Final:

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3/23: Particular Problems and Solutions (cont.): Aquatic Biodiversity, Extinction, Soil, Agriculture, and Food

READINGS:

Word Count: 1117

Many counterarguments to environmentalist efforts go a little something like “that would cost too much to implement”, “increased regulations would hurt small business”, or “the world economy would crash”. On a case by case basis these arguments may be correct; however, in many cases the better phrase would be “this isn’t profitable in the short-term”. This nearsighted view is particularly tangible when examining food production and more specifically aquaculture. Industrialized agriculture is environmentally and economically unstable due to topsoil erosion, desertification, soil salinization, climate change, and a reduction in biodiversity which are all products of quarter over quarter human profitability goals. Ocean’s are suffering a similar fate with 50% of coral reefs having been destroyed from coastal development, overfishing, pollution, rising ocean temperatures, and ocean acidification; in other words, human activities that did not factor in potential future repercussions. While there are many arguments to be made about the more subjective ethics of environmentalism, there are concrete capitalistic reasons for altering our land and ocean-based food production that can be seen within our lifetimes.  Therefore, ignoring ethos and morality, there is an overarching, long-term financial argument for environmental initiatives when pertaining to aquatic biodiversity and food production.

      71% of the earth’s surface is covered in saltwater, yet we have explored less than 5% of it and some go as far to say that we know more about space then our own oceans. Similar to its drier counterpart, aquatic life is an interconnected web of species interactions in delicate balance with one another. These webs require a level of homeostasis and routine that humans’ have directly impacted and in many cases have destroyed. Following the acronym HIPPCO, oceans, rivers, and wetlands are suffering from widespread habitat destruction, invasive species, population growth, pollution, climate change, and overfishing due to human activity. This involvement is in direct contention with human needs as ocean biodiversity and wellbeing is paramount for several reasons including: 850 million jobs in fishing and tourism rely on oceans; 40% of people get 15-20% of animal protein/nutrients from seafood; oceans generate more than half the oxygen we breathe; oceans help slow atmospheric warming and climate change (absorb 25% CO2 from human activities); oceans absorb 90% of excess heat we add to the atmosphere; and finally oceans also provide natural barriers such as coral reefs, mangrove forests, and sea grass beds reduce the impacts from tsunamis and major storms. These six reasons provide a plethora of economic motives to enact aquatic protections as ocean and human interests are aligned.

A fishprint is the area of ocean needed to sustain the fish consumption of an average person, a nation, or the world based on the weight of fish they consume annually. Currently, the worldwide fishprint is at unsustainable levels with 87% of the world’s commercial fisheries having been fully exploited or overfished. While some fishing regulation has been introduced including an act passed in 1990 that has reduced accidental sea turtle death by commercial vessels by 90%, there is far more legislation needed to be passed and funded in order to ensure aquatic life remains at sustainable levels for years to come. If we continue to harvest our oceans in this manner under the pretense of short-term profits, then the majority of staple wild-caught seafood populations will crash putting fisherman out of business and causing aquatic tourism to plummet. By not enforcing legislation to protect wetlands and coral reefs, property damages and insurance costs due to heightened storms will far outweigh the slight economic implications of the former. If we want to protect jobs, ensure adequate food supplies for our population, and maintain economic stability, solutions must be enacted to prevent and restore damages to our aquatic systems through initiatives like marine reserves. The current fishing subsidies to prop up and encourage exploitation by commercial fishing is costing the United States government 50 billion dollars a year not to mention their efforts to fix the effects of invasive species due to a lack of regulation. When taking into account the time value of money, putting environmental protections in place now will save on costs and actually help the future economy, therefore making our current reasons for avoiding legislation baseless.

