Comments due by 11:59pm Saturday, November 23, 2013.
In class you have read both "Deep Ecology" by Bill Devall and George Sessions and "People or Penguins: The Case for Optimal Pollution" by William Baxter. Here I want you to reflect critically on both essays.
What claims did you find striking in both essays? Did they make any plausible arguments? If so, which ones? And why should we find them plausible? Did they offer some implausible arguments? If so, which ones, and why should we think they are implausible?
Press each other here. Challenge one another. Get after these issues. Demand reasons. And as always, be gracious, charitable, and humble. Learn from each other.
The plausible I found in the essays is that if we learned how to manage our money better we could be putting it to good use instead of spending it on pointless things such as giving money to other countries. Implausible I got from Baxter's essay was that we shouldn't care what happens to the animals. Which I think is not true animals have a say just like humans do. Maybe they cannot vote but we are suppose to speak for them. There should be no reason that animals have to live a more miserable life than what us humans do. We are contributing to the extinction of some animals by releasing CO2 and other gases into the atmosphere and speeding up the process of global warming and slowly killing off polar bears and penguins.
ReplyDelete~Tara J.
Bill Devall and George Sessions did not make solid arguments throughout their article “Deep Ecology”. Even though every living thing has value and the reason to live, not all living beings have equal value and the equal reason to live. For example, both human and non-human animals need to take the life of a living thing to live, whether that be a plant life or and animal life. Either way, a life that had a value was taken. However, that value of life of the plant or animal was less than the value of the life of the one who had to eat to live. Part of the natural environment is taking the lives of living beings to survive, thus, by altering that part of the environment, the ecosystem would fall apart. Therefore, humans do need to care for other living beings but they cannot transform their lives in a way to protect the lives of every living thing that exists in the world, but rather transform their lives in a way that would protect the environment and the way it is suppose to run without human input.
ReplyDeleteIn William F. Baxter’s article “People or Penguins: The Case for Optimal Pollution”, Baxter also did not have a compelling argument in his article. He placed little value on the plants and animals that share the world with us and help create the climate we need to survive. He assumed that humans can make whatever they wish and if they destroy one thing then they can fix it by making something else in return. However, if humanity destroys the environment, they cannot fix it, they cannot remake it in a way that can sustain human life. Humans are not the only living beings on the earth and if we live that way, every species, including humanity, will suffer. Even if humans ignore the cost of being more energy efficient and strive to ‘live better’, with the mind set that they are the only important species in the world, the environment will still crumble. Humans cannot give up the world’s needs to save their personal wants and still expect the world to be in one piece. Thus, Baxter had a poor argument with little logic on how to treat the world around us.
Mollie B
one that I claim that I found striking was in "Deep Ecology". He said that we need to start using things to prevent having kids and even use abortion. Todays day and age abortion is a huge issue and seems to me to be frowned upon more than a positive thing to have going on. He did say that they more people we have the more pollution that there is going to be per person and that there will be more money spent while we could be spending it on our planet and where it is needed. We should find this plausible because of the fact that some people don't know when to stop having kids and then when they can no longer pay for them all it is up to the people to pick up paying where they left off. I feel that this money could be used else where to help better the world that we live in. In this article I didn't really find anything that was implausible.
ReplyDeleteIn the other article "people or penguins" he says something plausible in my mind. He says that people are always saying that we need to be concerned about our environment and such but they are never really willing to give what it takes to take care of it. He said that once people see or hear the price tag on how much the project to better the environment is going to cost the people back away. We should find this one plausible because it is very true. But when it comes down to it we have famous people buying gold purses and dresses and everything that cost millions of dollars that could be used for something like saving our environment. one thing that is see that is implausible to me however is that he is okay with getting rid of a hospital to lessen the pollution in that area. This is just a dumb idea. what if that hospital was the closest one within 100 miles and somebody was having a heart attack or was in a bad car accident? That person could not get the help they needed fast enough and would most likely die so im not sure how that is a good thing in his eyes just to cut back the pollution. This part I didn't find too plausible but I surely can agree with his first argument.
Chelsea
I feel like i understood the "People and Penguins" a lot better than I did the "Ecology" one.They made some arguments such as if the DDT is harming the penguins then why not just stop using it? Why be selfish. It is just like us stopping the use of some sort of product that is harming us humans, we do it because we want to be protected, so why not do it for them? They were talking about the ends and the means, honestly I was a bit confused by that but I kind of took it as how important should we label it all when it came to humans and animals or even trees and plants. I mean half of the carbon dioxide and the oxygen in the air comes from those plants and decomposing animals so why not make them just as important as we are? I mean any kind of pollution should be stopped, we have better health and living when it is. They even said that multiple times in the reading so why not strive for that? It will not only help the animals and the plants and our entire planet but it will also benefit greatly when it comes to our health as humans.
ReplyDelete--Kiersten Johnson
From the first article by Baxter the message i received was to look out for human kind. Although it is backed by the idea that what was best for us is also best for non human life, overall i think it was a poor point. one of the ideas he offered however, was this thought that his principles were so general, that it would be pointless for for someone to ask why, or question it. this is a fairly good idea. When he gives his criteria, it truly is hard to argue with. However the fact that he says it is pointless to ask "why" i think this is wrong. The question of "why" should always be asked, even on ideas as agreeable as the ones he states. If this question is not asked then eventually we become complacent, and that paves the way for more tings like pollution to happen.
