Since sustainability affects all of us, I thought it would be a fitting topic to center my first blog post around. In the millions of years life has evolved on our planet no single species has had the ecological impact we have had, the exception being early life forms that converted our atmosphere into an oxygen rich environment suitable for more diverse life. This process was of course a catalyst for life. Our history of ecological impact however is full of disregard for life, from mass deforestation to hunting to the point of extinction. Slowly but surely we have come to realize that our actions have significant consequences on our surroundings and in turn ourselves. Since we know through evolutionary biology fueled by Charles Darwin, and substantiated by the discovery and sequencing of DNA, that we quite literally are related to every life form on this planet, and through advances in astronomy we can see how improbable our existence is and how insignificant we are in the vastness of the cosmos, the only next step in my humble opinion is to be stewards of earth and the existence of all life. Enter stage right sustainability.
We are now entering an age where the short-term is no longer single handedly a decider, and the long-term holistic view of the consequences of our actions takes center stage. We have a responsibility to embrace sustainability as a way of life. Ideally, embracing sustainability involves living in such a manner that our actions merely constitute facets of the Earth’s many cycles, maintaining and nurturing those cycles for the wellbeing of all biological systems, to meet the needs of the present without compromising the needs of the future. In short, to live within our means. Some aspects of sustainability are undeniably crucial, such as the conservation of resources through the three R’s: reduce, reuse, recycle, the development and implementation of renewable energy sources, and the decline of our habitual meat consumption. Other aspects are heavily debated in the scientific community.
One such topic is the continued use of genetically modified crops. Proponents of the scientific breakthroughs that fueled the green revolution argue that higher yields per square acre, lesser need for pesticides, and the enabling of no-till farming justify the use.
Others argue that biodiversity is a very important part of our ecosystem and mass proliferation of GM crops endangers our biodiversity. GM crops require synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, and the continued purchase of seeds, causing farmers who convert from subsistence farming to cash crops to fall into unmanageable debt. The long-term effect of tinkering with gnomes is not fully understood, but supporters argue that we have been tinkering ever since domestication of plants first occurred and genetic engineering is simply a more precise side of the same coin.Nuclear power has always been a hot topic of debate. On the one hand you have a completely clean source of energy, and the ever essential baseload electricity production. Hydroelectricity is the only other renewable that produces baseload, with future prospects being space solar and fusion, both being many decades away. Many see it as a gateway technology to fossil fuel independence, phasing it out as renewables become more prolific and efficient.
On the other hand you have the issue of highly radioactive waste and well documented cases all over the world of increased cancer rates, birth defects and other radiation related deaths simply being in the proximity of facilities. Chernobyl’s affect was so widespread that thyroid cancers doubled in the whole of France! In northeastern France liver and lung cancer rates have gone up by 182%/120% and 225%/272% in women and men respectively. Similar problems were felt throughout Europe. Dealing with the waste is one of the longest-term projects humans have ever attempted to tackle. To call endeavors such as the Yucca Mountain project ‘solutions’ would be blasphemous to the definition of the word. At best they can be described as an inadequate counter of the symptoms. The issues just continue to mount and build upon themselves, but the timeline of climate change and the impending problems associated have the potential to be far worse.Continued urbanization is seen by many environmentalists as a growing problem because the people in cities tend to use more energy per capita and therefore contribute more toward global warming. Cramped lifestyles lead to less and less vegetation which leads to high import rates of food, both of which contribute to global warming, and water issues as a whole escalate exponentially. Other environmentalists argue that the birthrate of new urban dwellers immediately drops to ‘replacement level’ (2 children per mother) and continues to drop, and that the best way to keep our population in check is through urban development and city migration. They also believe that the cramped lifestyles actually reduce carbon emissions because traveling vertically in an elevator instead of horizontally along a commute and within suburbs is much more energy efficient. Another advantage is the higher rates of public transportation in cities.
There are many debates revolving around sustainability. Luckily, a lot of these are simply out of our reach. What we all should concentrate on is the conservation of our own resources and energy, conscientious consumption, and bringing awareness to the issues and informing others of our intimate interconnectedness.
On a lighter note…
Why I hate Fox News:
Reason One
Reason Two
Reason Three
