alyles52

[alyles52]

Blog 13 Water Pollution

This week we discussed water pollution and how it has ran its course on  the environment.  Besides air, we know water obviously to be the most essential resource for humans on the planet.  Not only is it essential for our bodies it is essential for our daily lifestyles.  We cook with water, we shower with water, we wash our clothes with water, and many more activities that involve water. I can’t even imagine what life would be like trying to live  life without water for lets say a week.  I don't even want to know what I would smell like. Thinking like this it just makes me also think about the less fortunate that really don’t have access to water like we do in America.  Water at times is the heal all medicine.  I remember when I was younger if I had stomachache, headache, or anything like that my mother would just tell me, “Go drink some water”.  And most of the time that is all my body needed to adjust itself.  A feeling that all athletes hold dear is that first splash of cold water hitting your lips after a hard practice or workout during a hot summer day. Just me sitting here writing about water I am understanding the emotional connection that we as humans have with water that we don't quiet understand. In the text Miller talks bout how we as human we can go weeks without food but we can only go a few days without water. Out of all the water on the plant only a small percentage of it is actually drinkable. A lot of the earth’s freshwater is not actually available to us because only a small percentage is stored in accessible underground deposits and lakes, rivers, or streams. The rest is in oceans or frozen polar ice caps which are hardly available for human consumption. An advantage however is that the world’s freshwater supply is constantly being recycled, purified, and distributed through the earth’s hydrologic cycle. The problem is that this ecosystem fails because humans pollute the water or withdraw freshwater at faster rates than the natural cycle can replenish it. The textbook mentions 3 types of water pollution, ocean water, ground water, surface water. Miller in Chapter 20 raises this important idea that groundwater is a hidden threat because much of the drinking water people consume is provided by groundwater. For example, in China about 90% of the groundwater is polluted with chemicals such as toxic heavy metals, pesticides, nitrates, etc. As people we rely a lot on these toxic chemicals to help us in other facets of life such as farming, cleaning, etc. I am not sure what solutions we could make as we are not purposely trying to pollute our own water.

Question : What solutions could we take to help prevent draining of chemicals into our ground water?

Miller, G. Tyler, and Scott Spoolman. Living in the Environment. Cengage Learning, 2021.

[alyles52]

Climate Change Practicum

I had a lot of fun working with the Bronx River Alliance this semester. This semester I took a course titled Art and Action in the Bronx River. The class met every Friday from 11:30-2:30 and required a lot of attention outside of it, whether it was working on art pieces are traveling to different parts of the river to help clean up. Throughout the semester we have taken trips to the river, studied the history of the river, its ecology and its relationship to surrounding communities and its connection to New York City's watershed. We have been directly engaged with the Bronx River Alliance, a non profit dedicated to promoting and protecting the river. My favorite part was going kayaking at the River House/Starlight Park. While I had fun in the water it vastly opened my eyes as to how beautiful the water is but how poorly we treat it. You can find anything in the Bronx River. I saw citibikes, basketballs, plastic cups, and many other things. One thing that caught my eyes was the tons of dead fish i saw. I just wondered why they died and why it was so many of them. I wondered were some toxins dumped or was it just a natural occurence. Aside from the day in the river my teacher urged us to go to parks and track down scenery. When you think of the Bronx you don't really think of beautiful parks and sunlight but we were urged to go out and explore. I found myself correlating this class a lot to environmental science. I found myself in a lot of moments of silence and just admiring the nature present. I noticed i loved being way from the loud and smelly cars and bus engines. For our final project we have to make a map of a portion of the bronx we were given. My teacher made us go to the location and pick up trash from there and try to somehow incorporate it in our piece. Picking up trash at the location I felt I was doing something good and it felt good pick up waste that doesn't belong on the earth's soil. Since I made this trip weeks ago I have found myself picking up trash on a couple of my walks from my apartment campus. The combination of these two classes have allowed me to appreciate the earth a lot more and I have realized I must do my part in trying to make sure the Earth is well and moving for future generations.

