Uploaded July 2025 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago

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Neil Manson explains the hidden tension between environmental ethics and findings in cosmology over the last thirty years: if life exists throughout the universe, then we lose one main argument for caring what happens to life here on Earth.

Neil Manson's paper, "Anthropocentrism, Exo-Planets, and the Cosmic Perspective": philpapers.org/rec/MANAEA-3

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EPISODE CHAPTERS
00:00:00 Introduction
00:00:45 Cosmological science today
00:10:25 Anthropocentrism, defined
00:15:16 Two kinds of anthropocentrism: biological and personal
00:30:46 Consequentialism
00:32:15 The cosmic perspective and non-anthropocentrism
00:40:47 Objection: Some infinities are better than other infinities.
00:56:59 Why we should reject nonanthropocentrism
01:01:48 Should we seek to preserve nature?
01:18:25 Towards a stewardship model of environmentalism