An argument is made for the special preservationist value of rock formations and other geological features, independent of their biotic status or aesthetic appeal. The work of Passmore, Hay and other contemporary ecological thinkers is cited.

A review of the arguments that make up the current controversy on genetically modified foods (GMFs) is briefly given as well as an assessment of their cogency. The two main arguments for GMFs are utilitarian (we can feed a greater number of people with them than without) and environmental (we can increase the food supply without diminishing the wilderness areas by displacing them with farm land). The arguments against evolve around the idea of unforeseen consequences which could have irreversible effects on the food supply and consumers. A major philosophical issue centers on the claim that genetic engineering is equivalent to conventional breeding (the advocates claim this) and the opponents who deny the equivalence. Because of the uncertainties involved in GMFs, it is suggested that their labeling, in addition to non-GMFs’ labeling, should be enforced so that the public can make their own decision as to what they should eat. The inference drawn from this debate is that we should proceed on a case by case basis, because of the rapidly changing biotechnologies.

Our reluctance to demystify grief is a sign of the distinctive obligation and discomfort that people feel towards those who have died. These feelings, however, are instructive about the nature of grief. As a vehicle of a living person’s relation to the dead, grief is mysterious—and we are rightly reluctant to take that mystery away. But grief is not to be avoided by philosophy on that account. I defend a less Romantic view of grief, in which a grieving person’s experience of “normal” grief: 1) is felt to require an objectively recognized loss; 2) is felt to be dedicated to that lost object; 3) seems to most people to be something that she ought to feel; and 4) probably ought not to be medicalized, nor consequently medicated. This view of grief affords an understanding and appreciation of this rather special and important emotion without reducing its mystery.