I’ll start by saying that I agree with Leopold’s position that the land itself deserves some form of protection, a view which I think most people, without any real stake in the exploitation of the land (such as maybe an oil company, etc.) ultimately agree with. I know I personally feel that way because I love nature. It’s not something that I really need to argue with myself about or subject to critical thought in the same way that I might love a piece of music; I just do. Leopold and a lot of environmentalists, I’m sure, feel the same way. They find value in the land for personal reasons – reasons that don’t need to be justified because they just feel right.
The problem here is that when Leopold needs to convince others that his view of the land is the correct view and the self-interested economic view of the land is harmful, he has to resort to the kind of personal feeling about the land that fuels his desire for conservation in the hopes that others will adopt this view. This is difficult – how can one argue in terms of personal feeling? He claims that it is inconceivable that “an ethical relation to the land can exist without love, respect, and admiration for land, and a high regard for its value” (171). Callicott, quoting Scott Lehmann, points out that “his argument is homocentric” in that it appeals to the “human stake in preservation” (184). This is really the question I want to pose: Is it that the land itself really does have value, completely independent of human interest in, love of, enjoyment of, or use of the land? Or is it that we view the land as being valuable because it provides all of these qualities for human beings? Is there ever really a completely altruistic environmentalist, or do we protect the land because its instrumentally valuable for our happiness? And if that is the case, where is the line drawn for when our economic interests go too far?
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