Value as a Reason for Action

"Core beliefs, principles, or standards that guide how people decide what is right and wrong and what matters most in life"

"Not just things we happen to like; they are things that can justify actions. They answer the question: "Why should I do this?"

First, read the abstract of my 1998 doctoral thesis.

What has changed since 1998?

The children have grown up. They are now in their mid-forties.
The science is now all but certain. The precautionary principle has become somewhat less relevant and denial untenable.
I have come to doubt the possibility of intrinsic value
The promised "National Statement of Values" has come, gone, been forgotten, and vanished into oblivion.

A dominant anthropocentric ideology

Anthropocentrism places humans firmly in control. Their science and technology will bring unlimited growth, ever increasing prosperity with abundant food and nutrition for the entire world’s population no matter how much this increases. Humans are above nature and rule the world, or at least, that’s what most of them think. Their education systems socialise their children into this belief and most of those children grow up acting as though it were true without conscious thought. This is the dominant ideology of our times, has been for centuries and has given us cornucopianism, the opposite of the dystopianism that has come to dominate YouTube in recent times. Relatively few question anthropocentrism, but those who do may assert an alternative ecocentric ideology which ascribes value, worth and primacy to the whole natural world. I would argue that ecocentrism is at heart also anthropocentric since it is a human construct giving us such fantasies as “Mother Earth”. In my view what is needed is the appreciation that both positions are value judgements to which the planet and its systems is entirely indifferent.

Failed carbon capture project, Petra Nova, Texas

Credit: Clean Air Task Force

Value free objectivity

I was completing my PhD during the tenure of Charles Clarke as education secretary. Clarke's period in office also coincided with our work in Stenier Schools. Clarke believed that the curriculum should be value free and entirely objective. He was at best cool towards the humanities subjects and outwardly hostile to such value driven enterprises as environmental education. I would argue that the default position of “value free” is anthropocentric cornucopianism because it is values and their attendant beliefs and not science that drives our behaviour. Failure to recognise the dominance of value as a reason for action over "following the science" may turn out to be catastrophic for humanity.