A contextualization of Richard Sylvan’s philosophical ideas in the history of developments in environmental ethics

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.35319/yachay.202582181

Keywords:

Richard Sylvan, environmental ethics, metaphysics, modal semantics, ecological thinking

Abstract

The communication presented by Richard Routley (later Sylvan) in September 1973: “Is there a need for a new, an environmental, ethic?” serves as a central axis for this paper, which aims to provide a clarifying presentation of the underlying philosophical layers that nourish Richard Sylvan’s reflection on thinking about ecology. The first part of the article offers a retrospective look at the relationship between humankind and nature, which allows us to contextualize the origins of Sylvan’s environmental thinking. The second part then focuses on the metaphysics that underlies the philosopher’s project in order to better understand the development of his ethics applied to ecology. The third part reviews the ongoing impact of Sylvan’s ideas on 21st century environmental ethics, connecting them with current trends in ecological thinking.

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Author Biography

Sylvain Le Gall, Ministère de l’Éducation Nationale, de l’Enseignement Supérieur et de la Recherche

Sylvain Le Gall holds a Doctorate in Linguistics from the Université de Bretagne Occidentale (University of Western Brittany), France. A professor in the French National Education system, he is also an associate professor at the Université Catholique de l’Ouest (Catholic University of the West), where he teaches linguistics for the Bachelor's degrees in Educational Sciences and Teacher Training (UCO-Bretagne Nord, Brest). His main areas of research are syntactic analysis, the developments and history of computational linguistics, and formal semantics. He is the author of about fifteen articles published in academic and international university journals in various countries across Europe and America.

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Una contextualización de las ideas filosóficas de Richard Sylvan en la historia de los desarrollos de la ética ambiental

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Published

2025-12-30

How to Cite

Le Gall, S. (2025). A contextualization of Richard Sylvan’s philosophical ideas in the history of developments in environmental ethics. Yachay, 42(82), 133–153. https://doi.org/10.35319/yachay.202582181

Issue

Vol. 42 No. 82 (2025): Revista Yachay n° 82

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Articles

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