The roots of environmental aesthetics are embedded in the ideas of nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century thinkers who found in nature the opportunity for an open, active, and creative form of aesthetic appreciation. Having blossomed into a significant subfield of aesthetics, environmental aesthetics today encourages appreciation of not just natural environments but of human-made and human-modified landscapes as well.
Allen Carlson's comprehensive survey of the subject is an important introduction to this rapidly growing area of aesthetic understanding and appreciation. Carlson begins by outlining the field's historical background and surveying contemporary positions, such as scientific cognitivism, which argues that certain kinds of scientific knowledge are necessary in order to fully appreciate nature. Carlson then turns to the aesthetics of environments that have been created or changed by humans and the dilemmas that arise when appreciating such landscapes. He investigates how to aesthetically appreciate various kinds of urban and rural landscapes and concludes with a discussion of whether there is, in general, a correct way to aesthetically experience the environment.