[alyles52]

Blog 12 Human Health Hazards

This week we discussed hazards and risks that humans face.  This reading really opened my eyes as to what we as humans are exposed to on the day to day.  Disease is something that we as humans face everyday.  Thankfully we have developed vaccines and medications that fought off the diseases that use to give us trouble.  Yes we have gotten rid of certain diseases but many others are still prevalent today and still are a risk factor to humans everyday. We all literally had to stay in the house all of 2020 just because of a coronavirus disease.  In chapter 17 we are introduced to hazards and how they affect us as humans.  Miller talks about five areas of hazards that are damaging to human health.  These risks are biological hazards, chemical hazards, natural hazards, cultural hazards, and lifestyle choices.  Natural hazards consist of wildfires, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, flooding, tornadoes, and hurricanes. Cultural hazards in daily life include harmful work practices, criminal violence, and impoverishment. Lifestyle decisions such as smoking, making bad eating choices, and having sex without protection. And that leads to the next point of how humans are susceptible to catching diseases and other illnesses from person to person. Such as a bacteria, virus, or parasite that invades and multiplies in the body's cells and tissues. No matter what status you are and how many zeros are on your paycheck you still face the same hazards as everyone else.  You can not hide from these risks and infectious diseases.  The threat of biological hazards to human health derives from over 1,400 pathogens that can cause disease in other organisms. Three major types of pathogens that cause infectious diseases are bacteria, viruses, and parasites. Bacteria are common, single-cell organisms that can multiply rapidly on their own. Interestingly, most bacteria are harmless, and some are beneficial, such as the ones found in probiotic supplements. Individuals who are most at risk for diseases are those who live in unsafe conditions, don’t have access to clean drinking water or clean bathrooms. And because they already don’t live in sanitary environments, when they do get sick the viruses and bacteria are even likelier to cause death. Even if they don’t cause death, illnesses can cause long term effects such as blindness, weaker immune systems, paralysis and other forms of disability. Viruses and bacteria are also dangerous because they can evolve to become resistant to vaccines and medications, leaving people even more vulnerable.  Diseases are probably the most lethal risk humans face cause they are always present and aren’t easily detected.  Ultimately I think we learned our lesson when it comes to disease control in America and globally.  The amount of wash your hands sign that I see now compared to before the pandemic is laughable.  I hope we all were washing your hands before the pandemic and that it didn’t take millions of lives just for some people to wash their hands and preach cleanliness.  

Question: What more could be done to promote public health?Personally I feel like those with power to promote do enough

Works Cited:

Spoolman, Scott, and G. Tyler Miller. Living in the Environment.

[alyles52]

Blog 11 Industrial Agriculture

This week’s discussion will be on Industrial Agriculture.  Agriculture is just a fancy way to say food production.  And I love talking about food.  Food has never been a problem for me.  If you just look at me you can tell.  I am a 250 pound collegiate defensive lineman.  I guess you can say I am a product of food production in America and how easy it is to be well fed here in America.  If I were to go to a country south of the Sahara such as Miller talked about I would probably look crazy next to someone from there.  Food insecurity is a problem plaguing the human population as a whole. In particular, the Global South is hit the hardest by this. One of every four people living south of the Sahara is undernourished (Miller, 263). Around the world hunger and malnutrition is something that is seen as very common.  Most of these people live in low income, less developed countries and can only live off low protein and vegetarian diets.  Undernourishment can lead to the hindering development of children physically and mentally.  Just like it is possible to be undernourished that these poor countries display we in America display obesity of all kinds.  We lead the world in diabetes and thyroid issues. Despite a majority of communities facing the brunt of food shortages, food production has increased and we are using about 40% of the world’s land to produce grains like rice, wheat, and corn that in return produce almost 80% of the world’s food. As food production around the world has vamped and up and become beastly, what is actually going into the food to help it be produced has raised some red flags.  New technology and advancements have made us able to genetically engineer what we produce.  Miller gives us the positives and negatives of us being able to modify our produce.  With genetic engineering we are able to modify crops and have them be what we want them to be.  We do this by altering its DNA and giving it desirable traits that make the product desirable for consumers.  These products are labeled as GMOs(genetically modified organisms).  Many people have a problem with these GMOs as they are not organic.  Personally I don’t have a problem with eating foods that have been genetically modified.  I don’t think there has been research developed that says they are any less healthy but still I understand the opposition.  GMOs are something that are relatively new so I guess so we really don’t know its long term effects yet.  With a side of people wanting to stay organic still and be reliant on organic produce the prices have became higher for those foods.  I understand the view of people against GMOs and just wanting to keep their food organic.  At times I have even become puzzled when I look at a bag of snacks I’m eating and I can’t pronounce or spell the list of ingredients that it contains.  So yea that is pretty scary, but I’ve been eating like that my whole life and I believe I feel fine.  Plus some organic stuff is just straight nasty.  You ever try organic ketchup? Yea I will never again.

Question; Do you mind if your food has been genetically modified?

Works Cited:

Spoolman, Scott, and G. Tyler Miller. Living in the Environment.

