ANTHROPOCENTRISM - A MISUNDERSTOOD PROBLEM

Anthropocentrism can intelligibly be criticised as an ontological erro r, but attempts to conceive of it as an ethical error are liable to co nceptual and practical confusion. After noting the paradox that the de arest instances of overcoming anthropocentrism involve precisely the s ort of objectivating knowledge which many ecological critics see as it self archetypically anthropocentric, the article presents the followin g arguments: there are some ways in which anthropocentrism is not obje ctionable; the defects associated with anthropocentrism in ethics are better understood as instances of speciesism and human chauvinism; it is unhelpful to call these defects anthropocentrism because there is a n ineliminable element of anthropocentrism in any ethic at all; moreov er, because the defects do not typically involve a concern with human interests as such, the rhetoric of anti-anthropocentrism is counterpro ductive in practice.