Why We Have Environmental Problems: Section 1-3

Major causes of the environmental problems we face are...

(1) population growth (2) wasteful and unsustainable resource use (3) poverty (4) failure to include the harmful environmental costs of goods and services in their market prices (5) increasing isolation from nature

Poverty

a condition in which people are unable to fulfill their basic needs for adequate food, water, shelter, health care, and education

Environmental Wisdom Worldview

holds that we are part of, and dependent on, nature and that the earth's life-support system exists for all species, not just for us

Planetary Management Worldview

holds that we are separate from and in charge of nature, that nature exists mainly to meet our needs and increasing wants, and that we can use our ingenuity and technology to manage the earth's life-support systems, mostly for our benefit, into the distant future

Stewardship Worldview

holds that we can and should manage the earth for our benefit, but that we have an ethical responsibility to be caring and responsible managers, or stewards, of the earth

Exponential Growth

occurs when a quantity such as the human population increases at a fixed percentage per unit of time, such as 1% or 2% per year

Environmental Ethics

the study of our various beliefs about what is right and wrong with how we treat the environment, provides important ways to examine our worldviews

Environmental Worldview

your set of assumptions and values reflecting how you think the world works and what you think your role in the world should be