[alyles52]

Blog 10 Aquatic Biodiversity Loss

As humans we tend to forget that the ocean water is a part of the environment as well. The ocean water contains numerous ecosystems that we as humans live off. Without these ecosystems our way of life changes and many can not imagine a life without it. The ocean holds lots of valuable life and is where lots of our ecoonmy is held. It seems like all we do is take from the ocean and do not offer anything to it. Not only do we take from ocean, but the ocean does its part in reversing our wrong doing of pollution. The ocean is a great heat sink and CO2 sink, Humans have contributed to the huge disruption of life amongst marine ecosystems and now many of this life will face extinction. Miller states in the text,. “Evidence indicates that, in each mass extinction, high levels of dissolved CO2 and prolonged ocean warming and acidification played a role in dissolving the calcium carbonate that coral polyps use to build the reefs. With each mass extinction, the corals disappeared and did not come back for 4 million to 10 million years.” Human activities have caused mass extinction in freshwater and will continue to do so if no changes are made. When we add carbon dioxide to the ocean it changes the habitat of many fish and forces many to migrate, or die off. They might migrate in areas where they cannot establish life whether its becoming pray or killing off other species. Coral reefs are among the most diverse habitats on earth with all types of life occupying a single densely packed area and we have seen humans drop their footprint on them as well.  Ocean acidification caused by increased levels of carbon dioxide threatens coral reefs because it slows the growth of coral, a vital resource of reefs as they provide shelter, oxygen and food for animals. And these don’t include direct exploitations from humans.  Runoff from agricultural land increases nitrogen levels in water which leads to eutrophication and algal blooms, removing the water of safe oxygen levels and leads to death.  Overfishing directly contributes to the endangerment of fish species as well as unintentionally catching fish they don’t mean to. Fish farms can be especially harmful to the larger ocean. Diseases and parasites can be passed to wild fish, and the dense grouping of fish in one area creates a cesspool of nutrients and fecal matter, also leading to eutrophication.  

The more and more I read about marine life the more I realized just how important it truly is.  First I think we must realize that humans seem to be the only ones that can be held responsible for the degradation of the ocean.  Last week we talked about how land animals and plants are facing extinction due to human hands now I just read about how marine species are facing mass extinction worse than them.  The ocean does nothing but good for us.  Almost 80% of the world’s growing population lives near or along sea coasts in major coastal cities.  With that 80% means a whole lot of trash and waste. And where does this waste tend to end up?  Right to the ocean where it has gone through some pipeline of sewage filtered to the ocean.  This trash ends up in aquatic ecosystems, tearing them down and killing species that have to live there.  The fish and other animals in the water most of the time kill themselves when eating this trash because they either choke or the object may go to their stomach having them they think they have eaten but, the object was not digested and can lead to starvation.  I really don’t know what solutions we could implement that we haven’t developed that would stop our trash  and waste from ending up in the ocean.  We have already developed marine protected areas but there has also been belief that harmful activities have still been taking place amongst those areas.  I just think at this point we must only use the ocean for transportation needs and food needs with heavy emphasis on punishment for overfishing.

Question: The ocean is so large we don’t know how much it can take.  Do you believe we should worry about life in the ocean? Or do you believe it will work itself out as the Earth always does?

Works Cited:

Spoolman, Scott, and G. Tyler Miller. Living in the Environment.

[alyles52]

Blog 9 Biodiversity Loss

This week we learned about biodiversity loss and extinction.  I never really learned to this much depth about biodiversity loss until this week.  That goes to show how it isn’t discussed as much as topics like climate change and pollution are discussed.  What I’ve ultimately learned is that because it doesn’t seem to be affecting the health or living situation of humans we just put it on the back burner of all our issues.  Reading from the textbook I have learned that biodiversity is actually the backbone of the biosphere.  Every species plays a role in biodiversity between their exchange of nutrients and energy that we also as humans rely on.  Something I grabbed from the reading was that its not just animals that are endangered but plants can be endangered as well.  We’ve all heard and seen the commercials and ads to help the tigers, pandas and whales but I’ve never seen support for a plant species.  But something like a plant going extinct could affect an animal like the panda and cause for them to go extinct as well. According to the textbook, the definition of extinction, is the disappearance of all members of a species from the earth.  This often occurs when a species lacks adaption skills.  So we do essentially place more meaning on certain species.  The second chapter of the reading focused on sustaining and protecting ecosystems.  Biodiversity is what allows for an ecosystem to flourish.  At the same time a lack of biodiversity will negatively affect any ecosystem.  For example forests are one type of ecosystem that make up about 31% of the lands surface.  Forests provide as great ecosystems by, removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, producing oxygen, purifying water, and reducing soil erosion and runoff.  Even though we understand its value we still contribute to deforestation for our own economic gain and growth.  Not only does biodiversity loss promote extinction but, we see humans do too as well.  Our new industrial and technological developments interrupt the lives of plants and animals.  Up to half of the world’s known species could become extinct by the end of the century due primarily to human activities.  Because of this we should advocate to avoid environmentally harmful activities that promote extinction rates.  Like I said before, the exchange of energy and nutrients between all species have a domino effect.  Natural disasters as well can create an extinction.  This doesn’t occur too often but is still very possible and has happened before.  Human activities have negatively impacted almost every natural ecosystem on this plant.  I believe it is important that we first notice our wrong doin and take immediate action through ecological restoration.  We must understand that yes, there is great economic value through these ecosystems but at what cost are willing to pay to see the long term affects that could occur if we keep harming these ecosystems.

