While reading William Baxter’s piece “People or Penguins” I was really able to relate to what he was saying – not in the sense that I agreed with him, but in the sense that I feel like most people in today’s society would. He talks about how in order to properly deal with a problem you first must have a good general objective. Continuing on to explain that his main objective is to further humans, he claims that while benefits might also extend to animals through humans, animals do not have a right to be conserved in themselves. Admitting that his ideas are “undeniably selfish,” Baxter continues on to argue that animals and nature have no value in themselves, and so should thus not be taken into account when looking at human growth and development. I feel like a lot of Americans in particular would agree with his main idea in believing that humans are of the only importance in the world.
I however refuse to believe that animals and nature have no moral status and are simply at our disposal. Baxter blatantly refuses to believe that we should preserve the environment or its balance unless in doing so we benefit ourselves, and I disagree whole heartedly. I believe that it is our duty to try and help preserve the natural environments and animals around us, for they are just as much a part of this world as we are. While I do not think that we should put them at equal status or above ourselves, I think that they should be given some moral consideration. I do not think that cutting down trees for lodging is wrong per say, but that there is a balance between conservation and fulfilling basic human needs, and that we must strive to maintain this balance. Baxter claims that “there is no normative definition of clean air or pure water,” but I disagree again. Clean air and water is what the earth naturally does through its interconnected processes of life without the interference of man. I am not inferring that we should discontinue our use of the earth’s resources; I think that with all our innovations in technology we must aim to further push its limits and find new and more efficient ways of living, essentially decreasing the size of our human footprint.