Argues that anything living is intrinsically valuable and builds a bridge between the biological sciences and morality to form a new hierarchy of living organisms. Agar analyzes a wide array of historic and contemporary views, from Aristotle and Kant, to E. O. Wilson, Holmes Rolston II, and Baird Caldicot. The result is a challenge to prevailing definitions of value and a call for a scientifically-informed appreciation of nature.
1. The Psychological View of Intrinsic Value2. Science's Bridge from Nature to Value3. Overlapping Kinds and Value4. Recent Defenses of Biocentrism5. A Morally Specialized Account of Life6. The Contents of Biopreferences7. Species and Ecosystems8. An Impossible Ethic?
Nicholas Agar is lecturer in philosophy at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand.
I hope that this book is a harbinger of a new age in environmental philosophy.... Agar's book is an excellent illustration... [that] draws on contemporary work in the philosophy of mind, philosophy of biology, and philosophy of science. -- Gary Varner, "Environmental Ethics"