While the topic of global warming is a very important one, an even more important one is now coming into the light. We know that we are destroying the Earth with our carbon emissions and know that in just a few years time, most of us will be dead because of global warming. The topic I am talking about is what happens after global warming has taken into effect. What happens to those who survive the extreme heat and droughts and make it through to live on past the destruction? Both “Peak Oil Survival” and “The skill of Ecological Perception” talk about the aftermath rather than the before.
“Peak Oil Survival” is about the many solutions people have come up with to slow down global warming. It is also about how no matter the amount of ideas that are made; there is always a reason for them to not work. Some solutions can be changed to work while some, like hybrid cars, according to Aric McBay, “because hybrid or battery-powered cars are more complex to build, use energy-intensive high-tech and lightweight materials, and require more maintenance, they require more energy to build than gas-powered vehicles” (McBay, xii). “The Skill of Ecological Perception” is about how the only solution to stop global warming is to stop using everything we would normally use and start acting like we did before we grew technologically advanced. According to Laura Sewall, author of “The Skill of Ecological Perception”, “my hope for a sophisticated response to contemporary ecological and psychological conditions calls for a return to our essential, animal selves,”(Sewall,203).
So while “Peak Oil Survival” talks about the problems with the solutions, “The Skill of Ecological Perception” is just about one solution and the methods to its continuation. “The Skill” offers the one idea that “Peak Oil” doesn’t contemplate and doesn’t talk about. While it is never mentioned, the idea in “The Skill” is never talked abut because it’s too radical of an idea for society to use. The ideas used in “Peak Oil” are at least reasonable and solutions can always be made for the problems that arise from the solutions. They both want to help stop global warming but each lack the idea that things can sometimes go right and not everything has to be so radical or have problems to it.
McBay, Aric. Peak Oil Survival Preparation for Life After Gridcrash. New York: The Lyons, 2006. Print.
Sewall, Laura. The Skill of Ecological Perception. 201-15. Print.
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Saturday, August 1, 2009
The Deconstruction of Whiteness and A World Without Us
The article “The Deconstruction of Whiteness” and the book The World Without Us act not as two different pieces of literature, but rather a continuation of one another. “The Deconstruction of Whiteness” is about how in early America, slaves were the building blocks for America. It talks about how the white people were taking black people from their homes and forcing them to work on plantations in America. This also relates to the actions early settlers took on Native Americans to take their land by expelling them to the west. It’s not just the racism that started global warming in the American country but also a simple little plant called tobacco.
Tobacco was the starting foundation for the economic system of America. Once it became a popular item to buy, plantations grew. With their increase in size the plantations required more workers which they got from Africa and were called slaves. The slaves were the beginning of the destruction of the Earth. In order for market workers to keep up the demand, the slaves were forced to work in the fields by cutting down the crops and trees to create a bigger plantation. According to Mr. Anthony, “At the point they realized that this one crop was a source of great potential wealth, they looked around for a labor force to cultivate the land. That’s when slavery began to develop and harden.” So not only did tobacco start global warming, but also slavery.
In The World Without Us, Alan Weisman is in the future, after global warming has started to take in effect and slavery is already gone. It talks in great detail on how the world would start to crumble at the thought of the disappearance of human civilization, according to Mr. Weisman, “Gradually, the asphalt jungle will give way to a real one.” It details on how we have deteriorated the planet with our consumption of the Earth’s plant life and moved on to using the resources at hand to create doomsday weapons like missiles and nukes.
It wasn’t the Earth that is killing us with deadly natural disasters, but rather ourselves. It’s always has been us from the beginning of industrialization of America to the construction of large cities to finally the creation of nuclear weapons. The article “The Deconstruction of Whiteness” starts from the beginning with our abuse on the planet to the end of the planet in the book The World Without Us. It’s a shocking idea but if mother earth doesn’t kill us with global warming, it will be our own species that have killed us not with weather, but with weapons.
Roszak, Theodore. The Deconstruction of Whiteness. New York: Sierra Club Books, 1995. Print
Weisman, Alan. The World Without Us. New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2007. Print.
Tobacco was the starting foundation for the economic system of America. Once it became a popular item to buy, plantations grew. With their increase in size the plantations required more workers which they got from Africa and were called slaves. The slaves were the beginning of the destruction of the Earth. In order for market workers to keep up the demand, the slaves were forced to work in the fields by cutting down the crops and trees to create a bigger plantation. According to Mr. Anthony, “At the point they realized that this one crop was a source of great potential wealth, they looked around for a labor force to cultivate the land. That’s when slavery began to develop and harden.” So not only did tobacco start global warming, but also slavery.
