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ESC110 CHAPTER ONEUNDERSTANDING OUR

ENVIRONMENT

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Chapter One Readings & Objectives

Required Reading

Cunningham & Cunningham, Chapter One: Understanding Our Environment

After finishing Chapter One you should be able to:•define the term environment and identify some important environmental concerns that we face today;

•explain the scientific method and why it refutes or supports theories, but never proves them beyond any doubt;

•apply the scientific method to problem solving;

•explain how statistics can help evaluate the accuracy and significance of results;

•summarize four stages in the history of conservation;

•distinguish among analytical, creative, logical, critical, and reflective thinking;

•summarize some major environmental dilemmas and issues that shape our current environmental agenda; and,

•discuss the implications of sustainability and sustainable development.

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Chapter One Key Terms

analytical thinking – page 11 of text

biocentric preservation 15

blind experiments 6 controlled studies 6 creative thinking 11 critical thinking 11 deductive reasoning 7 double-blind design 6 environment 3 environmental science 3 global environmentalism 17 hypothesis 7 inductive reasoning 7 logical thinking 11

arithmetic mean 8 modern environmentalism 16 paradigms 10 parsimony 5 probability 10 reflective thinking 11 reproducibility 6 sample 8 scientific theory 8 significant numbers 6 statistics 8 sustainability 21 sustainable development 21 utilitarian conservation 15

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Chapter 1 Topics

• Understanding Our Environment (Dredging the Hudson)

• Science as a Way of Knowing• Investigating our Environment• Thinking About Thinking• A Brief History of Conservation &

Environmentalism• Current Environmental Conditions• Human Dimensions of environmental science

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The Planet Earth

• Unique in the universe (?)• Mild, relatively constant

temperatures• Biogeochemical cycles• Millions of species• Diverse, self-sustaining

communities

PART 1: UNDERSTANDING OUR ENVIRONMENT

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Environment is the circumstances and conditions that surround an organism or a group of organisms.

Environmental science is the systematic study of our environment and our place in it.

Ecology is the study of an organism or organisms, the impact of the environment on them, and their impact on the environment.

Environmental Science

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Part 2: Science as a Way of Knowing

• Modern science has its roots in antiquity

• Greek philosophers

• Arabic mathematicians and astronomers

• Chinese naturalists

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Scientific Investigation

• Deductive vs. inductive reasoning

• Hypothesis - a conditional explanation that can be verified or falsified

• Scientific theory - an explanation that is supported by an overwhelming body of data and experience

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Models and Natural ExperimentsModels• Simulate real environmental systems;• Can be physical or mathematical;• Provide heuristic information (suggestions of how

things MIGHT be); and• Are influenced by researchers' assumptions.

Natural Experiments• Gathering of historic evidence; and• Conducted by scientists who can't test their

hypotheses directly.

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• In some ways, children are the “ultimate” practical scientists…no pre-conceived bias in their investigations.

• However, Society uses numbers, called “statistics” to let you evaluate and compare things. Information known by one person isn’t useful to Society.

Open Minds are Learning Minds

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Scientific Design

• Blind Experiment– Conducted so investigators do not know

which is the control and which is the experimental group, until after data have been gathered and analyzed.

• Double-Blind– Neither the subject nor the investigators

know which participants are receiving an experimental treatment.

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Statistics and ProbabilityQuantitative data• Precise and easily compared; and• Good benchmarks for measuring change.

Probability• Measure of how likely something is; and• High degree of scientific certainty: 95% probability.

Statistics• Important tool in both planning and evaluating scientific

studies; and• Sample size, number of replications important.

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Paradigms and Scientific Consensus

Paradigms • Overarching models of the world that guide our

interpretation of events• Examples: tectonic plate movement, Einstein's theory of

relativity

Paradigm shift • Occurs when a majority of scientists accept that the old

explanation no longer explains new observations very well

• Paradigm shifts are sometimes contentious and political.

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Part 3: Thinking About Thinking

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Table 1.3 Steps in Critical Thinking

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Applying Critical Thinking• Identify and evaluate premises and

conclusions in an argument;• Acknowledge and clarify uncertainties,

vagueness, equivocation, and contradictions; • Distinguish between facts and values;• Recognize and assess assumptions;• Distinguish source reliability or unreliability;

and• Recognize and understand conceptual

frameworks.