Question: Besides keeping them captive and building safe zones what else can we do to negate from certain species to becoming extincted?

Works Cited:

Spoolman, Scott, and G. Tyler Miller. Living in the Environment.

[alyles52]

Blog 8 Human Over-Population

Our focus this week was human population and urbanization.  This topic I will actually present on so I feel like I know a little bit more than I usually know just from reading the text.  Human population growth has become a worldly topic. As the human population grows the Earth’s resources do not.  With how advanced the world is today we have seen human population grow at a very steady rate.  Technology and industrialization have made energy, food, water, and medical care more accessible and reliable.  Going all the way back we recognize the agricultural movement as a major development in the history of humanity that allowed us to overcome a major obstacle that most other species contend with- food availability and scarcity.  In the wild there is only so much food available for animals but when humans learned to domesticate our own food it turned into a game changer.  Families started to grow as people became able to feed more mouths.  Since the daily life of people has just became better and better, we have seen this become a good and bad thing.  While countries that are vastly developed thrive in a new age, underdeveloped countries struggle being able to support all of its people.  Despite there being extreme water and food shortages, high infant mortality rates and lower life expectancies, families in these countries have way more children to help as laborers so they can contribute to the household. Women in these countries also tend to be uneducated and are restricted to housework, so they typically spend more time having children than women in other countries who go to work and don’t have as much time to dedicate to having children. Uneducated women are also more likely to have accidental pregnancies, which either leads to more children, or abortions which can be very harmful for women. 

I’m going to mention some solutions that I discussed in my powerpoint that can help solve overpopulation.  One of the first solutions is to empower women and girls.  Empowering women and girls means giving them freedom to pursue education and a career, economic independence, easy access to sexual and reproductive healthcare, and ending injustices like chid marriage.  Where women and girls are empowered to choose what happens to their bodies and lives, fertility rates plummet.  Another solution is making people aware of family planning.  We should educate the masses on the population issues that coils arise in the near future.  We should establish accurate and unbiased education for children, adolescents and adults about reproduction, sexual health and consent.  These topics would be an essential foundation in reducing the number of unintentional births that occur each year.  Another solution would be action on the national level.  Governments should integrate family planning and safe motherhood programs into primary health care systems.  They should also invest and support responsible and innovative agriculture.  Agriculture that wouldn’t just over produce food and only satisfy our need would be ideal.  Lastly, Government Incentives and one child legislation could help solve overpopulation.  Governments can offer tax incentives to families who have fewer children.  During China’s high controversial one child policy, fertility fell from a peak of almost six births per female between 1960 and 1965 to 1.5 per woman between 1995 and 2014.  I don’t agree or like this possibility at all but it is indeed a solution to overpopulation.

Question:What other solutions did I not tackle in my post above?

[alyles52]