      Technological advances including irrigation, synthetic fertilizers, and synthetic pesticides have increased the amount and efficiency of our food supply, but economically speaking are only beneficial for short-term gains and are not systematically advantageous. In the past, most farmers employed traditional subsistence agriculture which produces enough crops for a farm family’s survival with little left over to sell or store as a reserve for hard times. However, beginning with the green revolution in 1950 large corporations began with developing and planting monocultures of selectively bred or genetically engineered high-yield varieties of a crop (usually rice, wheat, corn). This in turn produced high yields using large inputs of water, synthetic inorganic fertilizers, and pesticides which also increased the number of crops grown per year on a plot of land. While this made it possible to feed a growing population it created unsustainable farming practices that degrade soil quality due to excessive irrigation and stripping of nutrients. While these practices in combination with government encouragement and subsidies have allowed Americans to spend the lowest percentage of disposable income on food out of any other country, our food prices do not reflect the actual environmental cost of their production. Current industrial farming practices have created a vicious cycle of becoming increasingly reliant on pesticides, fertilizers, and antibiotics that deliver diminishing returns year after year making the future of food production highly volatile and unsustainable. This coupled with the fact that food production is expected to drop 10% for every 1 degree due to climate change puts our current system on a precipitous slope. Economic and logical reasoning indicates that production cannot increase infinitely even with the creation of new technology as we exhaust our current natural resources. While in the short-term company’s are making hefty profits, market outlook depends on stability and confidence which is something that we are lacking when facing widespread environmental degradation.

      The Great Pacific Plastic Garbage patch segment about the film Albatross, is a heart-wrenching and poignant message about the impact of single use plastics in our environment and on individual lives. It puts into perspective the consequences of a single bottle cap and how such a small human action can result in death and destruction. While this should be enough to convince people to change our views and actions toward nature, many in the business world still look to the bottom line instead so here it is: continuing to degrade and decimate our land and aquatic life for industry will result in economic collapse if things do not change.

3/30: Particular Problems and Solutions (cont.): Food & Soil

  • In-class film: “Symphony of Soil,” 64 mins. (1 wk rental on Vimeo & Amazon, instant viewing available on Netflix; youtube, subtitles)
  • In-class film: “Food Inc.,” 94 mins. (Amazon Instant Viewing) or if too many students have seen it, one of the films below

Word Count: 1090

In our current society there is a rapidly widening gulf between assumed and actual industrial processes that purposefully leaves many consumers benighted to human and environmental rights violations. While we tout ourselves as being a part of a science driven and enlightened age of widespread data sharing, there remains huge discrepancies in our knowledge of how everyday life is possible. As seen in the two documentaries and/or think pieces Symphony of Soil and Food Inc., corporations and governments are taking advantage of this oversight by degrading our soil and creating an unsustainable food industry while using subsidies and monopolies to reinforce these behaviors. Although technological advancement has been key to supporting our exponentially growing population, the previously untested long-term effects of these systems are now putting a strain on future possibilities. To improve our food production, there must be a reversal in mindset from reliance on innovative modern solutions to practices already demonstrated in nature having been refined over decades of evolution for efficiency and longevity.

Even though it is an ever-present construct, our knowledge of soil as a living ecosystem is both misunderstood and quickly being destroyed. Soil is made of three main components, rock, dead plants (organic material) and sand which together are responsible for the vast varieties of soil that enclose our globe. Soil is made from glacial sediment, river overflow, blown in by wind, and exposed rock with prairie grass, otherwise known as mollisol, being widely accepted as the most productive of all. However, despite being aware of all the different types, 70 to 80% of organisms living within the soil have yet to be identified with many not fully realizing that soil is a living ecosystem, not just the base of one. Soil has given life to human empires with civilization beginning on fertile riverbanks and it has also been our demise when plowing degraded soil quality to cause civilization collapse from lack of food.

The latter is unfortunately all too real as the green revolution developed and planted monocultures of selectively bred or genetically engineered high-yield varieties of a crop (usually rice, wheat, corn), produced high yields using large inputs of water, synthetic inorganic fertilizers, and pesticides, and increased the number of crops grown per year on a plot of land. This was all possible due to nitrogen fertilizer which was developed during World War II and allowed plant life to overcome their previous “shortcomings”. Unfortunately it also came with other consequences including a change in soil composition and an increased dependence on pesticides and fossil fuels to handle the increased harvests. This overfertilization and increased use of nitrogen creates exponentially smaller returns as the fertilizer use grows causing more environmental issues such as dead zones. 60% of ecological systems on earth are about to collapse making the widespread recognition of the damaging effects and lackluster returns of modern farming more important than ever.

This idea is made even more poignant in that large quantities of fertilizer and pesticides are actually not necessary to grow food at current levels. The law of return states that the best way to retain and enhance the capacity of life within soil is to return the same nutrients that were taken back into the soil. Through a variety of biomimicry techniques such as polycultures, cover crops, composting, and drip irrigation organic farmers are able to produce at the same quantities or even higher in times of drought than industry farmers. They also reduce nitrogen leaching by 70% and produce more nutritious produce making the switch seem like an obvious solution especially with rising temperatures creating more droughts all over the world.

Looking beyond soil into the history of American industrialized farming tells a sobering story of over-consumptive capitalistic tendencies with government agencies turning a blind eye. The individual, or rather group of individual, that acted as a catalyst for the entire industry is McDonald’s whose small menu of staple items changed America’s diet into the beef and corn reliant monstrosity that it is today. Now, instead of a wholesome subsistence farmer, three to four company’s including Tyson have a pseudo monopoly keeping farmers in debt and “slaves to the system” (Food Inc.). While food in America seems cheap and readily available, the prices do not reflect the actual costs of production. Not only do government subsidies encourage farmers to overproduce, they also put other countries’ farmers out of business with deceptively low prices, thus ensuring a stream of illegal immigrants to use as an inexpensive and oftentimes expendable workforce. To top off this nasty conglomeration, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that seeds represent copyrighted materials and are thus legal to patent, causing farmers to become dependent on one seed manufacturer that discourages biodiversity or old school farming techniques.

Despite their proclamations of efficiency and safety, industrial food production has become overly reliant on high tech fixes rather than trying to fix the system itself. This has not only led to the soil degradation as examined above, but also increased rates of disease-ridden and contaminated food. In a ridiculous, yet destructive cause and effect sequence, industrial meat factories feed government subsidized corn to cow which in turn cause e-coli to manifest and spread due to the crowded and unsanitary conditions. Because processing plants are also becoming larger food is not only becoming more contaminated, but more quickly contaminated as the germs are spread across the entire facility. Regulatory industries are getting less powerful due to a lack of funding, giving these contaminants free reign to wreak havoc on the American public without government intervention.

The message found within these two documentaries cause and effect cycles is that modern problems are not solved, but rather made worse with modern solutions. Instead of using our technological advances to make cleaner and more nutritious food with long-term sustainability, industrial food production has created complex interwoven processes that are Stone-Age like in their inability to meet basic needs. Behind the McDonald’s dollar menu is decades of soil degradation, animal abuse, and e-coli ridden food that acts as a sufficient counter-argument for those believing our modern age is without scruples. While I do not propose returning entirely to the sustainable farming practices of our early ancestor within the Fertile Crescent, the food industry needs to take a more careful look at their bottom line and recognize that long-term returns are more profitable than transient short-term gains. Organic and sustainable farming practices may seem to be archaic, but in that age is decades of natural experiments and evolution to determine the best methods of productivity.

4/6: Particular Problems and Solutions (cont.): Hazards, Waste, Human Health

READINGS:

Word Count: 1098

Some things are truly out of human control whether it be disease or natural disaster; our job is to not only try to minimize the detrimental effects of these natural events but look into the long-term consequences of our own actions and how they impact overall human and environmental health. As citizens, we rely on our government to have our collective interests at heart with the paramount of those arguably being safety. However, in the fields of waste management, chemical contamination, and widespread pollution, we as a collective and our body of legislators have fallen short in providing adequate protection, particularly for minority groups. It is imperative that we learn from past mistakes and take a long-term outlook when implementing widespread processes or risk the health and environmental concerns that we face today.

            In 1900, infectious disease was the leading cause of death in the world having killed more people than all our wars combined. Fortunately, this number has dropped significantly since 1950 due to better health care, vaccines, and antibiotics. From vaccines alone the worldwide deaths dropped from 35% to 16% between 1970 and 2015 and the number of children younger than 5 who died from infectious diseases dropped from 12 to 4.9 million. While this is a momentous development modern medicine is being faced with a new challenge: antibiotic resistance. Every major disease-causing bacterium has now developed strains that resist at least one of the roughly 200 antibiotics in use and that number is growing. Two million U.S. citizens that get infections every year that cannot be treated with any known antibiotics and the number is steadily increasing. This is particularly relevant because of the impact climate change will have on major infectious disease statistics. With a warming climate, some diseases, particularly those spread by mosquitos and other insects, will be able to spread more easily from tropical to temperate areas (southern to northern hemisphere). About 44% of the world’s population currently live in areas where malaria is prevalent, but as the climate warms this disease will spread north increasing that percentage and hence malaria’s potential victim pool. While malaria and other infectious diseases are beyond our control until modern medicine can cure it, it is our duty as citizens to mitigate the effects of climate change to avoid this fate.

