The Russell Jacobs Lecture in Philosophy
7:30 - 9 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 19, 2023
Memorial Union, Washburn B
Free and open to all. Reception to follow lecture.Dr. Clare Palmer presents "Environmental Ethics in a Changing Climate"
How can we best care for our world? Dr. Clare Palmer will discuss the challenges presented by climate change and technological change and will use case studies to suggest how we might respond.
Environmental ethics and policy in the United States have long championed the values of ecological communities, species and wildness. These values have been protected in important environmental legislation such as the US Endangered Species Act (1973) and the Wilderness Act (1974). However, Dr. Palmer will argue, as we move into the Anthropocene – that is, the current era of human dominance –significant challenges to the understanding and protection of these traditional environmental values exist.
In this talk, Dr. Palmer will...
- Explain what she takes these traditional environmental values to be
- Outline some of the leading challenges presented by climate change, technological change and several important value shifts
- Use case studies to think through how environmental ethicists could respond to such challenges.
Dr. Clare Palmer is a British philosopher and scholar of environmental and religious studies who is currently a professor in the Department of Philosophy at Texas A&M University, as well as a George T. and Gladys H. Abell Professor in Liberal Arts. Her research interests focus on environmental and animal ethics, and the ethics of emerging technologies. She is author or co-author of five books, including Animal Ethics in Context (Columbia University Press 2010), and Wildlife Ethics: The Ethics of Wildlife Management and Conservation (Wiley Blackwell 2023).
She has also edited or co-edited a number of volumes, including Linking Ecology and Ethics for a Changing World (2014), a collaboration between philosophers and ecologists. She was a member of the consensus committee that produced the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine report Biotechnology and Forest Health: Possibilities and Considerations in 2019, and served as the President of the International Society of Environmental Ethics from 2007-2010.
About the Russell Jacobs Lecture in Philosophy
The purpose of the Russell Jacobs Lecture in Philosophy is to bring outstanding philosophers and discussion of their work to Washburn University. It is held in the fall and is always free and open to the public. Emeritus faculty member Russell Jacobs established this lecture upon his retirement.
2022 - Dr. Agnes Callard of University of Chicago
2019 - Dr. Chike Jeffers of Dalhouise University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
GET IN TOUCH WITH Philosophy and Religious Studies Department
Philosophy and Religious Studies Department
Morgan Hall, Room 206
1700 SW College Ave.
Topeka, KS 66621
Phone & Email
785.670.1542
phil-rg@washburn.edu
