Water

After class discussion on Friday, I was thinking:
Water is all around us and determines if we live or die...
Knowing that, why do we continue to abuse it as if we could live without out it?

Our class discussion made me truly think about the longevity of our water supply. Postel explained the enormous percentage water filtration would have to increase in order to support an ever- growing population. The number is almost unfathomable, and I'm not really sure that it's even humanly possible to produce that much water. That being said, I highly doubt that our technology is going to stay the same. I'm sure that some brainiac somewhere will come up with a solution.

I did disagree with the idea presented in class that not using so much water here would provide water for people in other countries who do not have it. After traveling a few times to South America and having a best friend from Haiti, getting water to many third world countries requires a much greater solution than just water conservation in the United States.

Our class discussion led me to add "water conservation" to my Google Alert list because it's something I feel like I have become a little more interested in this semester. I found a really interesting article about several villages in India that have made water conservation an "invisible idea" in their community. It is so engrained in their way of life that they do not think about doing it any differently. I bet their grandchildren and great-grandchildren will not suffer as much as ours may have to...

Colorado River No More?

         To go along with "End of a River" featured on Patagonia's website, I found this YouTube video. At only 14 seconds, it highlights the key point of Jonathan Waterman's (ironic : ) ) article. The video shows a helicopter view of the Colorado River and the old water line which has water no where near it. What should have been a beautiful trek down the Colorado River served only as a reminder to him that we are in a major water crisis. As the YouTube videos shows, if we continue at this rate, the Colorado River will be dried up within the next 60 years. That is quite a daunting and horrifying piece of information...

         The water problem that we as a nation, and even as a world, are currently facing is not something that just needs to be studied. Action must be taken or we are going to see very unfavorable results. If we do not see these negative effects then our children and grandchildren will. Who wants to leave a major world crisis as part of a legacy? I surely do not.

Guyana... a whole different story

            After a week of planning and anticipation to receive my dad’s permission to go on the trip of a lifetime, it all boiled down to one moment. “Dad, can I go to Guyana for ten days on a mission’s trip? I’ll be super careful, I promise.” With a smirk, I was told I could go if I could pay for it. Three days later, money in hand, I received his permission to go on a trip that would change my college major, career plan, and my life.    We arrived in Guyana, South America extremely late at night and made the one-hour trek to the city we would be staying in for the next ten days. On the way there, I witnessed the worst living conditions I had ever laid eyes on as the people had relatively no access to clean drinking water, no sewage system, and no way to purify food. We drove by little huts made of cardboard and whatever else could be found where families were forced to live with many relatives and even friends that had no means of securing other housing. The next day proved to be no different as I met members of various orphanages all around town. The “they are extremely sick or have a rare condition with basically no chance of survival because there is no help here” story became all too familiar. I knew right then and there that I wanted to be the one to change the response to that question. The CIA lists Guyana as “high” on the degree of risk for infectious disease scale. Guyana also only has approximately 372 registered doctors in the entire country, and ranks 68th on the list (out of all countries in the world) for highest infant mortality rate (CIA). Clearly, their lack of essential environmental items that we take for granted in the United States is making its way to the forefront as we see it claim too many victims.
    The story that stood out to me the most is one that is nothing extreme or spectacular, but one that left an imprint on my heart. Hope Home, the orphanage we spend the most time visiting, houses around sixty children, many with special needs. Our task for the week was to put up a type of barbed wire fencing to protect the children because break-ins had become very commonplace. The barbed wire was stored in the room the children were not supposed to have access to, but unfortunately, Reshma managed to get in and step on the wire. She probably needed a tetanus shot and stitches, but because the only legitimate hospital for miles had recently been burnt down and she was scared of the scolding she might get for wandering somewhere she was not supposed to be, she simply walked around on it until she finally got the courage to show it to me. My only solution was a Band-Aid and some Neosporin I found in our team’s first-aid kit. Had I been medically trained, I could have easily stitched it back up to prevent infection that likely ensued after we left.
    When I returned home from Guyana, I was burdened by the enormity of the problem I had witnessed and wanted to do anything I could to help. The entire experience was enough to convince me that the medical field is the place for me. So now with a biology major I am hopeful to continue on to P.A. school and eventually return to Guyana to help right the wrongs society has placed on these precious people.
    At the end of all my thinking, I came to the conclusion that people today feel the problems of society and even environmental issues we have discussed in class are far too large to slowly be handled one person at a time. In all reality, however, isn’t that what starts revolutions and movements that change the world? In the words of Dr. Seuss, “Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better.  It's not.” (Inspirational)

"CIA - The World Factbook." The World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency. Web. 23 Jan. 2012.
        <https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/gy.html>.

"Inspirational Quotes about Helping, Sayings about Making a Difference." The Quote Garden - Quotes,           Sayings, Quotations, Verses. Web. 21 Jan. 2012. <http://www.quotegarden.com/helping.html>.

McKibben Haiku

McKibben tells all
The earth is not the same now;
We need some help, please.

McKibben

Tweet, Tweet

 So I'll just be honest by saying that the idea of Twitter seemed rather pointless to me (and it kind of still does), but it does provide more information than I thought could be found. For the purpose of using Twitter vs. Google Alerts in regards to English class, Google Alerts seems to provide more useful information and more quality, educational links that relate to the topics I searched.

