How to do Animal Ethics

Many think doing animal ethics demands we see moral humanism as a speciesist prejudice of the kind found with sexism and racism. The only serious case for this rests on the Argument from Marginal Cases. We find that argument to the point, but show that properly understood it supports humanism. Understanding why it does this lets us see how we ought to go on in animal ethics.     

Institutional Isomorphism and Food Fraud: A Longitudinal Study of the Mislabeling of Rice in Taiwan

A number of high-profile mislabeling incidents have led to many studies exploring the decision-making processes that firms make around performing illegal acts. However, it remains unclear why the proportion of firms conducting these acts constantly fluctuates and never disappears. Therefore, this study investigated this by carrying out a longitudinal analysis of food labeling in the Taiwanese rice industry. Drawing on the institutional isomorphism theory, it was found that the degree of mislabeling is negatively correlated with both the level of control of inspection regulations and public attention toward food regulations, and positively correlated with the previous proportion of firms mislabeling their products. Thus, there is a feedback loop between regulatory control, public attention, and the amount of mislabeling, with the amount of mislabeling not only being affected by the former degree of regulatory control, public attention, and mislabeling, but also modifying the future status of each of these. These findings further our understanding of the causal effects of illegal actions in the institutional agricultural environment.     

Cryptocurrency: governance for what was meant to be ungovernable

Cryptocurrencies have the potential to revolutionize the exchange of information and money through blockchain and distributed ledger technologies. Despite the promise of such underlying technologies, their reliance upon distributed consensus processes to approve software updates raises the potential for governance failures to destabilize a given cryptocurrency. These governance failures, known as ‘hard forks,’ can separate a cryptocurrency into two rival camps. Where such events can destabilize a given cryptocurrency’s value, and instill distrust in the capacity of a cryptocurrency to survive as a reliable vehicle of exchange, it is imperative for the cryptocurrency community to improve their governance processes and limit the potential for hard forks to occur. While the distributed nature of cryptocurrency governance makes any traditional governing process unlikely to succeed, anticipatory approaches that establish thresholds and metrics to determine when software reform is necessary may help alleviate the governance failures presented by many hard forks.     

Fertilizer Management in Watersheds of Two Ramsar Wetlands and Effects on Quality of Inflowing Water

Two field experiments were carried out in the watersheds of two Ramsar wetland areas, Lakes Koronia and Volvi (area A) and Lakes Mikri and Megali Prespa (area B), to study the effect of application of N fertilizer on wheat yields, the quality of runoff water, and the quality of stream water. The treatments were a combination of two methods of fertilizer application (total amount in fall, and 2/3 in fall + 1/3 in spring) at three rates (0, 100, and 200 kg N/ha) with four replications. Concentrations of NH₄ ⁺, NO₃ ⁻, NO₂ ⁻, P, and Cl⁻ and pH were determined in all water samples. Runoff water quality was not influenced by fertilizer application in either area. Chemical parameters for water did not differ along the selected watercourses in area B, while in area A they were higher in the samples taken near Lake Koronia than in the samples taken upstream, indicating that the watercourses are polluted downstream by nonagricultural sources. The differences in wheat yields between the 100 and 200 kg N/ha application rates were not high. These results call for better fertilizer management in order to achieve better yields and to diminish the possibility to have negative effects to the environment.     

Environmental impact assessment of a proposed info-tech complex in East Calcutta wetlands

An info-tech complex is proposed for 286 acres (116 ha) of land within the East Calcutta wetlands. The proposed site is 15 km east of Kolkata city and only 8 km south of Dum Dum airport. The site is vacant, with pockets of agricultural land and a few degrading water-logged areas. In order to assess the likely impact of the proposed development on the environment, a rapid environmental impact assessment of an area of 10 km radius from the centre of the project site was carried out. The present status of the environment with respect to ambient air, surface water, groundwater, soil, landuse, noise, and socio-economics of the core and buffer zone has been documented and correlated with 24 project activities during construction, development and operational phases. The frequency of adverse impacts is greater than that of beneficial impacts. Out of the total adverse impacts 20 are short term, reversible and have a low magnitude. The total impact score for the proposed project is (–)468.75 and as per the Assessment Value Index Scale the environmental impact of the proposed project activities is no appreciable impact. But there are certain sectors where the environment will be adversely impacted. Therefore, appropriate measures have been suggested to ameliorate the adverse impacts. It is envisaged that if these measures are implemented then there will be an improvement in the quality of the environment, as well as life, by 687.5 units.     

