biological diversity can negatively impact the well-being of humans, the loss of biological diversity is clearly a problem. But is it a problem if it does not directly affect humans? The answer to this will depend almost entirely upon what we decide matters morally. If some part of the non-human world counts, and if the loss of biological diversity negatively affects it, then the loss of biological diversity is a problem even greater than we had previously thought. And what about the relationship between biodiversity and biofuels, above? One criticism of biofuels is that their use will negatively impact biodiversity. While scientists can uncover the truth of falsity of this and related claims, neither ecological nor social science alone can tell us whether or not this is a justified trade-off, or examine the ethical questions such a dilemma presents. That is the work of ethicists — ideally working alongside scientists. Including ethics in the discourse on sustainability science, then, is valuable for exposing and helping to navigate through these questions, and for avoiding goals that can end up being irrational and indefensible.

While the implementation of sustainability requires vast scientific and technical knowledge, coupled with enormous political will, a commitment to sustainability is a commitment to a certain vision of how it is that we ought to live within the world — how it is that humans ought to interact with one another and the non-human world. Certainly, sustainability, without the scientific-technological and political ability to implement it, is meaningless. But so too is sustainability without ethics-without philosophical and conceptual clarity and defense. Sustainability science sometimes prides itself on its transdisciplinary (rather than merely inter- or multi-disciplinary) nature. To fulfill its promise, however, sustainability science faces serious challenges both within and outside of the academy. These challenges include — at a minimum — finding ways to be disciplinarily inclusive in a climate that is not familiar with, and does not reward, such inclusivity, and thinking seriously about how a trans-disciplinary commitment would manifest itself in the development of research agendas and programs in sustainability science that would provide something genuinely unique, something that directly engaged societal challenges, including their ethical aspects, beyond traditional disciplinary frameworks.

References and Recommended Reading

Callicott, J. B. & Mumford, K. Ecological sustainability as a conservation concept. Conservation Biology 11 , 32–40 (1997).

Clark, W. C. Lecture slides at http://www.csis.msu.edu/ClarkLecture.html (2007a).

Clark, W. C. Sustainability science: A room of its own. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 104 , 1737–1738 (2007b).

Clark, W. C. 12 questions to...William C. Clark. Gaia 15 , 164–169 (2006).

Clark, W. C. Sustainability science: The emerging research program. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 100 , 8059–8061 (2003).

Daly, H., Jacobs, M. & Skolimowski, H. Discussion of Beckerman's critique of sustainable development. Environmental Values 4 , 49–70 (1995).

Davison, A. Technology and the Contested Meanings of Sustainability . Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2001.

Jamieson, D. Sustainability and beyond. Ecological Economics 24 , 183–192 (1998).

Kajikawa, Y. Research core and framework of sustainability science. Sustainability Science 3 , 215–239 (2008).

National Research Council. Our Common Journey: A Transition Toward Sustainability . Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1999.

Thompson, P. B. Agricultural sustainability: What it is and what it is not? International Journal Agricultural Sustainability 5 , 5–16 (2007).

Vucetich, J. A. & Nelson, M. P. Sustainability: Virtuous or vulgar? BioScience 60 , 539–44 (2010).

World Commission on Environment and Development. Our Common Future . New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1987. [This document is commonly referred to as The Brundtland Report: IUCN, UNEP, WWF. Caring for the Earth: A Strategy for Sustainable Living . Gland, Switzerland, 1991].

Flag Inappropriate

Email your Friend

| Lead Editor: Ben A. Minteer

Within this Subject (13)

Basic (4)
Intermediate (4)
Advanced (5)

Visual Browse

Considering Environmental Ethics: The Center for Ethics in Society, the Doerr School of Sustainability, and Postdoc Ann C. Thresher

What if we could use geoengineering technology to reverse global climate change rather than having to reduce our overreliance on fossil fuels, lower our consumption of meat and manufactured goods, and worry about deforestation? What if we could solve the problem of invasive species, such as carp, by creating suppression drives — genetic modifications that are quickly inherited within a species — that would eventually sterilize and eliminate carp outside their native habitats, but in the worst case scenario, could accidentally eliminate the entire species?

Who would we need to get permission from to undertake such projects? How might we decide who we are responsible for and who we are beholden to when making decisions that affect the entire planet? And given that we cannot determine precisely what the long-term effects of altering the Earth’s climate or its biodiversity will be, how would we weigh our responsibility to future generations and current populations as we work out the answers? Does nature itself have an intrinsic value that we should account for as we decide whether to design and deploy such technologies?

These are the kinds of questions with which environmental ethics, a subfield of applied ethics in philosophy, engages. Broadly, environmental ethics studies both the conceptual foundations of environmental values, as well as the more concrete concerns that affect the attitudes, actions, and policies necessary to sustain biodiversity and ecosystems.

These are also the kinds of questions Ann C. Thresher — the first joint postdoctoral fellow for the McCoy Family Center for Ethics in Society and the Doerr School of Sustainability — will be collaborating with faculty, instructors, and students to explore.