In The World Without Us, Alan Weisman is in the future, after global warming has started to take in effect and slavery is already gone. It talks in great detail on how the world would start to crumble at the thought of the disappearance of human civilization, according to Mr. Weisman, “Gradually, the asphalt jungle will give way to a real one.” It details on how we have deteriorated the planet with our consumption of the Earth’s plant life and moved on to using the resources at hand to create doomsday weapons like missiles and nukes.
It wasn’t the Earth that is killing us with deadly natural disasters, but rather ourselves. It’s always has been us from the beginning of industrialization of America to the construction of large cities to finally the creation of nuclear weapons. The article “The Deconstruction of Whiteness” starts from the beginning with our abuse on the planet to the end of the planet in the book The World Without Us. It’s a shocking idea but if mother earth doesn’t kill us with global warming, it will be our own species that have killed us not with weather, but with weapons.
Roszak, Theodore. The Deconstruction of Whiteness. New York: Sierra Club Books, 1995. Print
Weisman, Alan. The World Without Us. New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2007. Print.
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Socities psychology
The video “The Story of Stuff” gives a lot of information on what goes through the process of making a consumer item like an ipod for example. It gives informative details on how it starts from the Earth, to the factories where it is made, to the consumer’s shopping building, then to their home, and finally to the disposal of that item that they have bought. It’s a through process that takes much of the Earth’s natural resources and results in something that just creates more garbage. What Allen D. Kanner and Mary E. Gomes describe in their essay, “The All-Consuming Self” is how we, as Americans, are one of the top world consumers and have actually admitted to not stopping our world consumption. They say that the companies have found ways that trick our mind into buying their product. They create images that attract the viewer and, according to Kanner and Gomes, “…advertisers need to create a false image of the ideal consumer, one which people will wish to emulate.”
Companies have found ways to sell their product without changing much. All they do differently is convince the viewer that they are watching someone who has made a better life for themselves, that is really just a false life, just by buying that companies product. The commercials make the viewer think that they need this product and that if they don’t get it, they will never be successful. It has become more than some marketing trick and is now a way of life. According to both Kanner and Gomes, “According to Business Week, the average American is exposed to about three thousand ads a day.” Three thousand ads a day they say is what we view daily and what companies shove into our faces to buy their product. It’s become something more than just selling a product but now has actually become a way of life because of how much advertising has changed us as a society.
Kanner, Allen D., and Mary E. Gomes. The All-Consuming Self.
Companies have found ways to sell their product without changing much. All they do differently is convince the viewer that they are watching someone who has made a better life for themselves, that is really just a false life, just by buying that companies product. The commercials make the viewer think that they need this product and that if they don’t get it, they will never be successful. It has become more than some marketing trick and is now a way of life. According to both Kanner and Gomes, “According to Business Week, the average American is exposed to about three thousand ads a day.” Three thousand ads a day they say is what we view daily and what companies shove into our faces to buy their product. It’s become something more than just selling a product but now has actually become a way of life because of how much advertising has changed us as a society.
Kanner, Allen D., and Mary E. Gomes. The All-Consuming Self.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
A Background In A Photo
The world is changing and we aren’t caring enough on what is happening. This photo by amazing photographer Ryan Southen is from his collection called “Southen’s Photostream” shows just the amount of how much we really care about our planet. In the photo, clearly shown is a gym with people working out. In the background of the photo is a whole city with lights and smoke coming from air conditioners and other places in the area. It’s showing us how detached to we are from our world. We care too much on how we look and how we are around other people that we completely forget the impact we are causing on the planet at the same time. It’s a shocking, but true realization that needs to be noticed.
Leon Kolankiewicz said in the video “Immigration Numbers Rise – Environmental Suffers” that “the impact of the American growth was much greater because of our much higher levels of precapica consumption and technology.” He was saying that we, Americans, consume more resources than the rest of the whole world. We strive to use what resources we have to look our best and it’s what we use that is what we should be conserving, natural resources. As shown in the picture, we’d rather use lights, air conditioning, plastic bikes and metal dumbbells to gain a better look than just run outside, enjoy the fresh air, and not use any resources. It’s our addition to the Earth that is the main problem.
