Deck 7: The Environment

Question 1

According to the philosopher Joel Feinberg,

A) future generations of people have a right to be born.
B) future generations have no moral rights.
C) we have no duties to future generations.
D) the rights of future generations are contingent upon those people coming into existence.

Answer 1

D

Question 2

Some environmental regulations (like forbidding the burning of coal in cities) benefit each and every one of us because the air we all breather is cleaner. If an individual ignores the regulation and burns coal, while others obey the regulation, then he or she

A) violates our right to a livable environment.
B) is being a free rider.
C) displays an ignorance of ecology.
D) creates an externality.

Answer 2

B

Question 3

According to Holmes Rolston III,

A) naturalistic ethics ought to be abandoned.
B) some natural objects are morally considerable in their own right, apart from human interests.
C) all moral rights are derived from the interests of human beings.
D) nature has no value apart from human beings.

Answer 3

B

Question 4

Which of the following is true of factory farms?

A) They are smaller these days than they used to be.
B) The people who run them are brutal.
C) Contrary to the critics, the animals in them rarely suffer.
D) They permit the mass production of meat at low prices.

Question 5

The philosopher Tom Regan

A) claims that no impartial morally sensitive person could approve of the treatment of animals in factory farms if he or she knew what was going on.
B) argues against the use of governmental regulations to control the actions of businesses.
C) believes that the FTC should be abolished.
D) denies that non-human animals have any moral rights.

Question 6

In consideration for the obligation to others,

A) we have no genuine moral obligations to future generations.
B) future people have a right to be born.
C) the U.S. uses more than its proportional share of the world's resources.
D) environmental protection is always a static trade-off, with a fixed economic price to be paid for the gains we want.

Question 7

Cost-benefit analysis

A) is influenced by value judgments.
B) considers only short-term effects.
C) values costs over benefits.
D) is a value-free social-scientific approach.

Question 8

An ecosystem

A) should never be tampered with.
B) can survive any human intervention.
C) can be upset by human behavior.
D) is independent of all other ecosystems.

Question 9

Which of the following is true of a regulatory approach to environmental problems?

A) It proceeds on a case-by-case basis, dealing with each company's specific circumstances.
B) It gives companies an incentive to do more than the minimum required by law.
C) It requires the EPA or other body to determine the most effective, feasible pollution-control technology for each different industry.
D) It involves the use of pricing mechanisms.

Question 10

William F. Baxter addresses environmental ethics by noting

A) the best ethical position to adopt on environmental issues is a naturalistic position.
B) non-human animals have intrinsic value.
C) judgments about environmental problems ought to be people-oriented.
D) damage to geological "marvels" is inherently wrong and should be prevented.

Question 11

Which of the following is true concerning our environment today?

A) the Clean Air Act of 1970 has had no beneficial effects
B) animal waste from factory farms is good for the environment
C) the "greenhouse effect" is basically media hype
D) polluted air is a health risk

Question 12

According to Shaw and Barry, utilitarians

A) focus on human well-being and ignore animal welfare.
B) oppose animal experimentation in principle.
C) should include nonhuman animal pleasures and pains in the overall utilitarian calculus.
D) are likely to favor factory farming.

Question 13

One truth about factory farms is

A) they rarely inflict any genuine suffering on animals.
B) most animals we eat are from them.
C) they are necessary to feed the world.
D) they are run by brutal people.

Question 14

The moral theorist William T. Blackstone claims that the right to a livable environment

A) would solve the problem of how to conserve resources.
B) prevents the use of government regulation to control the actions of business.
C) is a fundamental human right.
D) implies that non-human animals have no genuine moral rights.

Question 15

Which environmental statement is true?

A) Tropical forests are the earth's richest, oldest, and most complex ecosystems.
B) Because of technological breakthroughs, people living in developed countries put less strain on the environment than do people in poorer countries.
C) There are only about 1000 species of animals left in the world.
D) The United States consumes only its proportional share of the world's irreplaceable natural resources.

Question 16

Concerning future generations,

A) all philosophers today reject the idea that future people have rights
B) utilitarianism dictates a radical reduction in population growth
C) future people have a right to be born
D) the social and environmental policies we adopt can affect who is born in the future

Question 17

According to the anthropocentric (or human-oriented) ethic of Baxter and others,

A) environmental preservation is inherently valuable.
B) the Grand Canyon is valuable only because people care about it.
C) we have a strong, almost absolute obligation to preserve species from extinction.
D) future people have no interests that we need to respect now.
E) nature has value in and of itself, apart from human beings.