Rob Reich, the Center for Ethics’ Faculty Director, explains that the new partnership with the Doerr School is designed to promote a “joint, systematic exploration of the ethical questions manifold in the dilemmas of sustainability we must all confront.” Ethical questions, he contends, “are ubiquitous, arising in every aspect of our lives, from the personal to the economic. They are not just a humanistic concern, they emerge everywhere and in every discipline.”

Building an Ethics of Sustainability The breadth and scale of sustainability concerns is what prompted hundreds of people to propose ways the university could address these issues. Those proposals eventually resulted in the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability. As Anjana Richards , Director of Transition Planning and Implementation as the school was forming explains, “We recognized that Stanford has many world-class programs, but as we thought about 21st-century education, 21st-century students, and 21st-century sustainability and climate change problems, we wondered what we could do as a university and as a community to address these massive challenges in an integrated, strategic way.” The Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability — designed to merge scholarship, educational programs and interdisciplinary collaborations to address systemic sustainability challenges — is Stanford’s answer.

“Our team, led by Lynn Hildemann, Senior Associate Dean of Education, is thinking about how we can equip our sophisticated students — who are experiencing climate change as physical and existential crises — for the tough jobs and amazing opportunities they will be facing,” says Richards.

When Anne Newman , the Center’s Director of Research, was learning about efforts to launch the Doerr School of Sustainability, she had similar questions. But, given her experience developing and administering the Center’s postdoctoral fellowship programs , she also had ideas. “We’ve been partnering postdocs with scholars from the social sciences, life sciences, and engineering for a number of years.” Given that environmental ethics is a highly regarded subfield within academic philosophy, and the Ethics Center had long been having postdocs teach an environmental ethics class, Newman began talking with Nicole Ardoin, Associate Professor in the Division of Social Sciences and Senior Fellow in the Woods Institute, and Director of the Emmett Interdisciplinary Program in Environment and Resources (E-IPER), who co-led the Education workstream for the new school transition. “Together,” Newman explains, “we came up with the idea of creating a joint postdoc position shared between the McCoy Family Center and the Doerr School that would focus on environmental ethics.”

“Conservation without moral values cannot sustain itself” — George Schaller Although nature was the focus of a good deal of philosophy in the nineteenth and twentieth century, the subfield of environmental ethics, in which Thresher is grounded, emerged in western philosophy as a new philosophical subdiscipline in the 1970s. Many environmental ethicists argue that its inception was a response to the environmental crises identified by and communicated to the general public by scientist-writer Rachel Carson in her book Silent Spring . However, Dale Jamieson, author of Ethics and the Environment : An Introduction , Professor Emeritus of Environmental Studies and Director of the Center for Environmental and Animal Protection at New York University, describes its development even more broadly. He argues that “environmental ethics emerged in Anglophone philosophy as a result of the questions the civil rights and anti-war movements of the 1960s were raising about the morality of war and the constitution of civil rights.” By the 1970s, he asserts, these concerns gathered enough momentum in academic philosophy to help spur “‘the applied turn,’ where philosophers became more interested in how the field could be used to illuminate social values and public policy questions.” Jamieson contends that because the environment cuts across so many disciplines, “it wasn’t until 1979 that the Environmental Ethics Journal was founded and environmental ethics became a recognized philosophical subfield.”

Since its inception, environmental ethics’ primary concern has been studying human’s relationship with nature and the moral value and status of nature and its non-human contents . As a result, many early environmental ethicists, often building upon indigenous epistemologies, developed “a theory of nature’s intrinsic value that encompasses not just humanity and other sentient animals, but nature itself,” wherein nature’s value “takes precedence over other values,” Jamieson writes.

Whatever one thinks about the idea of nature having intrinsic value, environmental problems are social problems, Dorceta Taylor, Professor of Environmental Justice at the Yale School of the Environment, argues. Thus, they challenge our ethical value systems, especially when these problems are as widespread and destructive as the ones wrought by climate change. As a result, in addition to considering the natural environment, environmental ethicists must now ask: What do humans living in the present owe to future generations? How should individual humans live in the Anthropocene? What do we mean by “sustainability” and why is its achievement an ethical requirement in this century? And, as environmental justice advocates point to the disproportionate harm that poor, largely people of color face as the result of the pollution generated by the US and other large economies, ethicists must consider what rich, developed nations with some of the largest carbon footprints per capita owe to poor, developing countries who benefit least and are the most harmed by the excesses of late-stage capitalism.

“Bringing ethical considerations to bear on scientific questions and integrating values into the ways we think about and do science is essential,” says Emily Polk, cofounder and co-director of Stanford’s Environmental Justice Working Group . Like Richards, she believes that combining ethics and science in the Doerr School of Sustainability “can provide the space to think about the potential impacts of science before those impacts are felt.”