Public opinion and siting solid waste landfills in Kuwait

Siting municipal solid waste landfills in Kuwait had not considered public concerns about the location of such facilities. Kuwait Municipality has disposed urban waste in abandoned sand quarries for the past 20 years in an unplanned fashion. Due to this improper siting criteria, environmental and health problems have risen from old landfills that are located in residential areas. In an effort to help responsible decision-makers in assessing public support for siting landfills a structured, yet simple, questionnaire was designed and distributed to a random sample of heads of households. Statistical techniques were employed to examine trends and relationships between the sample public responses concerning landfill siting criteria. The findings of the research indicated that a significant percentage of the responding sample did not know about the various landfill impacts and less than 50% were aware of the negative impacts of landfills on the public health and the environment. The visual appearance of the landfill scored the lowest impact in the opinion of the sample public while the most important aspect in siting a landfill appeared to be its economic consideration. The research findings also directed attention to the important role that the media could play in increasing public awareness. Results from the cross-classification analysis demonstrated the existence of differences in awareness levels according to age, nationality, martial status, education, and occupation of the responding sample. Statistically, these differences were significant at the 95% significance level, as supported by the test of the χ-square.     

Influence of water treatment residuals on phosphorus solubility and leaching

Laboratory and greenhouse studies compared the ability of water treatment residuals (WTRs) to alter P solubility and leaching in Immokalee sandy soil (sandy, siliceous, hyperthermic Arenic Alaquod) amended with biosolids and triple superphosphate (TSP). Aluminum sulfate (Al-WTR) and ferric sulfate (Fe-WTR) coagulation residuals, a lime softening residual (Ca-WTR) produced during hardness removal, and pure hematite were examined. In equilibration studies, the ability to reduce soluble P followed the order Al-WTR > Ca-WTR = Fe-WTR > hematite. Differences in the P-fixing capacity of the sesquioxide-dominated materials (Al-WTR, Fe-WTR, hematite) were attributed to their varying reactive Fe- and Al-hydrous oxide contents as measured by oxalate extraction. Leachate P was monitored from greenhouse columns where bahiagrass (Paspalum notatum Flugge) was grown on Immokalee soil amended with biosolids or TSP at an equivalent rate of 224 kg P ha(-1) and WTRs at 2.5% (56 Mg ha(-1)). In the absence of WTRs, 21% of TSP and 11% of Largo cake biosolids total phosphorus (PT) leached over 4 mo. With co-applied WTRs, losses from TSP columns were reduced to 3.5% (Fe-WTR), 2.5% (Ca-WTR), and <1% (Al-WTR) of applied P. For the Largo biosolids treatments all WTRs retarded downward P flux such that leachate P was not statistically different than for control (soil only) columns. The phosphorus saturation index (PSI = [Pox]/ [Al(ox) + Fe(ox)], where Pox, Al, and Fe(ox) are oxalate-extractable P, Al, and Fe, respectively) based on a simple oxalate extraction of the WTR and biosolids is potentially useful for determining WTR application rates for controlled reduction of P in drainage when biosolids are applied to low P-sorbing soils.     

Biogeochemistry of fluoride in a plant-solution system

Fluoride (F-) pollutants can harm plants and the animals feeding on them. However, it is largely unknown how complexing and chelating agents affect F bioavailability. Two studies were conducted that measured F- bioavailability and uptake by rice (Oryza sativa L.). In the first study, rice was grown in solution culture (pH 5.0) with 0, 2, or 4 mM F- as KF to compare the interaction of F- with humic acid (HA) and with a conventional chelating agent, N-hydroxyethylenthylenediaminetriacetic acid (HEDTA). In the second study, F was supplied at 0, 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0 mM KF with an additional 2 mM F- treatment containing solution Ca at 2x (2 mM Ca) the level used in the first study, to test the effect added Ca had on F- availability and uptake. Total biomass was greatest with HEDTA and F- < 1 mM. Leaf and stem F concentrations increased exponentially as solution F- increased linearly, with nearly no F partitioning into the seed. Results suggest that F was taken up as HF0 while F- uptake was likely restricted. Additionally, F- competed with HA for Ca, thus preventing the formation of Ca-HA flocculents. The addition of soluble Ca resulted in the precipitation of CaF2 solids on the root surface, as determined by tissue analysis and energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy.