Q.Do we have the freedom to destroy our environment?

This margin question tests whether an action that harms the shared environment can still be defended as a purely personal freedom. …

This margin question sits in the chapter's discussion of positive liberty, and it is best answered using both the harm principle and the idea of positive liberty together. Under the harm principle, an action is treated as the individual's own business only when its consequences fall on that individual alone; destroying or seriously degrading the environment is precisely the opposite of that — its consequences (pollution, loss of resources, damage to the climate and to shared ecosystems) fall on other people as well, including people who have had no say in the decision at all, such as future generations. This makes environmentally destructive action a clear case of an 'other-regarding' action, and therefore a legitimate case for restriction under the very same reasoning the chapter uses for hate campaigns or serious harm to others. …