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Steps in Critical Thinking• Identify and evaluate premises and conclusions

in an argument.• Acknowledge and clarify uncertainties,

vagueness, equivocation, and contradictions.• Distinguish between facts and values.• Recognize and assess assumptions.• Distinguish source reliability or unreliability.• Recognize and understand conceptual

frameworks.

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Part 4. History of Conservation and Environmentalism

Four Distinct Stages:– Pragmatic Resource Conservation– Moral and Aesthetic Nature Preservation– Modern Environmentalism– Global Environmental Citizenship

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Pragmatic Resource Conservation

President Theodore Roosevelt and his chief conservation advisor, Gifford Pinchot, believed in utilitarian conservation.– Forests should be saved so they can be

used to provide homes and jobs.– Should be used for “the greatest good for

the greatest number, for the longest time.”

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Moral and Aesthetic Nature Preservation

John Muir, first president of the Sierra Club,

opposed Pinchot’s utilitarian policies.– Biocentric Preservation– emphasizes the fundamental right of all

organisms to pursue their own interests

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Modern Environmentalism

Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (1962) started the modern environmental movement.

– awakened the public to threats of pollution and toxic chemicals to humans as well as other species

– modern environmentalism extends concerns to include both natural resources and environmental pollution.

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Global Concerns

Increased travel and communication enables

people to know about daily events in places

unknown in previous generations.

Global environmentalism is the recognition

that we share one environment that is common to

all humans.

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Part 5: Current Environmental Conditions

• Half the world's wetlands were lost in the last 100 years.

• Land conversion and logging have shrunk the world's forests by as much as 50%.

• Nearly three-quarters of the world's major marine fish stocks are over-fished or are being harvested beyond a sustainable rate.

• Soil degradation has affected two-thirds of the world's agricultural lands in the last 50 years.

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Major Causes of Environmental Degradation

(1) Population Growth

• More than 6 billion people now occupy the earth, and we are adding about 85 million more each year.

• In the next decade, most population growth will be in the poorer countries - countries where present populations already strain resources and services

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• burning of fossil fuels• destruction of tropical

rainforests and other biologically rich landscapes

• production of toxic wastes

(2) Resource Extraction and Use

Major Causes of Environmental Degradation (cont’d)

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Major Causes of Environmental Degradation (cont’d): Acid Deposition

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Part 6: Human Dimensions of Environmental Science

• More than 1.3 billion people live in acute poverty, with an income of less than $1 (US) per day. These people generally lack access to an adequate diet, decent housing, basic sanitation, clean water, education, medical care, and other essentials.

• Four out of five people in the world live in what would be considered poverty in industrialized countries.

• The world's poorest people are often forced to meet short-term survival needs at the cost of long-term sustainability.

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The American Lifestyle

To get an average American through the day takesabout 1,000 pounds of raw materials, including• 40 pounds of fossil fuels• 22 pounds of wood and paper• 119 gallons of water.

Every year, Americans throw away some 160 million tons of garbage, including• 50 million tons of paper• 67 billion cans and bottles• 18 billion disposable diapers.

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If everyone in the world tried to live at consumption levels approaching ours, the results would be disastrous.

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SustainabilitySustainability

How can the nations of the world produce the goods and services needed to improve life for everyone without overtaxing the environmental systems and natural resources on which we all depend?

Sustainable development:progress in human well-being that we can extend or prolong

over many generations, rather than just a few years.

To be truly enduring, the benefits of sustainable development must be available to all humans, not just to the members of a privileged group.

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Indigenous Peoples

Indigenous peoples are generally among the least powerful, most neglected groups.– In many countries, traditional caste systems,

discriminatory laws, economics, or prejudices repress indigenous peoples.

– In many places, indigenous people in traditional homelands guard undisturbed habitats and rare species.

– Recognizing native land rights may safeguard ecological processes.

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Summary:• Environmental Science

• Science As a Way of Knowing

– Scientific Design

– Reasoning

– Scientific Theory

• Approaches to Thinking

• History of Environmentalism

• Human Dimensions

– Rich and Poor Countries

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Test Your Understanding

Review of lesson objectives: After mastering the material in this lesson, you

should be able to

• define the term “environment” and identify some important environmental concerns that we face today

• explain the scientific method and why it refutes or supports theories, but never proves them beyond any doubt

• apply the scientific method to problem solving

• explain how statistics can help evaluate the accuracy and significance of results

• summarize four stages in the history of conservation

• distinguish among analytical, creative, logical, critical, and reflective thinking

• summarize some major environmental dilemmas and issues that shape our current environmental agenda

• discuss the implications of sustainability and sustainable development

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