            This topic is thrown into sharp relief by the coronavirus pandemic that was able to spread so easily because of our increased inter-continent interaction. The book also noted that Scientists estimate that throughout history, more than half of all infectious diseases were originally transmitted to humans from wild or domesticated animals which is studied in a practice called ecological medicine. With quarantine still in effect, coronavirus has shown the devastating impact widespread disease can have on our daily lives and routines.

            Although diseases were not originally created by humans, the toxic chemicals that have become omnipresent as everyday use are. Toxic chemicals are split into three groups: carcinogens, mutagens, and teratogens. All three of subgroups are commonplace within households and industry with only 2% of chemicals in commercial use having been adequately tested.         Toxicologists also struggle with determining how chemicals may interact and potentially heighten one another when performing tests all of which lead to incomplete experimental results. Instead of using the precautionary principle and put the burden on companies to show chemicals are safe, government agencies must prove they are specifically dangerous at great expense and limited success. Because of this, according to the EPA 1 in 12 women of childbearing age in the United States has enough mercury in their blood to harm a developing fetus. Furthermore 70% of all the PCB’s ever made are still in the environment due to a lack of long-term testing and regulation of chemicals before they enter mass manufacturing. Even more concerning is that infants and young children are more susceptible to the effects of toxic substances than adults are because they consume more air/food/water per unit of body weight, are exposed to more dust/soil, and have less well-developed immune systems. Besides the impact on humans, these chemicals are also at risk due to biological magnification, the concept that animals who eat higher on the food chain are more susceptible to the effects of fat-soluble toxic chemicals because they slowly build up in their systems overtime. This is seen in particular in carnivorous fish with long lifespans like tuna, who in many cases contain a toxic level of mercury buildup. Although companies’ use elaborate marketing routines to try and convince us otherwise, both citizens and our governments advocate for more rigorous testing of commonplace chemicals to better protect ourselves, our children, and our environment.

            Waste represents another issue that modern lifestyles have made into an environmental and health concern. In nature, wherever humans are not dominant there is essentially no waste because of natural processing systems. On the other hand, the U.S. (surprise, surprise) leads the world in total production of industrial and municipal solid waste as well as solid waste per person. Some of this waste, particularly e-waste is shipped to China, India, and other Asian/African countries for processing because labor is cheap and environmental regulations are limited which presents an elitist and morally questionable situation. However, understanding the difference between waste management and waste production is key to reducing the hazardous waste both within our country and others. By following the process, reduce, reuse, recycle/compost, incinerate, and bury in that order we could eliminate 80% of solid waste produced. Six other strategies for reducing resource use, waste, and pollution are:      1. change industrial processes to eliminate or reduce harmful chemicals 2. redesign manufacturing processes and products to use less materials and energy 3. develop products that are easy to repair, reuse, re-manufacture, compost or recycle 4. establish cradle to cradle responsibility laws 5. eliminate or reduce unnecessary packaging 6. fee-per-bag solid waste collection systems. As Albert Einstein said, “A clever person solves a problem, a wise person avoids it” and this idea holds true for waste reduction. Despite having quite a few necessary laws in place the lack of funding due to government lobbying and corrupt interests has impaired the U.S.’s ability to safely ensure the public against hazardous waste and chemicals. While there are various pros and cons to both recycling, incineration, and other waste disposal methods, our current waste system is literally spilling over our borders. Without instituting and funding regulation, we are wasting finite resources and putting our health and the environment at risk which should be incentive enough to enact change in our communities and at a federal level.