            After class discussion about picking our topics for future posts, I followed many people on Twitter who posted about factory farming and set up Google Alerts for posts related to factory farming. I came across the Twitter pages for "FarmSanctuary" and "Compassion". They both work, in some way, to "protect farm animals from cruelty, inspire change in the way society views & treats farm animals, and promote compassionate vegan living". Google Alerts sent me to a Here and Now page displaying an article called "The FDA's Confusing Message on Antibiotic Use on Farms". This article discusses some confusing rules the FDA has implemented and explains what they have really been doing in terms of regulation. 

            I also began researching and adding pages and alerts regarding sustainability. The Environmental Protection Agency says that sustainability is "everything that we need for our survival and well-being depends, either directly or indirectly, on our natural environment". At many points in every human being's life, we directly depend on the environment for some aspect of life, whether it be food, clothing, etc. If we do not protect the environment, our needs could very well not be met. While sifting through Twitter posts relating to sustainability, I came across "Sustainable Brands", a page whose sole purpose is providing brands that have been known to support a sustainable lifestyle. Their website, Sustainable Brands, lists these companies, describes how one can obtain membership, and even shows the conferences that they offer to learn to better appreciate the environment. 

            Through Google Alerts, I was led to a video produced by GE that highlights what they are doing with researchers at the University of Illinois to become a more sustainable company. Their research on pig manure may be a breakthrough for other companies to learn what they can do to help. It almost makes me wonder whether they are doing this to protect their company's reputation and gain consumer support or if they actually care about what their company does to the environment. We may never know...

Response to "Island Civilization" Continued

Nash's idea of an "Island Civilization" although radical, could potentially be caused by many issues. The issue at the forefront of my mind is the lack of food the world could potentially face in the future. According to a report by Elizabeth Dickinson, food production would have to increase by 70% in order to support the population (if it grows at the rate it is growing now) the world will most likely house in 2050. Right now, it is estimated that there are 850 million hungry people to this date and is expected to increase rapidly. With the percentage that food production would have to increase and the number of hungry people increasing daily, the possibility of an extreme food crisis is not all that far-fetched.

             Dickinson stated in her report, "All new technologies and practices must be on the table if we are to produce enough food to support global population growth." "Poverty is the main problem. Even when food is abundant, many go hungry because of lack of income to purchase food."

            To me, it sounds like a global food crisis may be inevitable if changes are not made in the way we live. Whether that means really implementing a huge reform to food making processes so that the amount of food we currently have greatly increases or whether we implement plans that would block a huge population growth surge for the future, something must be done in order to plan for what could lie ahead. Otherwise, "Island Civilization" may become a reality : )

Information from: "The Future of Food" by Elizabeth Dickinson

"Island Civilization" Response

Wilderness and civilization seem to be heavily debated topics not only now, but since the beginning of recorded time. Because of the significant human-nature relationship, much controversy and discussion are obviously present. Ancient civilizations relied on wilderness for their food by using a ”hunting and gathering” approach to collect food for themselves and their families. Their entire lifestyles revolved around the wilderness because if they could not find anything to hunt where they were, they had to move until they could find food, never settling in an area for an extended period of time.

As civilizations progressed, hunting and gathering slowly turned into farming. Instead of humans relying on the wilderness for food, they resented the wilderness because its wild animals were now a threat to their herds of livestock, which was not their food source. One small success led to greater and larger successes, and these small herds of animals provided a way for permanent civilizations. These civilizations would then grow and change to create bigger buildings, roads, dams, and freeways. These “improvements” left the wilderness to “scattered remains”.

When all hope for the wilderness seemed lost, Americans slowly began learning to appreciate it again. Environment and wilderness-friendly words like “conservation”, “food chains”, and “ecosystem” were coined in the 1900’s. The late 20^th century brought legislation, the Endangered Species Act of 1973 and the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972, to ensure equality towards the wild.

Roderick Nash still believes that there is much more to be done to protect the wilderness and the environment. He presents four ways the world could possibly be in another millennium. The first three, the wasteland scenario, the garden scenario, and the future primitive scenario, are not as elaborated upon, but his main scenario, “the island civilization” was well explained. Essentially, Nash says that with much cooperation from mankind, the earth could possess a harmonious bond between wildlife and humans. Civilizations would be found in densely populated groups around the world; all other land would be completely uncivilized providing a safe haven for wildlife to do as they pleased. Nash says this would require much sacrifice from humans but is completely fair because of how much sacrifice humans have required them to make.

In my personal opinion, I believe that civilization was necessary in order to advance as far as we have to this day. In fact, the number of people who have read Nash’s argument probably would not have been able to without the advancements into the wild that were made. I do, however, think that mankind taking over so quickly and not completely respecting wildlife was a problem. I also think that as our society has gotten older and matured, rules have been put into place to help protect the wildlife that we do have left. They have not be left to just painfully die; plans were and have been implemented to help them.

The Island Civilization model is good in theory, but I feel that our society has reached a point in which everyone craves rapid advancement. Reverting to a system of little civilization and very cramped living spaces with no luxury vacations or road trips would be nearly impossible to implement. As hard as it may be to come to terms with, I honestly think that in another thousand years, society will be more high tech than we could ever imagine but little to no real wild life will be found. As unfortunate as this may be, I think it is what our society has allowed. 

Response to "Island Civilization: A Vision for Human Occupancy of Earth" Section: In the Fourth Millennium by Roderick Frazier Nash