Physicist, Philosopher of Science, Environmental Ethicist To address the interdisciplinary nature of the Doerr School of Sustainability, the postdoctoral search prioritized finding an environmental ethicist who was also grounded in science. “We were looking for someone who had a background in STEM that would be nimble enough to work with natural and physical science scholars to access philosophical ideas,” explained Richards. That intention led the Ethics Center and the Doerr School of Sustainability to Ann C. Thresher.

“I believe Thresher will be a particularly valuable member of the intellectual communities at both the McCoy Family Center for Ethics and the Doerr School of Sustainability,” says Leif Wenar , Professor of Philosophy, Senior Fellow at the Woods Institute, and a member of the Ethics Center's advisory board. “Her degree in physics and publications in the field, her expertise in biological and climate science; and her upcoming book, The Tangle of Science , co-authored with former Stanford professor Nancy Cartwright, means that Thresher has the expertise necessary to communicate with both scientists and philosophers.” Beyond her academic qualifications, Wenar also describes Thresher as “incredibly intellectually sociable.” That is, because she is truly invested in other people’s areas of expertise, Wenar believes that anyone at the Doerr School of Sustainability who thinks their work may be raising ethical concerns can talk with Thresher, and “together, they’ll be able to develop a much better understanding of the ethics of that situation.” This ground-up approach to ethics, Wenar asserts, also means that Thresher is a perfect fit for the McCoy Family Center’s mission of bringing ethical reflection to bear on pressing public problems.

Finally, Wenar points to Thresher’s paper on gene drives to suggest that in addition to using philosophical tools, she brings an engineering mindset to analyzing ethical problems that mirror the goals of the Doerr School of Sustainability. “She approaches problems by saying: here are our goals, here are the design constraints, and here are the risks and benefits of various alternatives. Let's just work through these to find the best option to provide specific policy guidance.”

Echoing Wenar’s support, Rob Jackson, professor of Earth System Science, views Thresher as a much-needed component of the new school. Jackson believes there hasn’t been enough campus-wide focus on ethics, environmental justice, and distributional justice issues. “If we are to succeed at the new school,” he argues, “it's extremely important that students are exposed to and given the formal training Thresher can provide, while they're being inculcated with the importance of technology, startups, and accelerators.”

Bridging Science and Ethics Having earned undergraduate degrees in both physics and philosophy at The University of Sydney in Australia, Thresher began her Philosophy of Science doctoral work at UC San Diego thinking she would become a philosopher of physics studying spacetime topologies. However, she discovered that “although I enjoy abstract thinking and math, they no longer felt practical enough for me. I believe environmental ethics is one of the most important things philosophers can be doing at this moment, because the tools philosophers have for analyzing big problems — breaking them down into their component parts, finding the base on which everything else rests, determining the fundamental unifying principles, and then putting these pieces back together to construct ethical, actionable next steps — can be applied to the sustainability challenges we all face.”

Thresher, whose environmental ethics work is deeply informed by her background in science, has been using these tools to examine the potential risks and harms of research itself (see her paper in progress, "How Research Harms ") and of emerging technologies. She specifically studies geoengineering and gene-drive technologies and evaluates the ways that policy tools, such as moratoriums, government intervention, and self-regulation can and cannot mitigate these threats.

Thresher also points out that the ethical difficulties posed by climate change, especially since we haven’t acted quickly enough, are only going to grow: “The bigger the problems, the bigger the solutions, and the bigger the solutions, the more extreme the risks they tend to pose.” In the case of geoengineering, for example, she argues that it’s difficult to conduct experiments on a scale relevant to geoengineering “without actually doing geoengineering.” This challenge led to the United Nations Framework Convention on Biological Diversity passing a moratorium on geoengineering research in 2010. However, because climate dangers are accelerating faster than the legislative and behavioral actions we’ve taken to address them, even the moratorium’s largely symbolic limits were essentially evacuated in 2016 . As a result, oil and gas companies’ funding of geoengineering research continues to rise, which raises a host of environmental and ethical concerns.

“Ultimately,” Thresher asserts, “science tells us what we can do. And while ethics cannot provide absolute answers, by balancing out options in a nuanced way, it can tell us what we should do. Ethics is the bridge between science and policy.”

To help build this bridge at the Doerr School of Sustainability, Thresher sees herself contributing in three ways: One is “collaborating with scientists themselves to help them think about the ethical concerns posed by their research. Two is increasing ethics education in the school, in ways similar to those undertaken by the Embedded Ethics postdoc fellows working with the computer science department. And three is bringing ethics more fully into the sphere of the school, so people are talking about scientific output, policy, and the middle ground — the ethics of their projects.”

