Ch 10: Sustainability: Ethics, Culture, and History

two-thirds, 2025

According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, without wholesale reformation of water management practices on a global scale, ___-_______ of the world's population will face water shortages by _____, including densely populated regions of the United States.

adaptation

Focuses on the need for strategies to deal with the climate change that is unavoidable because of increased carbon already in the atmosphere.

ecological

From a sustainability viewpoint, history is __________ rather than dramatic or moral; that is, human events exhibit the same patterns of systems connectivity, complexity, and non-linear transformation that we observe in the organic world, from the genetic makeup of viruses to continental weather systems.

1. psychological: inherited mental frameworks that reward us for the normalization and simplification of complex realities. 2. social: economic and institutional arrangements designed to protect us from material wants, as well as from risk, shock, disorder, and violent change.

What are the two serious obstacles that our ability to grasp the sustainability imperative faces?

the subtle linkages between the hypoxic "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico and farming practices in the Mississippi River watershed.

What is a practical example of biocomplexity as the frame for studies in environmental sustainability?

"we must strive to avoid the unmanageable, while managing the unavoidable"

What is one popular sustainability policy mantra?

Green Revolution

Rapid diffusion of new agricultural technology, especially new high-yield seeds and fertilizers. averted the specter of a significant die-off in human population owing to stagnant crop yields

mitigation

Refers to the importance of reducing carbon emissions so as to prevent further, catastrophic changes in the climate system.

knowledge, attitudes

Social behavior and political decision-making are not being driven by __________, but rather by entrenched __________ that perpetuate an unsustainable drawdown of earth's resources.

externalization

The process by which costs inherent to the production of goods - particularly environmental costs - are not included in the actual price paid.

closed loops

The sustainable reform of industrial production and waste management emphasizes the recycling of materials back into the environment or into the industrial cycle, that is, to eliminate the concept of waste entirely.

necessity

This Faustian power signals both our strength and vulnerability. We are dependent on the very ecosystems we dominate. That is, we have become carbon-dependent by choice, but we are ecosystem-dependent by __________.

carbon neutrality

To be carbon neutral, the carbon emissions of a consumable product or human activity must either not involve the consumption of carbon-based energy (a difficult thing to achieve under our present regime), or offset that consumption through the drawdown of an equivalent amount of atmospheric carbon during its lifecycle.

resilience and vulnerability (resilience is eroded to breaking point)

Two core concepts of sustainability studies

synchronic

patterns of repetition and equilibrium. migratory patterns of birds, plant and animal reproduction, or the microbial ecology of a lake or river. examines the interrelated parts of the system at any given moment, assuming a stable state

diachronic

progressively evolving over historical time. include the history of trade and finance, colonization and frontier development, and technology and urbanization. looks at the changes in a system over time.

The Great Acceleration

refers to the period after World War II, during which human population and economic activities grew at a greater rate than in the past. "over the past 50 years, humans have changed ecosystems more rapidly and extensively than in any comparable period of time in human history, largely to meet rapidly growing demands for food, fresh water, timber, fiber, and fuel. This has resulted in a substantial and largely irreversible loss in the diversity of life on Earth."

biocomplexity

the chaotically variable interaction of organic elements on multiple scales, the defining characteristic of all ecosystems, inclusive of humans. seeks to understand this nonlinear functioning of elements across multiple scales of time and space, from the molecular to the international, from the microsecond to millennia and deep time.

systems literacy

the core of sustainability studies, an evolved form of cross-disciplinary practice, calling for intellectual competence (not necessarily command) in a variety of fields in order to better address specific real-world environmental problems. combines the study of social history and cultural discourses with a technical understanding of ecosystem processes. Only this combination offers a comprehensive view of real-world environmental challenges as they are unfolding in the twenty-first century.

