Response to Quiz and Podcast

The bioregion quiz is a very valuable test of a person’s ability to survive should there be some kind of catastrophe.  Finding answers to the questions posed can tell a lot about the environmental dependency humans have lost or have overused. For example the quiz asks when shadows are shortest.  Knowing such information can inform a resident of the best time to plant or what weather to expect.

Bill McKibben posed some other environmental concerns in his podcast.  One of McKibben’s points was that the environmental decline caused by humans was occurring much faster than had been predicted.  Society must respond to these concerns or else there will be even greater consequences in the near future.

  In conclusion, there must be major changes to the way all humans live.  The earth can only handle so much before life can no longer exist. 

Light Pollution in Cities

Light Pollution

            I believe that one of the problems that we face today is light pollution.  You can tell where cities are in the distance by the glow they give off at night.  This is a real problem if you want to look at the stars, as they are blocked by light pollution.  Now this can cause some animals to lose their way when they are trying to navigate at night.  With Island civilization, there would be light pollution in far fewer locations on the earth, which would mostly solve the problem.  Most people don’t even consider light to be something that can pollute, but in fact it can.  With island civilization we can not solve all of our problems but at least we can solve enough to hopefully give nature a chance to thrive once again. 

            Now to solve the light pollution problem within the island civilizations we would need to realize that we are creating far more light than we need.  Not only is it wasteful but it is the main source of light pollution.  If we were to use dimmer lights, we could eliminate this problem even now possibly.  Also, this would save unimaginable amounts of energy that could be used for much more important things.

            In conclusion, light pollution may not kill us but it is a problem, a problem that we can solve even now.  We can gain so much from lowering our light output.  We have the technology, we just aren’t using it.

Island Civilization Reflection

Island Civilization Reflection

            Imagine a world where the Earth has been choked by overpopulation of the human race.  That could one day be a reality based on Nash’s Island Civilization.  The article suggests that the division of civilization and the wilderness is becoming an increasingly severe problem for the planet and everything that lives on it.  Humans are the only life forms on Earth that do permanent harm to their surrounding environment.  The human race is progressing towards total control of the environment.  This planet is a resource, a resource that we can not yet live without.  The most important thing we have here is diverse life, without which we could not survive.  Only through major changes in human society and responsibility can we save our future.  The Island civilization theory states that small pockets of human civilization would live in spaced out “island” cities in order to allow the wilderness to thrive once again.  This would work very well for the wilderness but would also be terrible for human life as we know it today. 

            Based on the idea that the only salvation for the future being an unimaginable decrease in human population, it would seem that the outlook is not good.  Our current society is based on control of the outside environment.  With this pattern of throwing away, nature will not sustain life on this planet.  The best way to move forward on this subject is to move away from nonrenewable resources and move towards more sustainable power sources.  That way we no longer have to destroy the wilderness in search of more resources.  Only by changing our behavior can we stop ourselves from going down the path to extinction that we have paved for so many other species.  Now we are destroying resources such as the rainforests without even using them.

            I believe that some of the predictions in this article could possibly be accurate for our future.  However, none of the options given for solutions are likely to please current or future society.  Unless better solutions can be found, I believe that people will not put their hearts into the change we need to save our future for our children.  If we don’t, we are likely to end up in the trash world situation discussed in the article.  We need to prevent this from happening.  We cannot let human evolution cause worldwide devolution of nature. 

            In conclusion, we can not go on living like parasites.  We have to change or the world will change us, possibly by killing us from lack of resources.  As the most intelligent species on the planet, it is our duty to take care of our surroundings so that they will be usefull to future generations of all life here.  Island civilization may not be the solution we need, but it is proof that there are a few among us who are looking to our future.  As it was said in the article, “now we are the death star, but we are also capable of changing course.”