Blog 7 Environmental Economics and Politics

This week the textbook discussed how global economics and politics are impacted by the environment.  Before this reading what came to mind was when I think of how natural disasters might effect a whole country’s economic and political development for years.  A country like Haiti is still trying to get back on its feet from the earthquake that hit them back in 2010.  It is now twelve years later and Haiti continues with recovery efforts and is still faced wth many challenges.  Challenges such as declining food insecurity and malnutrition, water borne disease epidemics and high vulnerability to natural disasters has increased pressure on women and children.  Economic growth and sustainability is at the top of a nations need and want.  The key issue we face is shaping a cultural shift mindset from “growth above all” to “just enough”.  The most successful countries and nations with power have been able to promote their economic growth behind strong politics.  At a smaller leveler to individual people the economy determines the lives of average people. The economy determines where people live, their jobs, the food they have access too, and many other daily life factors.  The economy being a huge factor in how one lives has sparked greed and selfishness in each other. Greed has led to the overproduction of food and products and us taking from the earth.  As humans we used to be way more resourceful.  We would hunt for our necessity, and whatever we caught we ate.  Recently, I just found out the yearly tons of food that the Fordham Rose Hill campus dining throws out.  Today everything we do is in excess. We try to obtain the most land, power, money and capital we can achieve.  Just like last week a plan of ethics comes into play when talking about the Earth and how we use it.  The most ethical approach toward assessing our relationship with the Earth is one that prioritizes comfortable coexistence for all life on earth.  When we exploit and degrade land for harvests, destroy forests for timber, mine coal for fuel, and build expansive commercial retail centers, we benefit only from receiving extra material goods, yet we suffer in so many more ways, whether it be from less clean air, polluted water, or poor health.  The economy and the environment seem to be in a direct trade off.  If we were to just make goods more expensive with a limit due to production it would involve full cost pricing which would make these goods hard to access by low income communities and others.  The economics side is very different from the political side.  The big environmental topic we all know that has been involved in politics is climate change.  National governments have become involved in ‘trying’ to combat climate change.  Climate change poses a unique set of challenges to world trade and the global economy.  As temperatures rise and extreme weather events become increasingly common it can negatively impact several areas of trade, such as agricultural production, supply chain logistics, and transportation. 

Honestly just like most other topics we have been discussing recently I believe that education would be a huge solution to the problems we see economically and politically.  Politically I think education would be beneficial because we are allowed to vote and as citizens we hold the power of who comes in charge and what their stance and agenda is toward climate change.  In becoming president nowadays or any political figure best believe you must need to have a stance on climate change, and it is up to us as the people to vote for you or not.  

Question: Economically, do you think we will ever be able to say no to growth and be ok with sustainability?

Works Cited:

Spoolman, Scott, and G. Tyler Miller. Living in the Environment.

[alyles52]

Blog 6 Environmental Ethics

When I hear the word ethics I think of differences between people.  Ethics deals with morality and what people believe to be right or wrong.  Ethics has always been a sensitive topic in American culture as people are allowed to express their views and opinions on certain topics.  This semester I am taking a course titled Philosophical Ethics.  In this class I’ve learned about how great philosophers such as Socrates, Platos, and Aristotle all examined human behavior and what leads us to our decision making.  These philosophers made their arguments and works back in Ancient Greek times but the human instinct, feeling and nature has not really changed.  This week the text teaches us about human centered and earth centered environmental views.  These views have learned to become the system of how people view the environment that surrounds them. Miller says “the assumptions and beliefs that you have about how the natural world and how you think you should interact with the environment”(Miller,637).   The human centered model believes in humans using the environment only to their benefit.  The human centered environmental world view highlights human significance.  They believe that the earth was created only to support humans and our endeavors.  This view ultimately says that humans are the most important species on Earth.  The human centered approach is also able to be in a stewardship approach.  The stewardship approach believes that humans hold a duty to manage the earth responsibly.  Those who believe this argue that humans have the ability and responsibility to save the earth, so we must focus and promote beneficial routines and limit those that harm the earth.  While these approaches may be different, they both hit back on humans, and how humans are the center of environmental issues and matters.  Wendell Berry’s rebuttal to the stewardship really intrigued me.  Berry says that the Earth is self sustaining and has a long past of being able to bounce back from any damages done to it.  It is the species here on Earth that are in the most danger, not the actual Earth.  Berry gets across that it ultimately isn’t humanities duty to save the earth as it it will be just fine on its own, but it is our duty to make sure we can continue to exist on it.  Basically we can not manage the earth, but we can take action in trying to further our existence on it.  On the other side the Earth centered view respects all forms of life and gives value to all.  It infers that humans do not deserve to be dominant over other species or that their livelihood is more important.  This view pays respects to all ecosystems no matter what their role is to human society.  Personally I believe I lean towards an earth centered approach. I think as humans we should do our best to preserve nature when it is possible and to evaluate all positive possibilities when we see degradation taking place. Even though I identify with an earth centered view I can respect and understand the human centered approach.  I think every species on Earth uses the earth to their own benefit.  Other species just don’t have the capability to think of how anything but themselves are affected so, they are selfish and centered to themselves as well.  Seeing it in this view I again understand why people side with the human centered approach.  The human centered approach preaches that humans are the most important species in the world and as a human I can understand that view as we are the smartest and most dominant species. 

Question: What do you believe will be the ultimate outcome of a human based approach?

Works Cited:

Spoolman, Scott, and G. Tyler Miller. Living in the Environment.

[alyles52]

Welcome To My Blog!