On the Ground in the New School Since beginning her fellowship this past fall, Thresher has been hanging out in labs, listening to scientists talk about their work and asking, “Have you considered …?” Have you considered the potential impacts of your research, how it might be weaponized, what communities and species might be affected? Thresher has found biologists particularly receptive to talking about the ethical issues in their field. For instance, she is collaborating with Professor Elizabeth Hadley’s lab , whose “mission is to understand, describe, and predict how biodiversity responds to change in the Anthropocene.” Thresher and some lab members are working on creating a feasibility study for bringing Tule elk, once native to the area, back to Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve . While the chances of actually reintroducing them are low, Thresher explains that the goal is to research whether such projects are feasible and then to use these findings as a model for similar regional projects. The other related goal of the research is to contribute to the California 30x30 project — conserving 30 percent of California’s lands and coastal waters by 2030. California 30x30 must grapple with complicated ethical issues regarding the tradeoffs between people and nature, questions about our obligations towards the environment, and the balance between humans actively stewarding nature and taking a more hands-off position. “I'll be consulting with the project’s lab members and helping write about the ethics of rewilding — what we owe the elk, the natural environment, and people — as well as what we value in nature, such as biodiversity, 'naturalness,' and the instrumental/economic value of nature to humans,” says Thresher.

Thresher is also working to raise the visibility of ethics education in the Doerr School of Sustainability. She expects to be delivering more guest lectures, teaching courses and helping design syllabi and assignments. In spring 2023, Thresher will be co-teaching the “Ethics and the Anthropocene” course with Professor Hadley.

The final goal of the Ethics Center/Doerr School partnership is to position ethics more centrally within the school’s field of concern. Thresher sees herself as an ambassador who is there to get more people talking about ethics. She believes that “having a huge group of people who want to make a positive difference on the environment all integrated into a single school designed to research not only how to build solar panels, for instance, but how to use ethics to determine how and where to deploy this technology — is a truly phenomenal initiative.”

Ongoing Encounters with Ethics “Frankly,” Rob Jackson reflects, “sometimes, we need to slow down. There's a tendency for us, at places like Stanford, to think that we have the answers, that we have the technologies, and that the world really needs us to be able to get what we think is the best solution out there as quickly as possible. That can be true, but it's also dangerous, in my view, and ethicists can help us slow down long enough to grapple with the many issues that surround technology.”

Reich’s even broader hope is that “the Center for Ethics can make meaningful, ongoing encounters with ethical questions impossible to avoid, not just at the Doerr School, but in the entire university.”

Donna Hunter is a freelance writer, editor, and tutor living in San Francisco. She has a Ph.D. in English from UC Berkeley and was an Advanced Lecturer in Stanford’s Program in Writing and Rhetoric.

Table of Contents
Random Entry
Chronological
Editorial Information
About the SEP
Editorial Board
How to Cite the SEP
Special Characters
Advanced Tools
Support the SEP
PDFs for SEP Friends
Make a Donation
SEPIA for Libraries
Back to Entry
Entry Contents
Entry Bibliography
Academic Tools
Friends PDF Preview
Author and Citation Info
Back to Top

Supplement to Environmental Ethics

Pathologies of environmental crisis – theories and empirical research.

Part of environmental philosophy’s project since its inception is the diagnosis of the origins of our present-day environmental extremities. The best known of these is probably Lynn White’s theory. As seen in the main entry, White argues that Judæo-Christian monotheism, because of its essentially anthropocentric attitude towards nature, is the ideological source of the modern environmental crisis. At the heart of his philosophical cum cultural-historical analysis seems to be a simple structure:

W1. Christianity leads to anthropocentrism. W2. Anthropocentrism leads to environmentally damaging behaviours. W3. So, Christianity is the origin of environmental crisis.

The second premise of White’s argument also seems to have a central place in a number of rival diagnoses. In fact, the structure of the major theories in the field is regularly of this sort: (1) X leads to anthropocentrism, (2) anthropocentrism leads to environmentally damaging behaviours; therefore (3) X is the origin of environmental crisis. Three other well-known cases have already been discussed (section 3 above), namely: ecofeminism (which identifies X with those patterns of thought that are characteristically patriarchal), deep ecology (which takes X to be atomistic individualism), and the new animism (which regards the disenchantment of nature as the X -factor).

The four theories all seem to have one view in common: that anthropocentrism is at the heart of the problem of environmental destructiveness. If anthropocentrism is the problem, then perhaps non-anthropocentrism is the solution. At this point, it may be helpful to separate two theses of non-anthropocentrism, ones that are not normally distinguished in the literature:

The evaluative thesis (of non-anthropocentrism) is the claim that natural non-human things have intrinsic value, i.e., value in their own right independent of any use they have for others. The psycho-behavioural thesis (of non-anthropocentrism) is the claim that people who believe in the evaluative thesis of non-anthropocentrism are more likely to behave environmentally (i.e., behave in beneficial ways, or at least not in harmful ways, towards the environment) than those who do not.

