Description
This work applies an environmental ethic ground in an interpretation of Thomas Aquinass Summa Theologiae to a particular environmental region, namely the Loess Hills of Iowa. The book begins by telling the ecological story of the Loess Hills and the proceeds to summarize the development of environmental ethics through the legacy of Henry David Thoreau, thereby revealing certain tensions that exist in contemporary environmental debates. Then, after considering the strengths and weaknesses of anthropocentric and ecocentric ethical systems, the author provides an exposition of Aquinass understanding of the bonum naturalis , bonum connaturalis , and the bonum supernaturalis , as these are found in the Summa Theologiae . From these a eudaimonistic ethic emerges: human communities ought to pursue flourishing only in ways that simultaneously save the contextualizing ecosystems. This ethic is then applied to the particular case of the Loess Hills, producing an eudaimonistic ecoregionalism. This study should appeal to scholars working in environmental ethics, philosophy, theology, and ecology.
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