Hello, I am Ahmir Lyles currently a junior at Fordham University. I am on the University's football team and am an Environmental Studies major. Outside of football I am heavily into clothing and music. Off the field I am creating designs for my clothing brand that I hope to bring to life someday. I play three instruments, the violin, trumpet, and piano. The environment played a pivotal role in my life growing up as I was always outside. I loved nature and just being outside. I remember at my grandma's house she had this forest that started in her backyard and I would just wander back there for hours. Playing with bugs, rocks, worms, anything I could grab and look at to be honest. I remember finding dead birds and rabbits. Now that I'm older I have learned about the life that these creatures have and what our responsibility as humans is to maintain their lives and ours. What we do doesn't just affect our lives. When we knock down trees and take over land we are destroying a community's habitat. Not only are we harming other creatures but we have diminished our own health with loads of pollution. It is important as humans we come together and raise awareness about the environment now.

[alyles52]

Blog 5 Environmental History

The topics discussed this week were environmental history and reform environmentalism.  Environmental history is described as the study of human interaction with the natural world over time.  Environmental history allows us to trace our actions back and view our impact whether it is good or bad.  Environmentalism is aimed at protecting the environment.  So viewing humans’ past history with the environment we are able to seek methods that improve the environment and call out practices that harm the environment.  Different environmental groups have been made to focus on different areas of the environment.  Whether its public health issues or dangers with the climate they all go about their practices the same to start with.  The Bruelle reading defined reform environmentalism as “a complex system of beliefs whose origins lie in the utilitarian philosophy of providing for the common good through the application of science and law to public problems”(p. 174).  When I hear the word utilitarian not many great things come to mind.  But in this effort it makes sense that you would need a utilitarian approach.  The definition of utilitarianism from oxford languages states “the doctrine that actions are right if they are useful or for the benefit of a majority.��  In this case the idea of bettering and correcting mistakes we’ve made to the environment is the right idea.  It is the right idea once you understand what we are actually doing to the environment and how vital the environment is to our survival.

When you attack a problem like public health it is important to understand that most health problems come from urbanization and industrialization.  New styles of buildings have crammed people and families together where disease can easily spread.  We have built factories that produce gross air in these peoples backyards  and we have seen the rise of health issues such as asthma on the rise.  Reformists have made movements to advocate for ecological justice on the vast new technologies and developments that go against their efforts.  The introduction of burning coal has become a major problem in terms of health for humans.  Obviously coal was a great find during the industrial revolution.  It helped us build America into what it is today, but for what cost though?  These rich companies don’t care where they put these money making factories. They also don’t care who they harm on their journey of doing so either.  I believe that these are just things that we are going to have to live with and as messed up as it sounds I can’t see much change.  These rich companies will continue to build their billion dollar factories in low income areas just as it is to their benefit and how is going to stop them.  These factories are a necessity in the way we live. We can’t just get rid of them or else that stops everything to our economy and trickles down.  These rich people in power also aren't going to industrialize their neighborhoods as they know the negative effects that come with it.  I would love to see laws placed that could combat most of the urbanization and industrialization that has happened but I just don’t see much being put into effect. Bruelle tackles the subject of funds extremely well in his text. Bruelle says that Reform Environmentalism has been able to stay away from those with the wrong intentions. The movement is guided by actual science and not through business and industry. Environmentalism was able to break loose and set its self apart just from any other social movement while protecting itself from the hands of the wrong donors. Those funding the actually movement would have strong say in the direction and the intention of the movement. It is essential that integrity is kept in a movement such like this. With people's lives and future lives at stake genuine facts and exposure is needed to help.

Question: Why are politics so heavily involved when it comes to trying to save and take care of the Earth? Why does it feel like you have to pick a side?

[alyles52]

Blog 4 Climate Change

The topic this week was climate change and what humans have done to permanently affect the climate.  The textbook informs us about air pollution and what it does to the human health system.  Climate change is something that is real and present.  I question deeply when people say they don’t believe in climate change. Cold hard evidence and facts have shown it to exist and be a problem in the world we live in today.  Those that don’t believe in climate change just display ignorance.  Climate change has already affected our living conditions, health, and safety as people.  It's not just the cars and factories that pollute the air but we have items that contribute to pollution in our own households.  Items such as cleaning sprays, air fresheners, aerosol sprays, and many more items that can be found in the common household contribute to pollution.  In Chapter 18(Miller 437) of the text we are introduced to the reasoning of Los Angeles’ dirty air.  This in itself was hilarious to me because when I think of Los Angeles and California life you think of this new clean environmentalist new age promoted lifestyle.  In the text it is also mentioned that some of the air pollution is brought over from China through pollution clouds.  This is a crazy thought. Climate change is real and it affects all of us.  