4/20: Particular Problems and Solutions (cont.): Water

READINGS:

Access to fresh water is meant to be an inalienable right, but our mismanagement of this precious resource has created a global health, economic, national & global security, and environmental issue. Only .024% of the world’s water is available freshwater and while the hydrologic cycle makes it a semi-renewable resource, we are using it up at unsustainable levels. During the last century, the human population tripled, global water withdrawals increased sevenfold, and per capita withdrawals quadrupled. The major uses of water in the United States right now are cooling of electric power plants, irrigation, public water supplies, industry, and livestock production. Many of these uses are known as virtual water, or water that is not directly consumed but is used to produce food and other products. Much of this water comes from aquifers like the Ogallala Aquifer. Unfortunately, these ground water source are being pumped out, mostly to irrigate crops, at a rate greater than the rate of natural recharge from rainfall and snowmelt. In the case of the Ogallala Aquifer, the ground water is being pumped out 10 to 40 times faster than the slow natural recharge rate. This is not necessarily due to human need, but as a byproduct of government subsidies which have led to inefficient use and inaccurate pricing of water-intensive crops such as rice, cotton, almonds, alfalfa, and corn. For example, one hamburger actually represents 630 gallons of water which is not accurately reflected in the dollar menu pricing. Unknowingly the average American consumes 300 gallons of California water every week by eating foods produced in that state because of the discrepancies in actual vs. subsidized pricing. With available fresh water supplies in high demand and more than 30 countries now facing stress from freshwater scarcity, Desalinization is becoming increasingly popular. This is the process of removing dissolved salts from ocean or brackish water to increase the supply of freshwater, but it is expensive and create a non-usable byproduct that must be disposed of safely or risk harming surrounding ecosystems.

            Not only is our freshwater supply running dry from overuse, this valuable natural capital is being heavily polluted. Water pollution is any change in water quality that can harm living organisms or make the water unfit for human uses and can be from point (single source) or non-point (larger and more dispersed sources). Agricultural activities are the leading cause of water pollution with the most common pollutant being sediment. The largest source of oil pollution doesn’t come from spills, but urban and industrial land runoff which receive far less media attention. The three other major sources are pesticides, bacteria from livestock/food processing facilities, and mining which all disrupt the natural hydrologic cycle and affect ground water supplies. Groundwater is a major supplier of water for human use, yet it is very susceptible to pollution. For example, groundwater provides 70% of Chinese drinking water; however, 90% of it is polluted with chemicals such as toxic heavy metals, organic solvents, nitrates, etc. Eutrophication is another major pollution issue in which the natural nutrients within a body of water are enriched. This causes so called “dead zones” in which algae grow in excessive quantities due to extra nitrates then use up all the oxygen in the surrounding water while decomposing. This causes fish to abandon the area due to lack of oxygen while crustaceans and other sea life drown. This can be prevented by banning/limiting phosphates in household cleaning agents as well as employing soil conservation and land use-control to prevent nutrient runoff. However, eutrophication and water pollution in general are becoming increasingly prevalent even though there are several important reasons that oceans represent a vital part of our environment including: recycle planet’s freshwater through the water cycle, affect weather/climate, help regulate earth’s temperature and absorb emitted CO2. Despite this reasoning, the garbage patches within the ocean now cover a total area larger than all of earth’s land area.

4/20: Particular Problems and Solutions (cont.): Water

READINGS:

Word Count: 1105

We take many facets of our society for granted in a way that has run contrary to sustainability principles. From where our trash actually ends up to where our food comes from to the dwindling availability of fresh water, there are so many parts of our daily lives that are both vital and misunderstood. Understanding not only our individual effects on the world but also that our industries is the first step in taking long-term and widespread actions to improve our environment.

Access to fresh water is meant to be an inalienable right, but our mismanagement of this precious resource has created a global health, economic, national & global security, and environmental issue. Only .024% of the world’s water is available freshwater and while the hydrologic cycle makes it a semi-renewable resource, we are using it up at unsustainable levels. During the last century, the human population tripled, global water withdrawals increased sevenfold, and per capita withdrawals quadrupled. The major uses of water in the United States right now are cooling of electric power plants, irrigation, public water supplies, industry, and livestock production. Many of these uses are known as virtual water, or water that is not directly consumed but is used to produce food and other products. Much of this water comes from aquifers like the Ogallala Aquifer. Unfortunately, these ground water source are being pumped out, mostly to irrigate crops, at a rate greater than the rate of natural recharge from rainfall and snowmelt. In the case of the Ogallala Aquifer, the ground water is being pumped out 10 to 40 times faster than the slow natural recharge rate. This is not necessarily due to human need, but as a byproduct of government subsidies which have led to inefficient use and inaccurate pricing of water-intensive crops such as rice, cotton, almonds, alfalfa, and corn. For example, one hamburger actually represents 630 gallons of water which is not accurately reflected in the dollar menu pricing. Unknowingly the average American consumes 300 gallons of California water every week by eating foods produced in that state because of the discrepancies in actual vs. subsidized pricing. With available fresh water supplies in high demand and more than 30 countries now facing stress from freshwater scarcity, Desalinization is becoming increasingly popular. This is the process of removing dissolved salts from ocean or brackish water to increase the supply of freshwater, but it is expensive and create a non-usable byproduct that must be disposed of safely or risk harming surrounding ecosystems.