Much of the last three decades of environmental ethics has been spent analysing, clarifying and examining the evaluative thesis of non-anthropocentrism, which has now achieved a nearly canonical status within the discipline. By contrast, the psycho-behavioural thesis is seldom discussed, but is part of the tacit background of environmental ethics. When it does get explicit mention this is often in the introductions or prefaces of books, or in reference works – for example, when it is said that deep ecology’s “greatest influence … may be through the diverse forms of environmental activism that it inspires” (Taylor and Zimmerman 2005, compare Rolston 1988, xii, Sessions 1995, xx-xxi, Sylvan and Bennett 1994, 4–5, and see also Akamani 2020, 5). If the psycho-behavioural thesis is true, then it is important in two ways: (1) it provides a rationale for both the diagnosis and solution of environmental problems, and (2) it gives practical justification to the discipline of environmental ethics itself (conceived as the mission to secure converts to the evaluative thesis of non-anthropocentrism). Conversely, if the psycho-behavioural thesis turns out to be false, then—since the thesis is the common tacit assumption of all four theories—not only the discipline itself, but also the four major diagnostic theories of the origin of the environmental predicament will be seriously undermined .

Central to the psycho-behavioural thesis is a problematic assumption: that if people believe they have a moral duty to respect nature or believe that natural things are intrinsically valuable, then they really will act in more environmentally-friendly ways. This empirical question cannot be answered by purely a priori philosophical reasoning. In fact, the other core premises in the four major philosophical theories on the origin of environmental crisis are also empirical claims about social and cultural reality. To be credible, they must be able to stand up to empirical testing. For example, are people who think in dualistic and hierarchical ways (as described by feminists) in fact more likely to have anthropocentric attitudes and more likely to act harmfully towards the environment? Are people who believe in animism (as panpsychists argue) in fact less likely to have anthropocentric attitudes and also less likely to harm the environment? What about people who adopt some relational or holistic view of the world, as advocated by deep ecologists? How do they act toward nature compared to those who adopt a more individualistic and atomistic worldview? These questions about the relations among various belief systems and behaviours look no different in kind from the sorts of questions that social scientists regularly ask.

Of the major philosophical theories on the origin of environmental crisis, Lynn White’s is the only one to have been empirically tested by social scientists. The net result of these studies for the most part has been “inconclusive”, especially when education, sex, age and social class are also factored in (Shaiko 1987, Greeley 1993, Woodrum and Hoban 1994, Eckberg and Blocker 1996, Boyd 1999). By and large, anthropocentrism rather than non-anthropocentrism persists as the focus of work on the “greening” of religion (see Taylor, van Wieren and Zaleha 2016). Authors often note that “anthropocentrism does not explain the obvious differences between conservative and liberal Christians on climate change” (Zaleha and Szasz 2015). Moreover, like their philosophical counterparts, environmental sociologists often take the psycho-behavioural thesis of non-anthropocentrism for granted. Some of the best-known and most widely used survey instruments in the field are also problematic. Riley Dunlap and collaborators developed many years ago the “New Environmental Paradigm” (NEP) scale, to measure pro-environmental attitudes (Dunlap and van Liere 1978). That scale, and its later revisions (see Dunlap et al. 2000), is problematic precisely because it explicitly uses indicators of beliefs in anthropocentrism to measure the presence of un-environmental attitudes, thus assuming in advance that anthropocentric beliefs are harmful to the environment. But whether that is so should be settled by empirical investigation rather than by an act of a priori stipulation in survey design. Likewise, the psycho-behavioural thesis of non-anthropocentrism would also require such testing.

Despite the fact that there is a striking common underlying structure between White’s theory and the other major theories discussed above, no sociological studies so far have been done on the other theories, nor on the common underlying psycho-behavioural thesis of non-anthropocentrism and its effects. This presents an opportunity for interdisciplinary collaborations among philosophers and social scientists. Many tools and methods well established in the social sciences can justifiably be adapted for use in research on environmental philosophy, giving the subject an empirical or even experimental turn. Such work may stimulate new ideas about the origins of our environmental pathologies, and for testing the extent to which belief systems and worldviews actually drive attitudes and behaviours. As long as empirical facts are relevant to philosophical and ethical thought, adoption of social science methods will be a means of keeping our theorising in touch with the motivations and behaviours of the people we are trying to describe and influence.

Similar points about the role of empirical investigations can also be made about theorizing over a range of other problems, including drought, the preservation of biodiversity, and climate change. There is increasing agreement across the entire globe that the world is facing chronic and unprecedented environmental problems, many of them of human origin. Indeed, the United States military, responding to an albeit speculative report on abrupt climate change prepared for the Pentagon by the Global Business Network (see Schwartz and Randall 2003, in the Other Internet Resources section below), have declared that the problems of adjustment to climate change constitute a more severe threat to national and international security than does terrorism. Public perceptions across a variety of nations also match this perception (Poushter and Huang 2019). More severe droughts, floods and changing weather patterns, the expected burden of caring for environmental refugees, the effects of consumerism, and the health decline associated with various forms of pollution are continuing and major problems for human beings themselves (see Shue 2001, Sagoff 2001, Thompson 2001), and raise crucial issues about sustainability and environmental justice (see Shrader-Frechette 2002, Gonzalez, Atapattu, & Seck 2021). The prospects for controlling climate change remain dire (IPCC 2021). At the same time, the continuing destruction of natural environments and the widespread loss of both plant and animal species pose increasing problems for other forms of life on the planet. In facing these problems, there will likely be great opportunities for co-operation and synergy between philosophers and both natural and social scientists.