Anthropocene

the modern geological era during which humans have dramatically affected the environment. we are no longer biological creatures, but biophysical agents, reshaping the ecology of the entire planet, and shaping the fates of all species.

our cultural institutions

these have evolved to offer a counterweight to the complacency and inertia encouraged by other simple, security-focused principles governing our lives.

arts and sciences

they perform the same social function: they remind us of what lies beyond the dominant security paradigm of our societies - which tends to a simplified and binary view of human being and nature - by bringing us closer to a complex, systemic understanding of how the natural world works and our embeddedness within it.

intergenerational contract

to provide for our present needs, while not compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs.

fruits, harnessing

A stern judgment of the recent past: we have not adapted well, as a species, to the _______ of our own brilliant technological accomplishments, in particular, to the __________ of fossil fuels to power transport and industry.

metabolic

A useful counter-metaphor for sustainability studies, to offset this habitual view of nature as separate, is to think of human and natural systems in __________ terms.

normalization

An acquired evolutionary trait characteristic of human beings, whereby even radical changes are quickly adapted to and represented as normal.

instrumentalist

An attitude to environmental resources characteristic of the last 500-year period of global human economic development, whereby ecosystem provisions - water, minerals, oil and gas, etc. - are perceived only in terms of their use value to human beings, rather than as integral elements of a wider natural system.

remote responsibilities

An ethical extension of systems literacy and the principle of connectivity: we are linked to peoples and places remote from us through the web of global industrial production and commerce, and thus have responsibility toward them.

common but differentiated responsibilities

An ethical framework, promoted particularly by developing nations, that recognizes mitigation of global warming as a shared responsibility, but at the same time argues that the wealthy, industrialized countries of the West that have been the historical beneficiaries of carbon-based development should accept a greater burden for both reducing global carbon emissions, and providing developing nations with the technology and economic means to modernize in sustainable ways.

waste

In important ways, the problem of unsustainability is a problem of _____.

CCD, Nosema

In strictly pathogenic terms, ___ is caused by the combination of a virus (called Iridoviridae or IIV) and a microsporidian fungus called ______. The specific interaction between the pathogens, and why they cause bees in their millions to vacate their hives, is not understood. What is becoming clear, however, is the increasing burden being placed on bees by the human agricultural system, a burden that has rendered bees increasingly vulnerable to epidemic infection

lifecycle

In terms of sustainability, the entire lifecycle of a product must be measured for its environmental impact, not simply its point of production, consumption, or disposal. A key aspect of general sustainability education is the understanding of where goods originate, the industrial processes required for their manufacture and transport, and their fate after use.

to a complex, connected model of the world and our place in it.

In the end, how must we adapt our thinking?

human, perennial

Sustainability is a _____ and social issue as much as it is "environmental." Sustainability is about people, the habitats we depend on for services vital to us, and our ability to maintain culturally rich civic societies free from _________ crises in food, water, and energy supplies.

Dark Age

The environmental historian Sing Chew sees in the cluster of environmental crises of the early 21st century the hallmarks of a potential new ____ ___, that is, a period of conflict, resource scarcity and cultural impoverishment such as has afflicted the global human community only a few times over the past 5 millennia.

biophilia

adaptive trait that is a product of our long species evolution as hunters and agricultural land managers, a love for the natural world that provides for us.

precautionary principle

central to sustainability issues. The proposition that decision-making should be driven by a concern for the avoidance of bad outcomes. In environmental terms, this means coordinating economic development and the profit motive with the need to maintain resilient ecosystems.

connectivity

complex chains linking our everyday lives to distant strangers and ecosystems in far flung regions of the earth, we have no choice

nonlinear (increase)

economic growth, and the corresponding drawdown of natural resources

interdisciplinary

encourages students to explore connections between traditionally isolated disciplines and has been a reformist educational priority for several decades in the United States.

cornucopian

namely that the earth's bounty, adapted to our use by human ingenuity, guarantees a perpetual growth in goods and services. At the root of this worldview lies a brand of technological triumphalism, an unshakeable confidence in technological innovation to solve all social and environmental problems, be it world hunger, climate change, or declining oil reserves.