            Not only is our freshwater supply running dry from overuse, this valuable natural capital is being heavily polluted. Water pollution is any change in water quality that can harm living organisms or make the water unfit for human uses and can be from point (single source) or non-point (larger and more dispersed sources). Agricultural activities are the leading cause of water pollution with the most common pollutant being sediment. The largest source of oil pollution doesn’t come from spills, but urban and industrial land runoff which receive far less media attention. The three other major sources are pesticides, bacteria from livestock/food processing facilities, and mining which all disrupt the natural hydrologic cycle and affect ground water supplies. Groundwater is a major supplier of water for human use, yet it is very susceptible to pollution. For example, groundwater provides 70% of Chinese drinking water; however, 90% of it is polluted with chemicals such as toxic heavy metals, organic solvents, nitrates, etc. Eutrophication is another major pollution issue in which the natural nutrients within a body of water are enriched. This causes so called “dead zones” in which algae grow in excessive quantities due to extra nitrates then use up all the oxygen in the surrounding water while decomposing. This causes fish to abandon the area due to lack of oxygen while crustaceans and other sea life drown. This can be prevented by banning/limiting phosphates in household cleaning agents as well as employing soil conservation and land use-control to prevent nutrient runoff. However, eutrophication and water pollution in general are becoming increasingly prevalent even though there are several important reasons that oceans represent a vital part of our environment including: recycle planet’s freshwater through the water cycle, affect weather/climate, help regulate earth’s temperature and absorb emitted CO2. Despite this reasoning, the garbage patches within the ocean now cover a total area larger than all of earth’s land area. It has become more and more important for individuals to recognize our dependence our earth’s ecosystems, especially the ocean and how even choosing between a plastic or reusable bag can enact change.

            This message is most poignantly described through the photographic art by Albatross, which shows dead Albatross birds with the large piles of ingested plastic that killed them. In these birds are everyday items from bottle caps, to straws, to bits of plastic bags, and zip ties – all of which contributed to putting this species on the brink of extinction. As hard as it is, it is integral to look at the artwork and understand how each bit of plastic represents an individual action the led to destroy a living thing. We are not alone on this planet and can no longer turn a blind eye to the devastating impacts our daily routines cause. This kind of education is demonstrated through the Personal Water Footprint Calculator which takes into effect a variety of lifestyle factors and informs you about your personal water use. Mine was 595 m³ based on my country of origin, gender, diet, and gross yearly income. While I am currently vegetarian, I tested how much my score would increase by if I ate more meat and got 794.6 m³ – practically 200 m³ more. While many are not in the financial position to change their diet for the better of the environment, this change speaks volumes to how much an individual can either improve or deteriorate the environment with one lifestyle change.

Both fresh and salt-water pollution and overuse are fast becoming major issues in the near future for humanity, especially because in many cases the damages are irreparable. By over tapping ground water, polluting the water we do have with pesticides and harmful chemicals as well as dumping trash in our oceans that kill a variety of marine creatures both industry and individuals are contributing to widespread planet degradation. Dissemination of knowledge is the best course of action to help people make the right lifestyle and business choices when it comes to environmental health. Unknowingly we have brought our planet to the brink of collapse, and only by understanding this can we set it right.