Like many other important and interesting questions, no single discipline could claim sole ownership of those raised above about the origins of the modern environmental crises and the quandaries we now face, the relation between environmental problems and social injustice, and the vexed question of how human beings should relate to the natural environment in their pursuit of happiness and well-being. The move away from armchair speculation to link up with a wider community of inquiry appears inevitable not only in environmental ethics but in all areas of practical philosophy.

Accessibility

Support SEP

Mirror sites.

View this site from another server:

Info about mirror sites

Library of Congress Catalog Data: ISSN 1095-5054

Schools & departments

Research Ethics and Integrity

At The University of Edinburgh, we are committed to ensuring that research ethics, integrity and governance have a high profile and are firmly embedded in our ethos and culture. 

We support our researchers to adhere to the highest standards of research integrity, and effectively meet the challenges of an increasingly complex research environment through our College research ethics framework. All research activities must comply with these guidelines.

This framework for ethical conduct of research is guided by principles of: dignity, respect, care for others, honesty, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, and leadership. These principles apply equally to staff and students in the College.

Ethics resources for researchers and students

Information for researchers.

Policies, procedures, regulations and codes of practice.

Edinburgh Research Office Resources for Schools

Protecting Vulnerable Groups (PVG)

Guidance for Staff and Student Researchers

For School specific policies, forms and ethics application information, please contact your School research office or refer to your School ethics pages.

CAHSS Research governance office support

For Training, Guidance and Support

CAHSS Research support forms

How to Raise a concern

Although allegations of misconduct in research areas are rare, the University is committed to ensuring they are thoroughly investigated.

Reporting concerns

Who should I contact?

Cahss research ethics and governance team.

Email: [email protected]

Telephone number : +44 (0) 131 651 3916

College Associate Dean (Research Ethics & Integrity)

Dr Sudeepa Abeysinghe

Email: [email protected]

Contact us through an online sign language interpreter

British Sign Language (BSL) users can contact the University of Edinburgh via Contact Scotland BSL, the online British Sign Language video relay interpreting service.

Find out more on the Contact Scotland BSL website

Contact Scotland BSL - contact us through a sign language interpreter

Try our Advanced Search for more refined results

The Practice of Law

Law360 Pulse

Business of Law

Law360 authority, deep news & analysis, tax authority, employment authority, insurance authority, real estate authority, bankruptcy authority, healthcare authority.

Law360 Employment Authority
Law360 Tax Authority
Law360 Insurance Authority
Law360 Real Estate Authority
Law360 Healthcare Authority
Law360 Bankruptcy Authority

Law360 In-Depth
Law360 Podcasts
Regional Powerhouses
Law360's MVPs
Women in Law Report
Diversity Snapshot
Practice Groups of the Year
Rising Stars
Titans of the Plaintiffs Bar
Adv. Search & Platform Tools
About all sections
Browse all sections
Class Action
Competition

Expert Analysis

Intellectual Property
Product Liability
Track attorneys
Track judges
Join the Law360 team
Search legal jobs
Learn more about Law360
Read testimonials
Contact Law360
Sign up for our newsletters
Law360 Company
About Law360 Authority
Resource Library

The Ethics of Using Generative AI In Environmental Law

Law360 is on it, so you are, too..

A Law360 subscription puts you at the center of fast-moving legal issues, trends and developments so you can act with speed and confidence. Over 200 articles are published daily across more than 60 topics, industries, practice areas and jurisdictions.

A Law360 subscription includes features such as

Daily newsletters
Expert analysis
Advanced search
Judge information
Real-time alerts
450K+ searchable archived articles

Experience Law360 today with a free 7-day trial.

Already a subscriber? Click here to login

Related Sections

Cybersecurity & Privacy
Environmental
Legal Ethics
Rumberger Kirk
American Bar Association
Kentucky Bar Association
Microsoft Corp.
MIT Technology Review
New York State Bar Association
Pennsylvania Bar Association
Philadelphia Bar Association
State Bar of Texas
TechTarget, Inc.
Thomson Reuters Corp.

Government Agencies

New Jersey Supreme Court
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission

Judge Analytics

I forgot my password
I took a free trial but didn't get a verification email
How do I sign up for a newsletter?

Already have access? Click here to login

Get instant access to the one-stop news source for business lawyers, sign up now for free access to this content.

Email (NOTE: Free email domains not supported)

PLEASE NOTE: A verification email will be sent to your address before you can access your trial.

