Environmental Virtue Ethics: A Traditional Indian Perspective on Hursthouse’s Quest

Sitansu S Chakravarti explores the possible routes indicated by Hursthouse to building a viable environmental virtue ethics in her landmark 2007 paper. In the process he incorporates Indian philosophical concepts from ancient times as he builds a model for environmental virtue ethics grounded on the virtue Indian philosophy has especially emphasized in character building, viz., harmony within. Chakravarti claims this anchor virtue implies the presence of other needed virtues, thus pointing to the unity of virtues, as Hursthouse comments in personal communication on previous versions of this paper. Here Chakravarti has followed the spirit of World Philosophy in his attempt at finding a solution to the philosophical problem of building environmental virtue ethics with the help of philosophical insights and wisdom from the Indian tradition. He attempts to elaborate on Ronald Sandler’s concepts of the meaning of life, knowledge and autonomy suggested as distinctive emergent features in the process of evolution reaching its final state of rationality where we humans are situated. In fact, finding the meaning of life in knowledge and autonomy is a move toward a state of existential becoming where the virtue harmony within seems to be of quite a relevance. This existential becoming is what the author understands as spirituality involved in the process of our relation to nature while character is considered important in Sandler’s book with the significant title ‘Character and Environment’. ‘The meaning of life based on harmony within’, says Chakravarti, ‘which is ‘intentional’ in character, prompts one to look for harmony all the way, and help maintain, and build it if found missing by any chance’.