Philosophically, Buddhist ethics would appear to be well-prepared for the climate change age. Buddhists receive encouragement to extend compassion and nonharm throughout a universe that is utterly interconnected across time and space. Such positive extensions result in a strength of the tradition involving some welcome positive treatment of nonhuman animals. However, looking closely in terms of practical outcomes reveals some serious limitations regarding Buddhist environmental ethics. Not all animals receive ethical value and care, for instance, and the tradition provides a historically unstable platform for vegetarianism despite some popular beliefs to the contrary. Even worse, perceived sentience is required to receive substantial Buddhist moral value, in most cases leaving plants, stones, and bodies of water without ecological respect. Since managing climate change precisely includes the moral management of plants, stones, and bodies of water, our ethics regarding these entities must be clear. Buddhist environmental ethics, though, today provide us with few tools for developing such ethics for entities considered by Buddhism to be insentient, although perhaps views are changing.

中文翻译：

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佛教环境伦理与气候变化

从哲学上讲，佛教伦理似乎已经为气候变化时代做好了充分的准备。佛教徒受到鼓励，要在跨越时间和空间完全相互联系的宇宙中传播慈悲和不伤害。这种积极的延伸导致了传统的力量，包括对非人类动物的一些受欢迎的积极对待。然而，仔细观察实际结果，就会发现佛教环境伦理存在一些严重的局限性。例如，并非所有动物都受到道德价值和照顾，而且这一传统为素食主义提供了一个历史上不稳定的平台，尽管有些流行的信念相反。更糟糕的是，感知知觉需要接受实质性的佛教道德价值，在大多数情况下，植物、石头和水体都不受生态尊重。由于管理气候变化恰恰包括对植物、石头和水体的道德管理，因此我们对这些实体的道德规范必须明确。然而，今天的佛教环境伦理学为我们提供了很少的工具来为佛教认为无知觉的实体发展这种伦理学，尽管观点可能正在发生变化。