Password (at least 8 characters required)

Confirm Password

Show all interests

Law360 may contact you in your professional capacity with information about our other products, services and events that we believe may be of interest. You’ll be able to update your communication preferences via the unsubscribe link provided within our communications. We take your privacy seriously. Please see our Privacy Policy .

Already have access?

Password: Forgot your password?
Remember login

Sign up for our California newsletter

You must correct or enter the following before you can sign up:.

Law360 takes your privacy seriously. Please see our Privacy Policy .

COMMENTS

(PDF) Environmental Ethics
Abstract. Environmental ethicsc - the study of ethical questions raised by human relations with the nonhuman environment - emerged as an important subfield of philosophy during the 1970s. It is ...
Environmental Ethics
Environmental ethics is the discipline in philosophy that studies the moral relationship of human beings to, and also the value and moral status of, the environment and its non-human contents. This entry covers: (1) the challenge of environmental ethics to the anthropocentrism (i.e., human-centeredness) embedded in traditional western ethical ...
Environmental Ethics
Environmental ethics is a branch of applied philosophy that studies the conceptual foundations of environmental values as well as more concrete issues surrounding societal attitudes, actions, and ...
Reimagining research ethics to include environmental sustainability: a
In this paper we argue the need to reimagine research ethics frameworks to include notions of environmental sustainability. While there have long been calls for health care ethics frameworks and decision-making to include aspects of sustainability, less attention has focused on how research ethics frameworks could address this. To do this, we first describe the traditional approach to research ...
Environment and Ethics in Sustainability
The philosophical field of environment and ethics, sometimes known as environmental ethics, examines the moral and ethical link between humans and the environment. It examines the moral bond between people and the planet, animals, and plants. In the 1970s, the science of protecting the environment was recognized as a legitimate academic field.
The Oxford Handbook of Environmental Ethics
Environmental ethics is an academic subfield of philosophy concerned with normative and evaluative propositions about the world of nature and, perhaps more generally, the moral fabric of relations between human beings and the world we occupy. This Handbook contains forty-five newly commissioned essays written by leading experts and emerging voices.
Environmental Ethics: The State of the Question
Environmental ethics, as an academic field, was born out of professional philosophers' frustrations with anthropocentrism. In particular, philosophers such as Richard Sylvan and Holmes Rolston III found that canonical Western philosophy overlooked important questions regarding human relations to nonhuman animals and the broader world.
Gregory Bassham, Environmental Ethics: The Central Issues
Robin Attfield, Environmental Ethics: A Very Short Introduction. Show details Hide details. Thomas Pölzler. Environmental Values. Aug 2019. Restricted access. ... Sage Research Methods Supercharging research opens in new tab; Sage Video Streaming knowledge opens in new tab;
Environmental Ethics: An Overview
Environmental ethics is the study of normative issues and principles relating to human interactions with the natural environment. It comprises an increasingly significant field of applied ethics, crucial for the guidance of individuals, corporations and governments in shaping the principles affecting their lifestyles, their actions and their policies across the entire range of environmental ...
Environmental Ethics
Environmental ethics is the discipline in philosophy that studies the moral relationship of human beings to, and also the value and moral status of, the environment and its non-human contents. This entry covers: (1) the challenge of environmental ethics to the anthropocentrism (i.e., human-centeredness) embedded in traditional western ethical ...
Full article: Ethics requirements for environmental research
Does environmental research require (stronger) oversight? Despite the growth of environmental ethics (Curzer, Wallace, and Perry Citation 2013; Farmer Citation 2013), there is surprisingly little scholarship on how these principles apply to field research intended to advance environmental outcomes.Bioethics is a well-established field of philosophy that addresses the moral and ethical ...
(PDF) 'Environmental Ethics: An Overview'
Environmental ethics is the study of normative issues and principles relating to human. interactions with the natural environment. It comprises an increasingly significant. field of applied ethics ...
What Is Ethics in Research and Why Is It Important?
NIEHS is committed to conducting the most rigorous research in environmental health sciences, and to communicating the results of this research to the public. Explore Health & Education. ... education in research ethics should be able to help researchers grapple with the ethical dilemmas they are likely to encounter by introducing them to ...
(PDF) Environmental Ethics
Environmental ethics focuses on questions concerning how we ought to inhabit the world; what. constitutes a good life or a good society; and who, where, or what merits moral standing. The field ...
Environmental Ethics
Environmental ethics—the study of ethical questions raised by human relations with the nonhuman environment—emerged as an important subfield of philosophy during the 1970s. It is now a flourishing area of research. This article provides a review of the secular, Western traditions in the field. It examines both anthropocentric and nonanthropocentric claims about what has value, as well as ...
Environmental Ethics
Environmental ethics is the discipline in philosophy that studies the moral relationship of human beings to, and also the value and moral status of, the environment and its nonhuman contents. This entry covers: (1) the challenge of environmental ethics to the anthropocentrism (i.e., human-centeredness) embedded in traditional western ethical ...
An environmental ethical conceptual framework for research on
14. Our distinction between Value-oriented and relation-oriented environmental ethics does not exclude a certain overlap. For example, although deep ecologists would accept that non-human nature has intrinsic value, they would argue that nature encounters and human's personal relationships with non-human nature are keys to developing a 'deeper' moral outlook that can, from a Value ...
Redefining ethics and ethics research directions for environmental
The Northeast Ethics Education Partnership (NEEP), jointly coordinated by Brown University and SUNY-ESF from 2010 to 2017, organized and implemented short- and long-course training on research ethics and cultural competence to graduate students at four universities in the fields of environmental sciences/studies and engineering. This article provides findings from student evaluations of these ...
Reimagining research ethics to include environmental sustainability: a
In this paper we argue the need to reimagine research ethics frameworks to include notions of environmental sustainability. While there have long been calls for healthcare ethics frameworks and decision-making to include aspects of sustainability, less attention has focused on how research ethics frameworks could address this. To do this, we first describe the traditional approach to research ...
Sustainability Science: Ethical Foundations and Emerging Challenges
Figure 2: Sustainability is essentially the relationship between the environment and society. That relationship involves a physical aspect (exploitation) and an ethical attitude. That relationship ...
Environmental Ethics
Environmental Policies and Legislation. Iyyanki V. Muralikrishna, Valli Manickam, in Environmental Management, 2017 4.5 Environmental Ethics. Environmental ethics believes in the ethical relationship between human beings and the natural environment. Environmental ethics says that one should base their behavior on a set of ethical values that guide our approach toward the other living beings in ...
Considering Environmental Ethics: The Center for Ethics in Society, the
Thresher, whose environmental ethics work is deeply informed by her background in science, has been using these tools to examine the potential risks and harms of research itself (see her paper in progress, "How Research Harms ") and of emerging technologies. She specifically studies geoengineering and gene-drive technologies and evaluates the ...
Environmental Ethics > Pathologies of Environmental Crisis
Much of the last three decades of environmental ethics has been spent analysing, clarifying and examining the evaluative thesis of non-anthropocentrism, which has now achieved a nearly canonical status within the discipline. By contrast, the psycho-behavioural thesis is seldom discussed, but is part of the tacit background of environmental ethics.
Research Ethics and Integrity
We support our researchers to adhere to the highest standards of research integrity, and effectively meet the challenges of an increasingly complex research environment through our College research ethics framework. All research activities must comply with these guidelines. This framework for ethical conduct of research is guided by principles ...
The Ethics of Using Generative AI In Environmental Law
Law360 (August 28, 2024, 12:26 PM EDT) -- The rapid emergence of generative artificial intelligence tools is challenging environmental lawyers, consultants and government agencies to determine ...

