Unit 1 Notes

Unit 1 comprehensive summary (1.1, 1.2, 1.3)

Perspectives

• A perspective is how a situation is viewed, based on personal and collective assumptions, values, and beliefs.

• Perspectives are informed by sociocultural norms, scientific understandings, laws, religion, economic conditions, events, and lived experience.

Values

• Values are qualities or principles considered important.

• Organizational values are reflected in advertisements, media, policies, and actions.

• Value surveys can investigate perspectives on environmental issues and how values impact these issues.

Worldviews

• Worldviews are shared lenses through which groups perceive and act within their environment, shaping values and perspectives.

• Examples:

  • Buddhism: all living things are interdependent; humans are not more important.

  • Christianity and Islam: belief in 'dominion' over the earth (though Islam also emphasizes humans as caretakers).

  • Native American: communal property, subsistence economy, oral tradition, polytheistic religion with spirituality in nature.

Environmental Value System (EVS)

• EVS is a model showing inputs (media, education, worldview) affecting perspectives and outputs (judgments, actions).

• EVS Spectrum:

  • Ecocentric: ecology and nature-centered, prioritizes biorights and self-sufficiency.

  • Anthropocentric: humans manage the global system sustainably using regulations and legislation.

  • Technocentric: technology solves environmental problems, prioritizes the economy, encourages scientific research.

• Extreme EVS:

  • Deep Ecologists: reject materialism.

  • Cornucopians: environmental concerns should not inhibit economic growth.

• EVS overlap and complement each other, rarely fitting perfectly into classifications.

Changing Perspectives

• Perspectives evolve over time, influenced by campaigns and social changes.

• Influenced by:

  • Literature (e.g., Rachel Carson's Silent Spring).

  • Activists (e.g., Greta Thunberg).

  • Media (e.g., An Inconvenient Truth).

  • Disasters (e.g., Fukushima).

  • International agreements (e.g., Paris Agreement/COP 21).

  • Technological developments (e.g., Green Revolution).

  • Scientific discoveries (e.g., biodiversity loss).

Systems

• A system is a set of interrelated parts working together, living or non-living, applicable at various scales.

• Systems approach visualizes interactions, producing emergent properties.

System Diagrams

• Composed of storages (boxes) and flows (arrows).

• Flows: inputs and outputs of energy and matter; transfers (change in location) or transformations (change in state/nature).

  • Transfers: movement of energy/matter without changing its state (e.g., herbivore to carnivore).

  • Transformations: change in state/nature (e.g., photosynthesis).

Open and Closed Systems

• Open system: exchanges energy and matter.

• Closed system: exchanges only energy, rare in nature (e.g., global geochemical cycles, Earth as an 'almost' closed system).

Gaia Hypothesis

• Earth and its biological systems act as a single entity with self-regulating negative feedback loops.

• Based on constant temperature, atmospheric composition, and ocean salinity.

Feedback Loops

• Negative feedback (stabilizing): inhibits or reverses a process to reduce change (e.g., sweating in hot weather).

• Positive feedback (destabilizing): amplifies a disturbance, leading to a new equilibrium or tipping point (e.g., melting ice caps).

Equilibrium

• Equilibrium: tendency to return to original state after disturbance.

• Steady-state equilibrium: constant inputs of energy/matter, system remains stable (e.g., climax ecosystem).

• Stable vs. unstable equilibria: return to the same vs. new equilibrium after disturbance.

Tipping Points

• Minimum change causing destabilization.

• Characteristics: positive feedback, threshold, long-lasting changes, hard to reverse, time lag.

• Examples: lake eutrophication, extinction of keystone species.

Models of Systems

• Simplified version of reality used to understand and predict system behavior.

• Formats: graphs, diagrams, equations, simulations, words.

• Strengths: easier to work with, can predict effects, identify patterns.

• Weaknesses: loss of accuracy, wrong assumptions lead to errors.

Emergent Properties

• Appear as system components interact (e.g., ecosystem stability, climate patterns, urban heat islands).

Resilience of Systems

• Tendency to avoid tipping points and maintain stability; capacity to recover from disturbance.

• Diversity and storage size contribute to resilience.

• Eucalypt forests adapted to survive fires.

• Loss of resilience due to human activities (e.g., deforestation).

Sustainability

• Measure of long-term viability of a system; responsible maintenance of socio-ecological systems.

• Enhancing system resilience increases sustainability.

Pillars of Sustainability

• Environmental, social, and economic.

• True sustainability achieved when all three are in balance.

• Weak vs. Strong Sustainability models.

Environmental Sustainability

• Managing resources for replacement and ecosystem recovery; focuses on resource depletion, pollution, and biodiversity.

• Natural capital (resources) and natural income (yield from resources).

• Ecological overshoot: humanity's demand exceeds what Earth can renew annually.

Social Sustainability

• Creating structures supporting human well-being (health, education, equity).

Economic Sustainability

• Creating economic structures supporting production and consumption for future needs; relies on environmental sustainability.

Sustainable Development

• Meeting present needs without compromising future generations.

• Framework for human civilization development with economic stability, social equity, and ecological integrity.

Unsustainable Resource Use

• Can lead to ecosystem collapse (e.g., Newfoundland Cod Fishery).

• GDP as a measure may cause unsustainable development; Green GDP accounts for environmental costs.

Environmental Justice

• Right to a pollution-free environment and equitable resource access, regardless of demographics.

• Examples: Bulakan Shanty (Jakarta), Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill.

Inequalities

• Disparities in access to water, food, and energy due to income, race, gender, and culture.

• Reasons for varying consumption include access, quantity, wealth, technology, and infrastructure.

Sustainability Indicators

• Quantitative measures of biodiversity, pollution, population, climate change, footprints; applied locally to globally.

Ecological and Carbon Footprints

• Ecological Footprint: area of land/water required to provide resources and absorb waste.

• Carbon Footprint: amount of greenhouse gases produced.

• Water Footprint: water use.

• Biocapacity: area's capacity to generate resources and absorb wastes; unsustainability if footprint exceeds biocapacity.

Citizen Science

• Role in monitoring Earth systems and resource sustainability.

Sustainability Models

• Simplified versions of reality with uses and limitations.

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

• UN goals and targets for social and environmental sustainability.

• Uses: common ground for policymaking, galvanizing international community.

• Limits: goals not far enough, bureaucratic, ignoring local contexts, lacking data.

Planetary Boundaries Model

• Identifies limits of human disturbance to Earth systems.

• Uses: identifies limits, highlights need, alerts public.

• Limitations: focuses on ecology, work in progress, focus on global.

Doughnut Economics Model

• Framework for a regenerative and distributive economy.

• Includes social foundation (SDGs) and ecological ceiling (planetary boundaries).

• Uses: ecological and social elements, popular awareness, supports action.

• Limitations: work in progress, advocates principles, does not propose specific policies.

Circular Economy Model

• Promotes decoupling economic activity from finite resources.

• Principles: eliminating waste and pollution, circulating products and materials, regenerating nature.
  Butterfly Diagram.

• Uses: regeneration, emission reduction, community support, consumer habit changes.

• Limitations: lack of awareness, regulations, technical limitations, finance.