Areas that flood after hurricanes and storms are many areas that have been affected due to the rise of sea levels from human causes.  Sea levels globally have risen from the ice caps melting.  The ice caps melting increase ocean acidity, drought and extreme weather and threats to biodiversity. The sad thing I find in all this is that the people that are most likely to be affected are those in small poor communities that aren’t provided with the proper resources and education about climate change.  It is important that we educate the world globally about climate change and how to live more sustainably.  As a human I could understand why it may seem useless that just you as an individual can change the impact of climate change.  And yes it is true one person can't change the world but if you can get others and they get others it will make a difference.  In last week’s blog I discussed the movie “Who Killed the Electric Car”.  This movie greatly ties in with the effects of climate change.  In the movie we see the efforts that were being made to make a more environment friendly vehicle for the public. But the idea was scrapped by billion dollar companies that were afraid of its competition.  In the movie you can see that the public were all for the idea of the electric car but what all these rich companies could see was them losing dollars.  This movie was released in 2006 so since then times have definitely changed.  We’ve seen companies like Tesla flourish in recent years.  In May 2022 we even saw the introduction of a fully electric pickup truck from Ford motors. So even in recent years we have seen companies open their eyes and release products for the public that recognize climate change and help contain air pollution. I think we are still a long way from making major change towards climate change but there is hope as we’ve seen big companies make steps into the right direction.

Question: Globally, what is one solution that nations can reflect on and put into effect in regards of air pollution that we haven't seen placed already?

Works Cited:

Spoolman, Scott, and G. Tyler Miller. Living in the Environment.

[alyles52]

Blog 3 Energy

This week’s discussion was focused on nonrenewable energy. We learned that nonrenewable energy is a source of energy that can not be replenished in the span of a human lifetime.  For resources such as oil, coal, and natural gas it takes millions of years.  Our dependency on these resources is highlighted very well in chapter 15 and 16.  The United States has been very dependent on the energy industry since times like the Industrial Revolution.  It seems as though the entire world is driven through the use of these nonrenewable sources.  Currently, 80% of the commercial energy in the United States comes from fossil fuels.  Nonrenewable energy resources are a kind of commercial energy.  Americans have become addicted to oil.  We use oil to heat our homes, grow food, transportation, and for production and manufacturing purposes.  In recent years we have found this dependency to be very unsustainable and harmful for our future generations.  I think it is most important to understand where we are wasting non renewable resources and find solutions and establish efforts to promote renewable resources.  Capitalism has played a huge role in the waste of resources.  For us to get rid of nonrenewable energy we would have to shift all fuel and coal based energy consumes to completely renovate their process of energy use ranging  from personal cars to factories producing plastic at an extremely rapid rate that have been to solar charged electric cars to finding and producing a different material that does not create energy waste.

The movie we watched titled “Who Killed the Electric Car”really opened my eyes to the situation and the government's influence as to how we switch over to more renewable sources.  The film was made back in 2006 and things are already very different from what they were like back then.The main thing that I took away from the film was that it was the billion dollar companies that supply the renewable resources that were completely against the electric car.  These huge companies were so afraid of losing money that they just used their power to kill the competition.  Auto makers literally took electric cars off the street.  GM was forced to crush the EV1s and left them in the same lot as where the car was first tested.  People were fighting to keep the dream of the electric car alive.  A group of people spent weeks out in front of the lot where GM had plans to crush the cars.  A group signed up to buy the cars.  1.9 million dollars was offered to GM to keep the cars alive but they declined.  At that point I was just genuinely confused as to why GM was just okay with destroying the product they worked on to become the future.  I can just assume that more conversations were being had behind the scenes.  With the film being released in 2006 it amazes me how much society has flipped on the idea of the electric car.  Well society seemed to be more for the car so what I guess I’m amazed by is how the higher ups and billion dollar companies didn’t shut down cars like Tesla.  I guess we’ll have to wait some years to see the Tesla documentary and see how companies felt about Elon Musk and his innovative brain.

Question: Why in the film did GM not give a fight to have their cars destroyed?

