ECOCENTRISM AND ECOLOGICAL MODELING

Typical of ecocentric approaches such as the land ethic and the deep e cology movement is the use of concepts from ecological science to crea te an ''ecoholistic'' ontological foundation from which a strong envir onmental ethic is generated. Crucial to ecocentric theories is the ass umption that ecological science has shown that humanity and nonhuman n ature are essentially integrated into communal or communal-like arrang ements. In this essay, I challenge the adequacy of that claim. I argue that for the most part the claim is false, and that, if it were true, it would overextend the sphere of morally considerable entities to in clude entities that are implausibly deserving of moral consideration. In either case, the foundation of ecocentrism is significantly weakene d.