While I do believe in living a good life and having a nice look, it’s the Earth who needs the better look now. We are ruining our planet’s surface with unnecessary building. A company competes with other companies by creating stores or places that other stores down the street do the same thing. It’s an unnecessary waste of materials taken from this Earth. The only way to stop all this waste on places like extra gyms, food markets, malls, and stores is to place a ban on stores that sell the same thing in another store in the same city. The way to make sure this works is to keep the older store, get rid of the new one and make a park out of the empty space, saving another part of mother earth. It’s how I believe cities should be made.
(In the video quote, Leon spoke a work that I couldn't figure out how to spell. Precapica was what I thought he said.)
Photo:
Urban Lifestyle:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/southen/2184781085/in/photostream/
Immigration Numbers Rise – Environmental Suffers:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XW-NtQr89u4&fmt=18
Leon Kolankiewicz said in the video “Immigration Numbers Rise – Environmental Suffers” that “the impact of the American growth was much greater because of our much higher levels of precapica consumption and technology.” He was saying that we, Americans, consume more resources than the rest of the whole world. We strive to use what resources we have to look our best and it’s what we use that is what we should be conserving, natural resources. As shown in the picture, we’d rather use lights, air conditioning, plastic bikes and metal dumbbells to gain a better look than just run outside, enjoy the fresh air, and not use any resources. It’s our addition to the Earth that is the main problem.
While I do believe in living a good life and having a nice look, it’s the Earth who needs the better look now. We are ruining our planet’s surface with unnecessary building. A company competes with other companies by creating stores or places that other stores down the street do the same thing. It’s an unnecessary waste of materials taken from this Earth. The only way to stop all this waste on places like extra gyms, food markets, malls, and stores is to place a ban on stores that sell the same thing in another store in the same city. The way to make sure this works is to keep the older store, get rid of the new one and make a park out of the empty space, saving another part of mother earth. It’s how I believe cities should be made.
(In the video quote, Leon spoke a work that I couldn't figure out how to spell. Precapica was what I thought he said.)
Photo:
Urban Lifestyle:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/southen/2184781085/in/photostream/
Immigration Numbers Rise – Environmental Suffers:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XW-NtQr89u4&fmt=18
In Class Blog
What some people see that most scientists don’t is that it’s not our actions that are the cause for global warming, but instead immigration and the amount of people living on this planet. Leon Kolonkiewicz, a wildlife biologist and environmental planner, has been studying the ways human population is having an effect on the planet’s ecosystem and environment. He says in the video “Immigration Numbers Rise – Environmental Suffers” that “if you look at the oil imports, I can safely say that we wouldn’t even need any oil from the turbulent middle east if it weren’t for the 100 million people we’ve added since 1970.” Leon also suggests that it’s the population growth that is causing the increases in the amounts of carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases emissions. He is similar to Mark Maslin in that his information on carbon dioxide and greenhouse gas emissions by stating how it’s our fault, it’s our problem, and it’s our actions that have caused global warming. While I do believe Mark Maslin’s idea of slowing down carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases emissions, I believe more in what Leon is saying. It is the increase in population that has caused this world to become overpopulated and low on resources. I do suggest that we control the amount of growth population by limiting families to two children so that families do not overpopulate the world. It can be enforced by keeping yearly track of families and legalizing abortions to people who break that rule. It’s an effective way that would make sure the population growth is controlled.
Monday, July 20, 2009
Suburbia
The suburban lifestyle has changed drastically from when they were first really introduced in the 1950’s. They first started appearing after World War II when all of the soldier’s came home from the war. As shown in the video “1950’s”, the American Dream for everyone was to settle down in a nice suburban lifestyle and have a good job with a nice family. It was the year where people were starting to adjust to a life after the war and move on. Brand new inventions emerged like the plastic bag, microwave, and barcodes. Starting in 1950 and lasting until 1964, there was a boom in the increase of babies countrywide. It was a time where people were having babies right after the war. It became the era called the “Baby Boom” era. It also shows at the end how while the white folks were living perfect lives, the blacks were being abused and tortured. It’s a great representation of how the 1950’s was the start of the change of the country.
The video “Radiant City: Suburban Landscape” describes the way people got things back in the early days and up until now. People who built the cities decided to place everyday needs like gas and food stores far apart from each other. This was a way for people to keep buying gas and traveling around their suburban lives. This is also a huge contributor to global warming. Forcing people to travel from one place to the next just makes them use gas more and more. This resulted in more emissions of carbon dioxide, resulting in more greenhouse gases which is not at all what people were expecting back in the 1950’s when they first thought of this idea.