4/27: Futures of Climate Change

READINGS:

  • Lewis and Maslin – Human Planet

Word Count: 1115

Lewis and Maslin’s, Human Planet provided a driving message about the future for environmentalism while citing a variety of readings and sources that we had previously discussed in this course. They begin the discussion by articulating the three potential options for earth: “continued development of the consumer capitalist mode of living towards greater complexity; a collapse, or a new mode of living”. In other words, we can continue to rely on technological advances to stave off human collapse, actually collapse despite these efforts, or institute new routines and legislation that allow us to live in harmony with our environment. Making this choice has become inevitable as everything from technology to population is now increasing at exponential rate and putting exponentially more pressure on our planet. As stated by the Pentagon, climate change is a threat multiplier in that problems we may have already had such as food production issues or natural disasters will become far worse due to its effects. From rising sea levels to ocean acidification to increased spread of disease climate change represents a daunting array of issues that oftentimes seem insurmountable. However, Lewis and Maslin argue that a new mode of living is possible based on how we already handle our current issues in the form of positive feedback loops. While our present positive feedback loops are rooted in the supply and demand nature of capitalism, there is the possibility for them to drive fundamental change as well toward something akin to a degrowth or homeostatic economy. As discussed earlier in the course, the growth tendencies of capitalism run completely opposite to the stable cycles found in nature. Even from an economic perspective it is impossible not to realize that something cannot increase infinitely forever when there is a finite amount of resources to work with. While this seemed impossible when the population was in the hundreds of thousands, 7.6 billion people has tested this concept and created a situation in which we are on the brink of radical change or complete destruction. Therefore, many suggest tackling climate change with a lifestyle change with the idea of steady state economics, or an economy made up of a constant stock of physical wealth (capital) and a constant population size. Lewis and Maslin see this lifestyle as possible through Universal Basic Income (UBI) in which every person would receive a stipend to take care of all their basic needs such as food, shelter, and healthcare. The chapter provided evidence that not only would UBI be successful in improving people’s quality of lives but decreasing our degradation of the planet. They also focused on the idea of freedom in that UBI would grant people the freedom to not be forced to take jobs in corrupt industries in order to care for their families. They used the example of an oil rig worker who is forced to continue working in what they know to be an environmentally damaging profession under the obligation of having to survive and pay for their family. With UBI the oil rig worker would be able to safely quit their job and find another one more in line with their personal morals without fear of economic backlash. While this idea of freedom to work made sense, I found in interesting how freedom is subjectively brought up by both sides of the climate change debate. On the environmentalist side, they want the freedom for their children and grandchildren to grow up on a healthy planet and have access to food and fresh water. Contrary to this, those on the anti-environmentalist side believe that freedom is rooted in their ability to continue to drill for oil without interference from another. Though these examples do not represent the entire spectrum of arguments rooted in the idea of freedom, I found it interesting how both could take the word and use it to mean completely contradictory ideals. Along these same lines, Lewis and Maslin also suggested that keeping the internet as a free space as well would be key in instituting a lifestyle change for the benefit of our planet. This idea seemed somewhat contradictory in the era of fake news where semi-censoring the internet for accurate content might be able to bridge political divides and have more informed policy decisions from citizens. While I don’t pretend to fully understand the intricacies of a free internet debate, I do know that many sites downplay or fully negate the effects of climate change misleading many people, including family members, about this topic.

            A section that was shocking and highly disappointing for me was the lackluster Paris Accord goals. Although this agreement is certainly a step in the right direction for worldwide environmental collaboration, Human Planet articulated their actual shortcomings in a way that I wish we had been able to touch on more within this course. The Paris Accords do not actually mean stopping fossil fuel emissions, but rather intend to meet their goal by taking excess carbon dioxide out of the environment through capture and storage techniques as well as BECCS. While I understand the positive news that surrounded the agreement and subsequent anger that the United States bowed out, I was disappointed that the rest of the world were not trying to more radical goals more akin to the UN sustainable development goals.

            Human Planet also discusses a familiar concept within our course: The Anthropocene or the epoch where the human component of the Earth is large enough to effect how it functions. While it could be seen as an accomplishment in some circles that we have finally entered the geologic time scale going back millennia, it would have been a far better accomplishment had we somehow affected the world for good rather than as a force of destruction. In the advent of the Athropocene, no one can content that humans do not have power; however, it was used in the past it is still possible for humans to use that power for good. For humans to survive there must be a massive restructuring of our lives to better match natural systems. Our planet requires a net of interconnected species relations remaining in delicate balance to achieve harmony. As we come closer to finalizing the Anthropocene as an epoch, it is vital to analyze what caused collapse in the past and how we can best avoid that in our future. Much of human behavior is based on greed and resource hoarding, but their remains in us a deep sense of empathy and solidarity as well. These values must be drawn upon, not just by a few, but by all for our lives to be fully restructured and to allow our planet begin healing.

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