Paper 5
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Ana shares what she has learned in her environmental sustainability class this semester. [1] She discusses new concepts around ecological functioning, how ecosystems have slow responses to changes, and the importance of policymakers understanding natural processes. [2] Ana also learned about economic issues like unsustainable consumerism and the concept of natural capital. [3] Additionally, she discusses the connections between sustainability and ethics/equity, as well as potential solutions like improvements in technology and urban planning.
Paper 5
- 1. Dear Felipe, The semester is almost over and I wish I could go home and be with you all during Holidays, at least mom is coming and it will be also great. So, do you remember that Environmental stuff class that I told you would be just going all over again in same concepts and annoying talk about saving the planet? That old story that teachers tell us since elementary school. For my surprise, I actually got some new concepts and information that I have never heard about in this class. I always thought that the way we see sustainabilityfrom television and regular courses in high school and college was not very appealing, and just made me annoyed by that crazy teachers wearing sandals and just talking about three R`s. Sustainability can be appealing and it was the first time that I actually care aboutecological functioning, economic functioning, equity and potential solutions to our problems. Ecological functioning is how nature regulates itself, but it has a quite unique way to do that, what make many people not understand it. One example is policy makers. They are responsible for making many decisions in name of a big amount of people, but usually they do not have enough information to make decisions related to ecological concerns. So, as they need to be familiar with economy and sociology, they also need to understand natural processes. Not that we can expect that they will be experts on it, but basic functioning and its impacts in society should be a topic for study. Another information that was relatively new for me and that I think that is hard for people like you and me to understand is how ecosystems have a slow response to environmental changes. The best example that I got from my readings is oceans response to global warming. In the past years oceans temperature have increased less than other ecosystems, but twice as much warming is expected for the future. So, what I want to say is that all damage that we have already done may be still not caused all its effects on earth. Economic concerns are also a great part of sustainability.If countries economiesare not going well or if an environmental friendly solution is not affordable, weare not in the right path to a sustainable world. The first aspect that really got me is how consumerism is not economic healthy. For me, the obvious thought is that consuming more is equal to more product demand, consequently to more jobs and more economic growth. However, all this consumerism sometimes leads to economic failure worldwide, and we cannot argue about that, it is just what many economies are dealing with right now. But the new concept that I have never heard of is natural capital. Society usually thinks that it owns all natural resources, and that leads to no concern about its costs and damages. Actually, every product we consume has natural resources as their materials or causes some impact in nature. Having this in mind would change the way people consume, and maybe make you think before buying a new earphone every 2 months! Equity and ethics dont seem to be related to sustainability, butthey really have a strong connection to it. Several ethic theories consider nature as a big part of it, or even put nature in the center. Our relationship with nature affects our actions and how much we care about. That is another topic that I would like to hear about when I was in high school, it may make me see things differently and be more open minded. In class we have also discussed about ethics in animal raising in food industry. You know I love beef, but the food industry is not acting ethically in todays animals raising
- 2. techniques, and we, consumers, dont have a clue about how this industry really works. Not that I am going to stop eating meat, no, never, I just love it, but it is an issue that has to be debated. Actually, many countries have more ethical policies in animal raising, European countries are examples of how society defended animal rights, we could just follow this trend. And finally, after talking about problems and more problems that have to be discussed and researched, we went to the best part, there are hope and solutions! We complain about how expensive and not feasible sustainable solutions are, but as computers memory double every 18 months period, we can expect a reasonable growth of sustainable technologies as well. Maybe not that fast, society just started to really research it not many decades ago, we are still learning, but we are having pretty good results. Having solar power at home, as we do, started to be more affordable and it is a trend that many new technologies may follow. We may think that sustainability is having a futuristic house with all kinds of high technologies, but sustainability is much more about planning, planning our houses, and specially planning our cities. A well planned society is more sustainable than a disorganized one. Getting it all together, and our daily sustainable choices, being sustainable start to be possible, and most important, not that boring! So, if you think that this letter was not too boring, you may think the same about sustainability. All these topics are important to our understanding about how earth functions and what we can do to make our lives more sustainable. I am going to finish with a saying that a crazy teacher wearing sandals would say: we have to do our part. Miss you, Ana