Question 18

The "tragedy of the commons" is

A) the lack of a commons-a common place where people can come together.
B) the failure to appreciate what we have in common with other species.
C) that cost-benefit analysis involves value judgments that we do not share in common.
D) that individual pursuit of self-interest can sometimes make everyone worse off.

Question 19

Animal manure

A) is not available in sufficient quantities to replenish agricultural land.
B) is a large source of pollution.
C) helps counteract the "greenhouse effect".
D) is potentially more dangerous than nuclear power.

Question 20

"Pollution permits" are an example of which of the following methods of achieving our environmental goals?

A) pricing mechanisms
B) government subsidies
C) a laissez-faire approach
D) regulations

Question 21

Cost-benefit analysis is a device used to determine whether it's worthwhile to incur a particular cost.

Question 22

Cost-benefit analyses of rival environmental policies inevitably involve making value judgments about nonmonetary costs and benefits.

Question 23

A decade after wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone Park, their presence was discovered to

A) not change anything.
B) have stabilized their own population.
C) have changed the behavior of elk.
D) be disruptive.

Question 24

Advocates of a naturalistic ethic contend that some natural objects are morally considerable in their own right, apart from human interests.

Question 25

A moral of Garrett Hardin's parable "The Tragedy of the Commons" is that there can be a difference between the private costs and the social costs of a business activity.

Question 26

Regulation is always the most effective way to allocate the costs of environmental protection.

Question 27

Which of the following is a drawback to the regulatory approach?

A) regulation can take away an industry's incentive to do more than the minimum
B) regulation is an incentive to an industry to do more than the minimum
C) regulation does not apply to all equally
D) does not require polluters to use the strongest most feasible means of pollution control.

Question 28

Tampering with the ecosystem always has injurious effects.

Question 29

A moral vegetarian

A) rejects eating meat based on moral grounds.
B) only eats animal that were raised humanely.
C) does not believe animals suffer.
D) the pleasure we get from eating a hamburger justifies the price the animals pay.

Question 30

The word "ecosystem" refers to a total ecological community, both living and non-living.

Question 31

The word "ecology" refers to the science of the interrelationships among organisms and their environment.

Question 32

An assessment of costs and benefits inevitably involves

A) facts.
B) monetary costs only.
C) false opinions.
D) value judgments and factual uncertainties

Question 33

The new discipline of "ecological economics" calculates the value of an ecosystem, not in terms of what people are willing to pay for it, but in terms of what it would cost to provide the benefits and services that the ecosystem now furnishes us.

Question 34

According to William F. Baxter, we ought to respect the "balance of nature" and "preserve the environment" even if doing so brings no benefit to human beings.

Question 35

When it comes to the protecting animal interests, the United States is far ahead of Europe.

Question 36

The disparity between private industrial costs and public social costs is what economists call an "internality."

Question 37

According to Jeremy Bentham, the question is not whether animals can feel pain, but whether they can talk and reason.

Question 38

Moral vegetarians are people who reject the eating of meat on moral grounds.

Question 39

Business has considered the environment to be

A) a scarce commodity.
B) free and nearly limitless.
C) a limited supply.
D) costly.

Question 40

Advocates of a "naturalistic ethic" believe that penguins are important only because people like them.

Question 41

An ordinary example of an ecosystem is a pond.

Question 42

According to Joel Feinberg, we can predict various interests of future generations.

Question 43

According to Cambridge University biologist Andrew Balmford, the loss of nature's services is usually outweighed by the benefits of development.

Question 44

The rising affluence of people in the United States has meant a corresponding decrease in pollution and its attendant environmental problems in the United States.

Question 45

The international fishing industry as it exists today gives us good reason to reject the moral of Garrett Hardin's "Parable of the Commons."

Question 46

Thanks to the EPA, the federal government long ago eliminated the problem of potentially harmful pesticides and other chemical residues in food.

Question 47

Three approaches have gained the most attention when it comes to achieving our environmental goals: the use of regulations, incentives, and pricing mechanisms.

Question 48

William T. Blackstone rejects the idea that each person has a human right to a livable environment on the grounds that it is technically infeasible.

Question 49

Any equitable solution to the problem of who should pay the bill for environmental cleanup should take into account responsibility as well as benefit.

Question 50

One of the attitudes prevalent in business that has led to increased environmental problems is the tendency to view the natural world as a free and unlimited good.