This comment explains why the claims of Callicott et al. in their paper ‘Was Aldo Leopold a Pragmatist?’ (Environmental Values 18 (2009): 453–486) are incorrect. The arguments they make are shown to be based upon several misunderstandings. In addition, important contributions by Aldo Leopold to the philosophy of conservation are missed.
BernsteinRichard. 1997. ‘Pragmatism, pluralism, and the healing of wounds’, in MenandL., Pragmatism: A Reader.New York: Vintage Books, Random House.
2.
CallicottJ. Baird, Grove-FanningWilliam, RowlandJennifer, BaskindDaniel, FrenchRobert Heath and WalkerKerry. 2009. ‘Was Aldo Leopold a pragmatist? Rescuing Leopold from the imagination of Bryan Norton’. Environmental Values18: 453–486.
3.
DeweyJohn. 1920. Reconstruction in Philosophy.New York: Henry Holt and Company.
HadleyArthur Twining. 1913. Some Influences in Modern Philosophic Thought.New Haven: Yale University Press.
6.
JamesWilliam. 1909. A Pluralistic Universe.Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
7.
LeopoldAldo. 1949. A Sand County Almanac and Essays Here and There.New York: Oxford University Press.
8.
LeopoldAldo. 1923/1979. ‘Some fundamentals of conservation in the Southwest’. Environmental Ethics1: 131–141.
9.
MeineCurt and KnightRichard L., Eds. 1999. The Essential Leopold: Quotations and Comments.Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press.
10.
MinteerBen. 2006. The Landscape of Reform: Civic Pragmatism and Environmental Thought in America. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
11.
MinteerBen, and ManningRobert. 1999. ‘Pragmatism in environmental ethics: democracy, pluralism, and the management of nature’. Environmental Ethics21: 191–207.
12.
NortonBryan. 1990. ‘Context and hierarchy in Aldo Leopold's theory of environmental management,’ Ecological Economics2: 119–127.
13.
NortonBryan. 2005. Sustainability: A Philosophy of Adaptive Ecosystem Management.Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
14.
PeirceCharles S.1986. ‘The doctrine of chances,’ Writings of Charles S. Peirce: A Chronology, Vol. 3 (1872–78). Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.
15.
Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, Second Edition. 1959; 1983.
