J. Baird Callicott, Distinguished Research Professor of philosophy, tackles a new philosophy for the environment in his book Thinking Like a Planet: The Land Ethic and the Earth Ethic (Oxford University Press). He was inspired by conservationist Aldo Leopold's 1949 work A Sand County Almanac that featured the essay "The Land Ethic," about contemporary environmental ethics.

In Thinking Like a Planet, Callicott provides a full philosophical foundation for the land ethic, covering biotic communities, ecosystems and landscapes, and an "Earth ethic" covering the global scale in the age of climate change.