The Ethics of the Climate Crisisby Robin Attfield

ROBIN ATTFIELD, AN Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at Cardiff University and a key figure in environmental ethics, begins The Ethics of the Climate Crisis (2024) by laying out in clear, quantitative detail why the climate, pollution, and biodiversity crises require our urgent attention. As he says, the IPCC has warned that we have only until 2025 – this year! – if we are to have a chance of keeping global temperatures to a 1.5°C rise. But the book’s central concern is how those responsible for the detrimental impacts of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution can be held to account on the basis of an agreed set of ethical principles, for the benefit of present and future humans and other species.

Having laid the groundwork, we begin to see Attfield’s characteristically meticulous approach to detailed ethical questions swing into action. Reference to Kenneth Good-paster’s classic essay, ‘On Being Morally Considerable’ is salutary. Relatedly, I was surprised Paul Taylor’s biocentric ethics in his book Respect for Nature (1981) did not merit a mention. But the only thing that really troubled me during the early chapters was the sometimes puzzlingly elementary language: do we really need to be told that the Earth is warmed by the Sun? In addition, separating greenhouse gases from pollution, and therefore pollution from either climate change or the biodiversity emergency is strained, given how closely the three are intertwined. I would also like to have seen more interconnections made at this stage between current attitudes in political and social systems and the escalating crises. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that Attfield brings together the central scientific arguments for a consensus that the climate and biodiversity crises are existential threats, and therefore require a global response, rooted in universally acceptable ethical principles.