McKibben's

Relentless growing is not as ideal as most Americans seem to think.  Congress thinks a larger, stronger economy will solve America’s problems.  When in reality, all America needs is to maintain our wealth and current resources.  Earth has reached the point where there is no room for a larger population.  Earth cannot withstand any more expansion.  If Earth continues to expand a collapsed society could come as the result. 

People can stay locally based but locally connected by the internet.  The television used to be an exciting invention but never reached the same buzz that the internet inspired.  The internet allows people to connect in so many different ways.  For example, the seven guys organized 5,200 rallies in 181 different countries across the globe mostly from their computers.  Skype was an instrumental part of the rallying success.  However, there are many other programs that helped in the program’s success.

Local, labor-intensive, low input agricultural jobs are the smartest choice jobs for Americans.  Less than one percent of Americans truly farm today.  More human-intensive labor will create more interest and thus, more jobs in the farming industry.  McKibben believes we should get back to having boutique farms.  One farm would consist of a few workers and a small select number of animals or a specific crop.  More work would be done by the humans and less by machines.   Good soil is a key factor to these boutique farms.  Large industrial farms destroy the land but boutique farms would help build the soil back up.

The meteorological tropics have expanded two degrees north and two degrees south.

Davie County is a very agricultural based county where many people have boutique farms.  The soil in Davie is all very rich which makes it easy to grow plants.

The Everglades & Island Civilization

A key environmental issue that prevents the world from having an “Island Civilization” is habitat destruction.  Humans, all over the world, are destroying natural habitats for their own well-being.  Natural habitats are being ruined to support farming, mining, logging, and urban sprawl.  The number one cause for habitat destruction is the expansion of agriculture. Habitat destruction is ranked as the number one cause of the extinction of species worldwide.

Habitat destruction has escalated over the past 30 years due to the growth of the sugar industry and the urban sprawl along Florida's east coast.  The government provides subsidies that eliminate any foreign competition.  Furthermore, the subsidies ensure a minimum selling price for sugar.  The industry is so closely linked to lawmakers that they are also permitted cheap water prices since they require such large amounts.

The Everglades was a “river of grass” that flowed 60 miles wide.  The tip of the Everglades is marked at present day Orlando and it extends down into the Florida Keys.  Lake Okeechobee and rainwater fund the Everglades.  Until the 1990s Florida’s Everglades was an expansive, natural habitat for many species.  The land was bustling with alligators, crocodiles, wading birds, tropical fish, and many other forms of wildlife and plants before people started developing the territory.  The new railroad system brought many new people to area which was cause for expansion.  However, this expansion infringed into the Everglades ecosystem.  After a few decades, half of the ecosystem was nonexistent due to the recent developments.  The southwestern corner was on life support through manmade canals.  The canals assisted draining the Everglades since the natural drainage system had been destroyed.

If we lived in the ideal “Island Civilization” there would be no need for laws and manmade canals to attempt to protect these natural areas.  Humans can try to protect natural wildlife as they want but it never works.  In an “Island Civilization” all of the humans would leave the natural zones in peace.  The peace would then allow the Everglades to return to its former glory with a width of 60 miles.

http://www.nrdc.org/water/conservation/qever.asp

http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/translating-uncle-sam/stories/what-happened-to-the-everglades

Island Civilization

Roderick Frazier Nash’s Island Civilization: A Vision for Human Occupancy of Earth in the Fourth Millennium highlights several key events during the first three millenniums and how the fourth could turn out.  Humans developed their dominance over the years and continue to assert it.  Overtime they separated themselves from nature and the wilderness.  During the second millennium several laws were passed that forced humans to reassess their dominant role in nature.  They were forced to look at other life forms as important.  Today, we have progressed into viewing the world as a something that needs to be taken care of.

After evaluating the first three millenniums Nash continues to discuss the options for the fourth millennium.  Nash does not want the world to turn into a ‘wasteland’ where everything is trashed.  However, “humans have proved to be terrible neighbors,” who tend to destroy all the resources around them.  Only “pathetic remnants” would be able to live in a world as corrupt and polluted as the wasteland scenario suggests.  The world could also progress into a ‘garden scenario’ where humans control all of nature and society become anthropocentric.  Humans technological advances seem to become more controlling as they progress.  People say the power and control humans currently have over nature is dangerous.  The third scenario is the “future primitive” where humans would once again become “hunters and gatherers.”  Technology would not become nonexistent but humans would have to learn how to use it in a more responsible way according to Henry David Thoreau.  In Nash’s “dream world” an Island Civilization will occur in which humans will live on islands separate from the environment.  For this scenario to occur the population will have to be eliminated down to 1.5 billion people, which is about a quarter of the current population.

Reading Nash’s Island Civilization opened my eyes to the world’s potential.  The world could develop in so many different ways by the fourth millennium and it is up to us today to help it evolve.  I do not see Nash’s Island Civilization as a practical outcome but I do think humans are trying to become more conservative.  Therefore, the world shouldn’t develop into a complete wasteland.  Furthermore, I do not seeing humans as opting for isolation on these islands he is proposing.  Technology is ever evolving which is why humans will not stop improvements in technology so they can use it more wisely.  Therefore, the most logical scenario seems to be the garden scenario.  The garden scenario will let the humans have complete control and biodiversity will become extinct.

One part of the Island Civilization scenario that would be most beneficial to the evolving planet would be to cut our population.  More than one billion people are added to the earth every fifteen years.  If we continue at this drastic rate there will be no hope to conserve any parts of the Earth’s natural resources.  Furthermore, I agree that we should learn to use technology more wisely.  We continue to advance but we never assess the detrimental effects we could be causing to the environment.