The other video, “Gangs and White Flight” created a huge contribution to global warming. In the video, they talk about how whites were first adjusting to the addition of black residents. They didn’t like how they were moving in and going to their schools so some had decided to take action. White gangs were created in response to their new residents. A gang called the Spook Hunters attacked black residents. This resulted in violent crimes and blacks to create their own gangs in retaliation. Having black gangs scared most of the white residents in the suburban area, causing them to move farther away. This forced the white’s to build new houses, use more supplies and create a whole new settlement away from the blacks. Creating a new city just because they were scared of the blacks was a dumb idea for the whites. They wasted tons of resources to restart their community and this resulted in problems that we face today like global warming.
Work Cited:
Racism Divides the Working Class - Gangs and White Flight:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVHMJz0IYQM
Radiant City: Suburban Landscape:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCeWCVWZbdo&feature=fvw
1950's:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhKhA2w4cXs&feature=related
The video “Radiant City: Suburban Landscape” describes the way people got things back in the early days and up until now. People who built the cities decided to place everyday needs like gas and food stores far apart from each other. This was a way for people to keep buying gas and traveling around their suburban lives. This is also a huge contributor to global warming. Forcing people to travel from one place to the next just makes them use gas more and more. This resulted in more emissions of carbon dioxide, resulting in more greenhouse gases which is not at all what people were expecting back in the 1950’s when they first thought of this idea.
The other video, “Gangs and White Flight” created a huge contribution to global warming. In the video, they talk about how whites were first adjusting to the addition of black residents. They didn’t like how they were moving in and going to their schools so some had decided to take action. White gangs were created in response to their new residents. A gang called the Spook Hunters attacked black residents. This resulted in violent crimes and blacks to create their own gangs in retaliation. Having black gangs scared most of the white residents in the suburban area, causing them to move farther away. This forced the white’s to build new houses, use more supplies and create a whole new settlement away from the blacks. Creating a new city just because they were scared of the blacks was a dumb idea for the whites. They wasted tons of resources to restart their community and this resulted in problems that we face today like global warming.
Work Cited:
Racism Divides the Working Class - Gangs and White Flight:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVHMJz0IYQM
Radiant City: Suburban Landscape:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCeWCVWZbdo&feature=fvw
1950's:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhKhA2w4cXs&feature=related
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
In-Class Assignment / Nightly Blog Assignment
Dear Person,
I understand that you choose not to believe global warming exists and I respect that opinion. What you do not know is the consequences of global warming and how what you believe in is actually false. What your parents do as CEO’s for a major oil company is destroying our planet and needs to stop. The reason you should believe me is because of what you are not seeing and what is hurting the planet daily. Increasing temperatures and carbon dioxide levels are the most dangerous to come from global warming.
The increasing temperature affects the world the most. With increasing temperature, the polar ice caps would melt, causing global water increases, flooding coastal cities and destroying them tell they are completely underwater. The increase would also affect the amount of rain dry places like deserts receive yearly and the amount of rain that places in wetter areas receive. Now, you might be saying how stupid this all sounds and how it could never happen. Well, to your surprise, all of what I have said already has happened, multiple times. Scientists have known this information by studying past glacial patterns and the air trapped in bubbles in the glacier. With this data, scientists have predicted the weather going back hundreds of thousands of years and have been able to predict future weather patterns using this same data. By going only a few decades in the future, predictions put our Earth’s temperature far higher than it ever was before, which scientists have deemed the name, global warming.
Now that you know about the increasing temperatures, I believe it’s a good time to talk about carbon dioxide increases. With ever car that is turned on, machines that are being used, factories that emit smoke, and destruction of forests for bigger homes, we are creating a build up of global carbon dioxide emission. Each day we give out tons and tons of carbon dioxide, much more that we have ever given in the past few hundred years only due to our recent advancements in technology that give off carbon dioxide, like oil companies and their drills. The cause for all of those increasing temperatures I’ve told you about is because of carbon dioxide emissions we, as a group worldwide, put out. It’s the biggest cause of global warming and it needs to be stopped, starting with factories and companies run by people like your father.
