Journal Entry #6

After reading these articles it has become more evident that Congress is well aware of the effects of climate-change but not one representative has the courage to go through with a bill that will help us start to reverse the dangerous effects of global warming. The proposed spending of 1% of our GDP to help our planet from warming to 2 degree Celsius, in my opinion is a great idea. The first thing we need to look at is our budget. The United States has a $15 trillion economy and in my opinion the United States is spending tremendous amounts of money on areas that don’t need that much money. For example, health care; health care is still an extremely important subject but If we do not act now to help reverse the effects of global warming there will be no planet for us to even live on, let alone have any hospitals for our health care programs. In other countries they spend much less on their health care programs than we do and they have successful results. I believe that if we cut money in our health care budget we can use that money towards climate change.

From the article We Can’t Wish Away Climate Change they quoted Winston Churchill; “Sometimes doing 

your best is not good enough. Sometimes, you must do what is required.” I think that this quote is something that the US can use when pressuring other countries to curb their emissions. In the end, we are all a part of one world and everything that we do affects others on our planet. No matter where you live, everyone around the world is experiencing the effects of global warming, with increases in drought, floods, and more snowstorms. The one way that I believe that we can gain other countries support is to educate their people and their representatives on the long term effects of global warming.

In the next five years we most definitely need to curb our level of emissions so our planet does not reach a tipping point and we reach a point of no return. After reading the article As the world Burns it extremely aggravated me that K.G.L (Kerry, Graham, Lieberman) were working so hard to pass a climate-change bill and none of their colleagues were supporting them. It also frustrated me that all of these nonsense games are going on in Congress and no one is really sticking to the point and passing a bill that will hopefully start to reverse this ever growing problem. I learned from the video that Obama’s two platforms, when running for president was health care and climate control. He has achieved his health care platform but has not yet achieved a bill that will help reduce our emissions. In the video he encouraged legislation to come to him with ideas. It is very difficult for congresses who are not all for a reductions in emissions to come up with an effective bill. I believe that Obama has taken a back seat to climate control and I just hope that our next president will realize the importance of reduction and will act fast to help prevent global warming. Lieberman was interested in a pollution-control method called cap-and-trade which the “government would set an over-all limit on emissions and auction off permission slips that individual polluters could then buy and sell.” I feel like if we were able to get our top pollution companies to agree to this plan then we could significantly reduce our emissions.

In my personal opinion, the best way to start reducing emissions at home is to educate. Before this class I had no idea how bad our environment really is and after our first class I began to change my habits to start helping our environment.

Journal Entry #5

I don’t think I’ve ever realized how much our world is connected and how one minor change in one area of the world can affect another area thousands of miles away. Our world has increased in temperature by 1⁰C which has been caused by an increase in burning of carbon fuel in our atmosphere. With this rising temperature are animals finding it easier to survive?

In Alaska the Porcupine River herds of caribou have been the basis of the Gwich’in tribes’ survival. This tribe relies on the crossing of the caribou for food, warmth and nourishment. Since 1989 over 600,000 caribou have disappeared due to the rising temperature of the area. Elders of the village are worried that the animals won’t adapt to the climate change fast enough. One of the biggest problems caribou face are mosquitoes, which can suck up to a tablespoon of blood out of the caribou daily. Caribou are forced to graze on top of mountains to avoid the mosquitoes causing them to exert more energy climbing the rough terrain. The rising temperature has caused more snow, causing caribou to have to dig for their food and put them a vulnerable state to predators like wolves. If the weather in the region doesn’t change the herd won’t recover which will result in the impoverishment of the Gwich’in tribe.

 

Zoaplankton and many other marine lives are also affected by the rising temperature in the oceans. Crabs in tide pools are almost at their threshold with the warmer waters, creating a scare that if they are to rapidly crash in population, it will have an extreme affect on the food chain in the tide pools.

The most interesting part of the video was the part on Lake Chad and how it has dried up over the past decades. It astonished me to see the boat that was once giving hope to a family, sitting on top of a dried up lake. This drought in Nigeria has led an increase in asthma in Trinidad; the Indian Ocean is beginning to warm causing the North Atlantic Ostalation to carry the Saharan Dust across the America’s. The correlation of these events shows that we are one world and everything that happens has a consequence either in the area where it is happening or in another part of the world.

Journal Entry #4

Diamond begins his article by comparing two dairy farms, the Huls Farm and The Gardar Farm. Both share similar advantages and similar disadvantages with their farms. One of the biggest differences between both farms is their current status; Huls Farm is prospering in the mountains of Montana, while Gardar Farm has been abandoned for over 500 years now. 