[alyles52]

Blog 2 Energy, Ecosystems, Biodiversity

In the start of chapter 2 we are shown the basics of science and what its purpose is in life and how we use it as humans. The textbook tells us that scientists are curious and skeptical and demand evidence. Reading this I thought of my young cousin Mikey, that lives with me back home on Long Island, that I call “Curious”.  He’s only 8 but this kid will ask you anything and respond with a “why”.  He won’t believe anything you tell him until he knows why and even sometimes he’ll follow that up with another why.  Well, just like my cousin a good scientist will always demand evidence when new research and data has been found. The scientific method is the base for any experiment within science. “As the famous physicist Albert Einstein put it, “The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking.”(miller 25). We learn about the three most important features in the functioning of an ecosystem. Energy, chemical nutrients and evolution are these most important features. The textbook describes an ecosystem as “a set of organisms within a defined area of land or volume of water that interact with one another and with their environment of nonliving matter and energy”(Miller 5). The ecosystem shows how organisms and nature come together as an entire community. The interactions between species and nature will shape and affect the entire ecosystem, good or bad. Each creature on the planet has a designated “trophic level” that is chosen based on energy. Energy is one of the most important features that I talked about earlier out of the 3. The textbook focuses on factors such as population size in terms of balance in an ecosystem. Chapter seven discussed climate and biodiversity. The textbook discussed natural ways that the climate is affected and the ways we as humans affect the climate with our over releasing of greenhouse gasses. 

Chapter eight hit on aquatic biodiversity and how important waterlife is important to the Earth. I found this chapter the most interesting as I’ve thought about all the life in the ocean and how it too is its own system that has been suffering and deteriorating at the hands of humans.  Reading about aquatic life reminds me about a class I took last semester in the spring.  The class was a Texts and Contexts class and it was titled “Briny Exchanges: Literature, Commerce, and the Sea.”.  In this class we went from watching kid movies like Finding Nemo and Moana to classics like Jaws.  The difference is though I was taught to analyze deeper and understand the role that the ocean and sea played in all films and books that we analyzed in the class.  The class taught me to look at the ocean in a completely different way.  It opened my eyes to see all the history that the ocean holds.  People lived off the ocean and still do.  The ocean holds history such as the slave trade that is important to myself as my ancestors were slaves and brought to America via the ocean.  The class itself has definitely opened my eyes towards respecting and understanding how much the ocean provides for us as humans.  It is extremely important that we take the correct steps to take care of the ocean as it provides us with endless opportunities.

Question: How can we spread the importance of life in the ocean and the importance of maintaining upkeep of the ocean?

Works Cited:

Spoolman, Scott, and G. Tyler Miller. Living in the Environment.

[alyles52]

Blog 1 Sustainability and How Humans Interact With the Environment

In the first chapter of the text we are introduced to sustainability and how the Earth has been a sustainable system for the last 3.8 billion years. After 5 mass extinctions the earth has been able to survive and give life to an astonishing variety of life. If organisms didn’t adapt to the earth’s conditions they just died off. As humans we have taken advantage of all that the Earth has to offer. This reading opened my eyes to see how it important it is that we go back to an old way of life and examine nature more and what it has to offer. Organisms have always been forced to develop a variety of ways to find food. “ Spiders create webs that are strong enough to capture fast-moving flying insects. Bats have a radar system for finding prey and avoiding collisions. These and many other abilities and materials were developed without the use of the high-temperature or high-pressure processes or the harmful chemicals that we employ in manufacturing. This explains why many scientists urge us to focus on learning from the earth about how to live more sustainably.”. I think there are pretty clear answers and examples of how we can live more sustainably on earth as humans. We probably would have to do without a lot of things and cut out some of the comfort but to help the Earth and its future it is imperative that we go back to some of the old ways that humans used the Earth before times such as the industrial revolution. While reading I was introduced to a new term I never seen called biomimicry. Biomimicry is the effort to understand, mimic and catalog the ways in which nature has sustained life on the earth for 3.8 billion years. Biomimicry is very interesting to me as I think it very much reverses a lot of the problems that we as humans have caused to the Earth. By just examining nature, it will simply give us all our answers and tools as we can live off necessity and not want. 

The textbook gives insight as to how the Earth is used economically in service. The book focuses on three points of sustainability. Nutrient cycling, human activities degrading natural capital, and finding solutions to the problems we have caused. Nutrient cycling is the earth's ability to not receive any new supplies of chemicals but over years the plant has been able to provide and recycle chemicals or nutrients. Humans degrade natural capital by using renewable sources of energy faster than nature can restore them and by overloading the earth’s normally renewable air, water, and soil with pollutants and wastes. The third component just simply talks about people coming together to protect the Earth’s natural capital. This is where groups of people can find conflict. Economically it may be benefit some people to cut trees down for example but for the environment there is no benefit and it harms the environment. Building some middle ground is going to have to be important if we want future generations to enjoy the earth. As humans we can't let money and comfort run us off of the face of the earth.

Question: What evidence would the world have to show people that if we keep living like this the Earth will no longer be sustainable?

Works Cited:

Spoolman, Scott, and G. Tyler Miller. Living in the Environment.