Sure, you could be reading all of this and be like, “Why am I reading all of this?”. Well, it’s to make sure that you start believing that global warming does exist and is a serious problem. Unlike disbelievers who give bad reasons to their ideas, there is actual proof to global warming. Those disbelievers claim that scientists have altered data to make global warming seem worse than it really is. My question to those who claim that is “Why would they change something that would affect the whole world?” It doesn’t make sense why hundreds of scientists would purposely fake data to get a point across.
Another claim that people who don’t think global warming exists is that it’s not our fault at all, but instead the sun’s fault. How does the sun affect the Earth other than giving us light, heat, and solar power? Sure, the sun gives off heat that builds up in the atmosphere but that’s because of our carbon dioxide emission that blocks the heat from leaving. Only recently, with increases of carbon dioxide emission has global warming and climate change gotten worse like a fruit that is left out for too long because it’s not attended to before it rots. Only we are to blame for our future demise.
People like Dr. Tim Ball who claims global warming doesn’t exist are to blame for all of the skeptic’s beliefs. Political people who have power that can change people’s opinions are a big problem. They try to counteract the truth with false facts that politicians like Al Gore have already proven true. It’s a hard thing to believe that people would think global warming is false but they are wrong and this is what you, as a skeptic, need to know or else it will definitely be people like you who are the cause for the end of the world through global warming.
Your Informative Friend,
--Eric Bobrow
Maslin, Mark. Global Warming: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford
University Press Inc, 2004.
I understand that you choose not to believe global warming exists and I respect that opinion. What you do not know is the consequences of global warming and how what you believe in is actually false. What your parents do as CEO’s for a major oil company is destroying our planet and needs to stop. The reason you should believe me is because of what you are not seeing and what is hurting the planet daily. Increasing temperatures and carbon dioxide levels are the most dangerous to come from global warming.
The increasing temperature affects the world the most. With increasing temperature, the polar ice caps would melt, causing global water increases, flooding coastal cities and destroying them tell they are completely underwater. The increase would also affect the amount of rain dry places like deserts receive yearly and the amount of rain that places in wetter areas receive. Now, you might be saying how stupid this all sounds and how it could never happen. Well, to your surprise, all of what I have said already has happened, multiple times. Scientists have known this information by studying past glacial patterns and the air trapped in bubbles in the glacier. With this data, scientists have predicted the weather going back hundreds of thousands of years and have been able to predict future weather patterns using this same data. By going only a few decades in the future, predictions put our Earth’s temperature far higher than it ever was before, which scientists have deemed the name, global warming.
Now that you know about the increasing temperatures, I believe it’s a good time to talk about carbon dioxide increases. With ever car that is turned on, machines that are being used, factories that emit smoke, and destruction of forests for bigger homes, we are creating a build up of global carbon dioxide emission. Each day we give out tons and tons of carbon dioxide, much more that we have ever given in the past few hundred years only due to our recent advancements in technology that give off carbon dioxide, like oil companies and their drills. The cause for all of those increasing temperatures I’ve told you about is because of carbon dioxide emissions we, as a group worldwide, put out. It’s the biggest cause of global warming and it needs to be stopped, starting with factories and companies run by people like your father.
Sure, you could be reading all of this and be like, “Why am I reading all of this?”. Well, it’s to make sure that you start believing that global warming does exist and is a serious problem. Unlike disbelievers who give bad reasons to their ideas, there is actual proof to global warming. Those disbelievers claim that scientists have altered data to make global warming seem worse than it really is. My question to those who claim that is “Why would they change something that would affect the whole world?” It doesn’t make sense why hundreds of scientists would purposely fake data to get a point across.
Another claim that people who don’t think global warming exists is that it’s not our fault at all, but instead the sun’s fault. How does the sun affect the Earth other than giving us light, heat, and solar power? Sure, the sun gives off heat that builds up in the atmosphere but that’s because of our carbon dioxide emission that blocks the heat from leaving. Only recently, with increases of carbon dioxide emission has global warming and climate change gotten worse like a fruit that is left out for too long because it’s not attended to before it rots. Only we are to blame for our future demise.
People like Dr. Tim Ball who claims global warming doesn’t exist are to blame for all of the skeptic’s beliefs. Political people who have power that can change people’s opinions are a big problem. They try to counteract the truth with false facts that politicians like Al Gore have already proven true. It’s a hard thing to believe that people would think global warming is false but they are wrong and this is what you, as a skeptic, need to know or else it will definitely be people like you who are the cause for the end of the world through global warming.
Your Informative Friend,
--Eric Bobrow
Maslin, Mark. Global Warming: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford
University Press Inc, 2004.
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