Ecology
— Mitcham, Enc of Science, Technology, and Ethics, 2005

“Ecology,” in Mitcham, Carl, ed., Encyclopedia of Science, Technology, and Ethics, 2: 580-583. Farmington Hills, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, Thomson/Gale, 2005.
Online at: http://hdl.handle.net/10217/37190

Ecology is the logic of living creatures in their homes. Ecology mixes with ethics, an ecological (or environmental) ethics urging that humans ought to find a lifestyle more harmonious with nature. Humans have always had to rest their cultures on a natural life support system. Environmental engineers may now claim that the principal novelty of the new millennium is that Earth will be a managed planet. Such claims bring increasing concern how far nature can and ought be transformed into humanized nature. Thinking of humans as fitting themselves into a sustainable biosphere is a better logic of being at home on Earth.

Article also appeared in previous edition: Encyclopedia of Science, Technology, and Ethics (Detroit, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, ©2005). Rolston, Holmes, III, Ecology, Holbrook, J. Britt and Carl Mitcham, eds., Ethics, Science, Technology, and Engineering: A Global Resource, 2nd ed., vol. 2, 27-31. Farmington Hills, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, Cengage Learning, 2015. Online at: http://hdl.handle.net/10217/86381