Log in using your username and password

You are here

Statistics from Altmetric.com

Introduction

Environment and (bio)ethics

A research ethics framework based on sustainability

Scientific quality

Social value

Respect for persons, communities and environment

Favourable risk to benefit ratio

Case study: data-driven health research

Respect for persons, communities and the environment

Ethics statements

Read the full text or download the PDF:

National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences

See ethics in practice at NIEHS

Join an NIEHS Study

Codes and Policies for Research Ethics

Ethical Principles

Objectivity

Carefulness

Transparency

Accountability

Intellectual Property

Confidentiality

Responsible Publication

Responsible Mentoring

Respect for Colleagues

Social Responsibility

Non-Discrimination

Animal Care

Human Subjects protection

Ethical Decision Making in Research

What is the problem or issue?

What is the relevant information?

What are the different options?

How do ethical codes or policies as well as legal rules apply to these different options?

Are there any people who can offer ethical advice?

Promoting Ethical Conduct in Science

Annual Review of Environment and Resources

Most Read This Month

Redefining ethics and ethics research directions for environmental studies/sciences from student evaluations

Cite this article

Access this article

Similar content being viewed by others

Should Justice for People Come Before Justice for the Environment? Examining Students’ Reflections on Environmental Ethics

What is the future of ethics teaching in the environmental sciences

Availability of data and material

Acknowledgements

Author information

Corresponding author

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

Additional information

Rights and permissions

About this article

Share this article

Reimagining research ethics to include environmental sustainability: a principled approach, including a case study of data-driven health research

Cristina Richie

Introduction

Environment and (bio)ethics

A research ethics framework based on sustainability

Scientific quality

Social value

Respect for persons, communities and environment

Favourable risk to benefit ratio

Case study: data-driven health research

Respect for persons, communities and the environment

Ethics statements

References and Recommended Reading

Flag Inappropriate

Email your Friend

Visual Browse

Considering Environmental Ethics: The Center for Ethics in Society, the Doerr School of Sustainability, and Postdoc Ann C. Thresher

Supplement to Environmental Ethics

Support SEP

Research Ethics and Integrity

Ethics resources for researchers and students

Guidance for Staff and Student Researchers

CAHSS Research governance office support