The Delicate Balance, Part 1: The Human Imprint
The last half century or so has seen the impact of human enterprise on the environment escalate beyond the collective impact of humans over the previous four billion years. Human endeavors have changed the composition of the atmosphere, changed the...
The Delicate Balance, Part 1: Ecological Globalization
The industrialized world is responsible for most of the environmental devastation of the twentieth century. But an emerging middle class in countries like China and India have the potential to take an unprecedented toll on the environment because of...
The Delicate Balance, Part 1: The Cost of Science, Technology, and Population Growth
The impact of modern science and technology on the biosphere is profound. The earth's natural ecosystems have the ability to cleanse the water; recycle wastes, turning them back into nutrients; pollinate crops; generate and maintain soils and more, ...
The Delicate Balance, Part 1: Reason for Optimism
Ecological refugees-people whose environment is so degraded that it no longer supports the social fabric of the country are a growing concern in every industrialized country. Many other population issues exist, but changes have been seen, too. In co...
The Delicate Balance, Part 1: Economics vs. Environmentalism OR What's a Tree Worth?
The impact of the corporate mind-set on the environment. Modern culture tends to view the world through an economic value filter, ignoring the larger value of natural resources, such as trees, to the planet's ecosystems.
The Delicate Balance, Part 1: Technology is Not Always the Answer
The Biosphere 2 experiment attempted to create a human engineered self sustaining environmental system. The experiment served to illustrate how little is understood about the workings of our natural ecosystems services.
The Delicate Balance, Part 1: Exponential Population Growth
It took thousands of years for mankind to evolve from nomadic hunter-gatherers to farmers settled in towns and villages. It took only centuries from that point until Thomas Malthus postulated, in the 18th century, that human population would grow at...
The Delicate Balance, Part 1: Demography of Population Growth
Projecting population growth begins with three basic assumptions: everyone is born at age zero, everyone dies, and the earth is a closed system. Based on current fertility patterns, the world population will reach 296 billion people by 2150, compare...
The Delicate Balance, Part 1: John Muir
One of the first voices in the environmental consciousness movement was John Muir, who lobbied for preservation and the creation of the National Park System. He also founded the Sierra Club in 1892.