ReplyDeleteIn the other article by Devall and Sessions the major point i took away was from the section about Self-Realization. This basically said we need to grow up, and fully mature in order to really change anything. This was a good point because apathy leads to taking the easy way out, and these types of things cause pollution to happen.
-Matt Powers
In Baxter's article it surprised me that he was all for saving humans and lookout for humans, but there was no concern for nature or animals. It seemed to me that he just did not care about nature around, him when nature is the one thing that affects him everyday. Every human does not affect him everyday, so why worry about humans so much but not about nature including animals… including penguins.
ReplyDeleteI found Devall and Sessions article to me very interesting. They talked a lot about the emotional and thought process of humans and how just those intangible things affect the environment. For example they talked about how humans always want to be in control, over other humans and over nonhuman things, like the environment. But then they stated that the more forced control over something the more mass chaos it will cause, and I do agree with this statement. It have been proven time and time again that the more someone tries to take control the more problems arise. Then the article talks about "Self-Realization" and I think this section needs to be read by a lot of people. I liked that it talked about how people need look at themselves and realize they need to be their adult self, take responsibility and be mature in your decisions, because your decisions dont always just affect you, they can affect other humans and even nature. Like the article said no one really wins, unless everyone wins.
--Alyssa Toupin
I hate that in Baxter's article he says that items in nature is irrelevant. He only cares about what effects his fellow humans. Does he not realize that those items in nature also effect him too?
ReplyDeleteIn the other article, "Deep Ecology," they talked about how for every animal, being human or non-human, to live another meaningful life would have to be taken. Be that life a a plant or animal. Also, that fact that as humans all we really want to do is have control over everything that happens around us. Though, in reality, the more we try to control things, the more issues it causes. When one attempts to make a law regarding something, you will then have those who rebel against it. It just doesn't always work.
~Kimber Creteau
In the article, "People vs Penguins", Baxter talks about how animals and plants (basically anything nonhuman) do not effect how we should treat the Earth. He says that we should treat the Earth as humans need it, and then usually, what is good for the humans is good for everything else. I don't agree whatsoever. Humans, nonhumans, and plants all need each other to survive. We need to take into consideration what they need and think about how we effect them.
ReplyDeleteIn the article "Deep Ecology" the authors' main point is that of Self-Realization. They say that we need to develop a consciousness of the Earth. We need this self-realization in order to try to do anything about the planet. We can't just sit by and let others do the work for us. We need to actively take a stand. I agree with this. They also talk about how humans always try to be dominant in every way; whether it be over animals, the Earth, or even other humans. I agree with this and think that trying to be dominant over everything is wrong. It just causes more problems in the end,
Both Articles were surprisingly interesting in their own way. The “Deep Ecology” one was intriguing to me because the authors called for us to be consciously aware of nature and that in order to protect it and preserve the environment, we need not be experts in environmentalism. We each can do our own part in protecting Mother Nature and everything on this earth.
ReplyDeleteThe other article about the penguins or people, said something about how we misuse our resources and capital. This cannot be any truer in my mind because we do take our resources for granted every day. We need to realize and then act on the fact that instead of having another washing machine, like the article says, we could use it to help the environment and help with the pollution problem.
--Matt Pulter
The People or Penguins essay had a valid point that in order to get less environmental pollution, people will have to give up goods. However, I feel that the author implied that too many goods would have to be given up in order to obtain a decrease in pollution that we need. He even mentioned that hospitals, as goods, would be given up to contribute the goods and labor to pollution reduction. I don't feel that important goods and labor would need to be given up for pollution reduction. Think of all the trivial good produced in the world--like the plastic toys in a McDonald's meal. Those goods are produced on mass scales and doing away with them and putting their resources to pollution reduction would be very beneficial. We could alter the way we produce food and therefore cut down on the largest source of pollution we have. This way we could keep our hospitals.
ReplyDelete--Monica T
In the People or Penguins, William makes many strong suggestions that are viable statements. In order for people to begin to limit the amount of pollution, then there are many things that people need to begin to stop using. I do not agree with the statement that things like hospitals are a "good" but it cutting down on non-recyclable plastics is something that would benefit the environment. In the "Deep Ecology" article, the authors present a more self reflective approach towards cleaning the earth. They say that it is a constant self-questioning about if what you are doing is acceptable for the environment. I feel that this is a good way to look at things, but it does not exactly give you a guideline to follow. My opinion is that you are the only one who can judge if what you are doing is correct or not and that it would be a never ending cycle of what-ifs by someone.
ReplyDelete-Cameron K
In baxters argument, I thought he was selfish, he only cared about himself. He thought that nature and nonhumans have no effect on him or other humans but this is not true. How we treat the environment and animals affects us.. And those animals do include penguins. Every animal has its purpose in the world.
ReplyDeleteDevall and sessions argument was very true and enlightening. They said that humans have a need to control everything around them which includes other people, but if there's too much control then it will cause chaos. That is very true in my opinion, if people try to control and contain other people too much it will cause an uprising against the people who would cause the constricting.
--Michelle F.