Gardar Farm was located in Greenland Norse, a society that collapsed completely, leaving civilians to either migrate out of the area, fight for their food, or die of starvation. The strange thing about the collapse of Greenland Norse is that it was never anticipated. Greenland Norse is among many regions that have unexpectedly collapsed due to ecological problems and other contributing factors such as the five factors that Diamond has come up with: environmental damage, climate change, hostile neighbors and friendly trade partners, and society’s response to its environmental problems. Though these collapses leave behind ruins and a “romantic” mystery of what was, they also leave behind lessons for future societies. 

Today we are not naive to environmental damage; we have created technology, globalization, and modern medicine to work in our advantage. “Environmental problems that are hard to manage today were surely even harder to manage in the past.” (pg. 25) This statement shows that we are constantly trying to fix our environmental problems and even though we are fortunate to have all this technology, it still isn’t enough to fix the problems completely. 

What I enjoyed about this article is that Diamond was very factual about himself and what he sees when he visits environmental sites. He doesn’t fabricate anything that he sees and writes everything down at face value whether it be a good image for the company or a bad image.  

Journal Entry #3

These articles have been my favorite articles to read thus far. So much of what we are learning about never really has happy endings, and who doesn’t enjoy a happy ending? Some of my favorite stories in these articles were about the strength and determination humans have to help restore devastated areas. Not only did these stories talk about the restoration of wastelands and endangered species, but they also spotlighted the hard work of botanists and horticulturalists. Without their hard work to help save endangered plants and trees, animals would be deprived of their essential nutrients and in turn humans would be affected. 

The story of Gombe interested me the most; with its uplifting story of a village that was almost losing their chimpanzees with extreme deforestation, to a village that is now offering scholarships to women to help with their education. This story shows us that helping restore an environment causes a chain reaction to other problems that may be occurring within a village. After the implication of the TACARE program the inhabitants of the village became educated about health, clean access to water, growing of food and also education. When women started to become educated a decrease in family size started to occur, which was a main problem that the village faced. Now that there are smaller family sizes, forests now have the opportunity to grow without being cut down for fuel. I believe the passion people have to protect the environment can be contagious. 

 

After reading these articles, it has given me some hope that we will be able to restore the damaged areas on our planet.

Journal Entry #2

“The lesson from biodiversity is co-operation, not competition. It is the big depends on the small, and cannot survive by exterminating the small” (pg. 44). Biodiversity is the sole reason why our earth works the way it does and why we are so lucky to be able to produce the things we need to survive. I never realized until this class how much our daily existence is linked to nature. Biodiversity is becoming “endangered” as we are using up all of our natural resources, cutting down essential forests, and polluting our environment with toxic chemicals. 

“Humankind is one among millions of other species. It does not have a right to push other species to extinction, or to manipulate them for greed, profit and power without concern for their wellbeing.” (pg. 40) This line proves that even though we are the dominant specie in the world we need to also be aware of all the other species that help to make our world what it is today. Plants and animals are disappearing at a significant rate due to globalization, depriving local farmers of the essentials they need to provide for their families. Biodiversity will be the one thing that will save us from any risks that can be associated with contaminated food. 

As seen in the past biodiversity has saved populations from famine and other food-borne diseases. The poor are suffering the most from the diminishing of biodiversity. “The poor depend on the wealth of biological resources and on their knowledge and skills related to biodiversity.” (pg. 50) Ecological systems that are destroying biodiversity don’t understand how important it is to the survival of existence on Earth.

Journal Entry #1

As I embark upon this new class, my “sense of place” in the environment is probably much different than my other classmates. I, unfortunately, am minimally educated on environmental sustainability.  This, however, is not a true disadvantage.  I am walking into this class with an open mind and a willingness to learn as much as I can about the environment I live in and ways that I can help.

Growing up my family never recycled, therefore sustainability was never a factor in my decision making. The only way that I am somewhat environmentally cautious is with my electricity bill. Since moving out of the dorm and living in an apartment, my roommate and I have became very aware of how long we leave our lights on and not to keep our air conditioning on a low temperature.  Obviously, we began this practice to keep our expenses down but it is also a means of energy conservation.   

 In my freshman year, I took a Global Studies class which taught us about people around the world and their interaction with the environment. In that class we took a field trip to ECHO farms, educating us about world hunger and the various agriculture resources people can use to feed themselves. At the farm I was assigned the extremely dirty job of making mulch from compost that had decomposed. We had to sift through the dirt to make sure that no rocks were present and then shovel huge piles of dirt into bags. Working at ECHO began to open my eyes to environmental sustainability and I am anticipating that after taking this course I will create many new habits that will benefit our planet and help in my own little way.