Reflection on video: Strange Days on Earth: The One Degree Factor

          Domino Effect is a chain reaction that occurs when a small change causes similar change nearby, which then causes another similar change and so on. The final outcome may seem that nothing related to that small cause.

         

          Climate change is one of those examples. In the video, it gives us some examples that show what is actually happened when the weather increase 1 degree Fahrenheit. In Alaska, the population of caribou decreases about sixty thousand within several years.  The video shows the chain reaction that causes this: increasing the temperature lead to increase the number of mosquito which is threading caribous’ live. That force caribous to go up to the higher attitude, but at the same time, which is less food. Increasing temperature also leads to increase rain snow. During winter, caribous had to work a lot harder to get food because they had to dig deeper in the snow. Rain on the ground sometimes freeze, and turned into ice. Ice was so hard that it is impossible for the caribous to break and get what the grass they need underneath it.

          Climate change not just creates a chain reaction locally, but globally. At the second part of the video, it shows that a lake drawn in Africa can cause increasing number children asthma in Caribbean and dying of sea fan around the coast of North America, which is thousands of miles away from Africa.

           One degree Fahrenheit may seem to be not a big deal. However, the effect caused by that one degree is enormous, which we may never think of.

Reflection on Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed

            Societies rise and collapse in history.  The author, Jared diamond compared many past and present societies that differed with respect to environmental fragility; relations with neighbors, political institutions… His goal was to find out the influence of possible input variables on collapses. He found out deforestation might be one of the main reasons. His examples included 81 Pacific islands, medieval Vikings from Norway etc. History may repeat as modern Rwandans and Chinese are doing the same thing.

            At the first few paragraph, he gave a scary example: the tale of two farms. One farm is a typical American farm and the other one was Gardar barn in Greenland was abandoned over 500 years ago. The society collapsed completely: thousands of inhabitants starved to death, were killed in civil unrest or war against an enemy, or emigrated, until nobody remained alive. No one back than ever thought about the society would collapse. They were expending their farmlands, just like the modern American farmers do.

            By learning from the past, we can predict the future. However, the path would not be easy. Nowadays, there are new problems we face today: human caused climate change, build up of toxic chemical, energy shortage... According to the Jared, we would not able to apply the solution from the past directly to solve the problem we are facing today.

            P.S. It was unexpected that according to Jared, the big businesses found it in their interests to adopt environmental safeguards more draconian and effective than national parks.

Love It or Lose It: The Coming Biophilia Revolution by David W.Orr

             Biophobia is increasingly common among people raised with television, video games and shopping malls, freeways…. People who averse nature would be considered as biophobia. First of all, before I read this article, I did not know biophobia exist. As human are products of revolution. Biophilia should be the way we born. As E.O. Wilson said, ‘Biophiha is inscribed in the brain itself, expressing tens of thousands of years of evolutionary experience.’

            But what is the meaning of biophilia? David stated that there are three kinds of love in Greeks: eros, meaning love of beauty or romantic; agape, sacrificial love which asked nothing to return. philia, means love between friends. He has eight reasons why should we increase our love from eros to agapes because eros is just calculations of self-interest. It is too bloodless, too cool, and too self-satisfied. I do not think I would sacrifice for the nature. On the other hand, there are some points that I think would be considered as eros, such as kindness to wild creatures, caution in the use of technology…

            There is one thing that I absolutely agree. David said the nature has a complexity way beyond then we think of. I understand that by studying biology and organic chemistry. High-technology artificial things are usually good. For example, genetically modified seeds increase the quality and quantity of food. It is more environmentally friendly than traditional farming because less pesticide and chemical fertilizer is needed. As far as I know, nothing bad happened yet. On the other hand, there are still lots of things that human are not able to do or they do not understand the theories behind.

The Land Ethic

             The main idea of this article is to state that there is yet no ethic dealing with man’s relation to land and to the animals and plants which grow upon it. People tend to think land is merely a property. The land-relation is economic, entailing privileges but not obligation. Aldo Leopold, the author of this article, suggested treating land as an energy circuit conveys three basic ideas: 1. Land is not merely soil. 2. The native plants and animals kept the energy circuit open; others may or may not. 3. That man-made changes are of a different order than evolutionary changes, and have effects more comprehensive than is intended or foreseen.

            Aldo said landscape can be developed with expired. One of his example was the Pueblo Indians did not to be equipped with range livestock. I believe if they know how to do it, they would do it. Or it might just simply that it was not worth it to keep the livestock. Instead of working eight hours a day to take care of the livestock, it would be more efficient just to spend few hours to hunt them.

            I believe ancient people did not have land ethic. One theory said the cause of mammoth population died out due to overhunting by ancient humans. I agree we should protect the environment, but the reason behind that is economic, not ethic. Mankind is merely one among thousands other kind of species, and every species always try to do their best to stay alive.

Reflection on Nature-Deficit Disorder and the Restorative Environment

 The article states that ADHD, which we considered as a disorder, could be very useful in an agricultural society --- boys and girls usually prized for their strength, speed, and agility. In a highly urbanized culture, these advantage become disadvantage. Children have ADHD always be considered as trouble makers, hyperactivity or impulsivity.  But this article also states lots of facts and researches that nature is very important for children’s development, especially for those who have ADHD. Children who play outside every day, regardless of weather, had better motor coordination and more ability to concentrate. That also works for troubled teenage suspects too. Ybarra, a defense attorney, took them to Ketchikan, Alaska and spent two weeks there. Those teenagers were changed after spent two weeks in nature. Many of them had never been in a nature environment like that before.

 I think his theories that children tend to have less ability to concentrate in an urban environment are true. As the article said, most of mankind’s history is exploration and settlement, hunting and gathering. The environment today changed to a highly urbanized culture, but our brain still stays in its old way. It makes sense that attention capacities or ability to concentrate would increase by staying in a green environment.

However, I do not think the author’s suggestions would work. In this competitive world nowadays, the purpose of education is not to build a rounded individual, but to select the suitable children for higher education due to limited resources. Take the FCAT as an example. Many teachers in Florida teach FCAT materials only. The teachers are under great pressure. They have to do this because they are being evaluated by the score of their students. It would be better for the children to review the FCAT materials instead of playing in outside in a green area. For many schools and parents, a well-rounded happy child does not mean much without a good testing score.