The need of an ethics of planetary sustainability

Abstract

The concept of sustainability is widely acknowledged as a political guideline. Economic, ecological, social and cultural aspects of sustainability are already under discussion. Current space mining efforts demand that the discussion become a broader one about 'planetary sustainability', including the space surrounding Earth. To date, planetary sustainability has mainly been used with reference to Earth only and I will extend it here, elaborating on a similar NASA initiative. This article (1) sketches the contemporary economic-political initiatives which call for a special reflection of Earth's location in space, and then (2) discusses the meaning of the concept of sustainability in this context. Next, (3) I relate the discussion to the issue of planetary and environmental protection, before, (4) finally, presenting a philosophical and theological perspective that seems particularly able to broach the issue of the multiple dimensions of sustainability in this context. This is the concept of constructive-critical realism. My overview of the topic concludes with (5) a summarizing outlook.

Is transplanetary sustainability a good idea? An answer from the perspective of conceptual engineering

“…Thus, to the extent that sustainable development does not cover research, an ethics of sustainable development cannot deal with ethical issues that arise from research. I agree with Losch (2018 a ) that the exploration of outer space raises intricate issues, but it is not clear that all of them are being adequately addressed in an ethics of transplanetary sustainability.…”

“…'Planetary sustainability' (as e.g. used by Losch, 2018a, but see Losch, forthcoming) is a misnomer for a perspective that transcends the viewpoint of our planet. Note though that 'trans' in 'transplanetary' is not supposed to imply that our own planet is not an issue any more; it is included.…”

Do we need an ethics of planetary sustainability?

“…To address these questions, Andreas Losch (2019a) has recently called for a new ethics. Borrowing a term that has been used before by NASA (2014), Losch calls it an 'ethics of planetary sustainability'.…”

Planetary sustainability: transitions of an idea

“…Given this orientation, it made sense to connect the project to the existing NASA initiative, also called ‘planetary sustainability’ (Losch, 2016 a , 2018), which aims at including in our planet's sustainable development the ‘resources of the Solar System’ (NASA, 2014). At the same time, the need for planetary protection was to be retained; the inclusion of a discussion of potential extraterrestrial life (ETL) or extraterrestrial intelligent life (ETIL) was always on the horizon of the concept, as my previous project had dealt with the anthropological, philosophical and theological implications of the potential existence of life beyond our planet (Losch, 2016 c , 2017).…”