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The emergence of a
conservation ethic
Answers due before the start of class on Monday 2/4!
Politics contrast interview (Democrat vs. Republican)
A little biographical info... Age? Gender? Political affiliation? relation to you?
What comes to mind when you hear the word environmentalist?
Do you consider yourself to be an environmentalist? Please briefly explain.
Do you think current environmental regulations in the US are sufficient, insufficient, or
excessive? Please briefly explain.
What do you think of the current administrations approach to environmental issues?
Are you aware that some of the most significant environmental legislation in US history
(e.g., Endangered Species Act, Clean Air Act, creation of the EPA as a federal agency)
was passed during Republican administrations? Any thoughts?
What are your main sources of information about environmental issues?
What do you think are the most serious environmental issues today?
Do you make a daily effort to conserve resources (e.g., water, electricity, fuel)? Explain.
How regularly do you participate in outdoor recreation? Please briefly explain.
Age contrast interview (< 25 years vs > 65 years)
A little biographical info... Age? Gender? Education? Relation to you?
Do you consider yourself to be an environmentalist? Please briefly explain.
What do you think are the most serious environmental issues today?
Do you think progress has been made in addressing environmental issues during your
lifetime? Please briefly explain your answer.
Do you think public attitudes about the environment have changed during your life
time?
Are you a member of any environmental organizations or subscribe to any
environment related magazines? If so, please identify.
What are your main sources of information about environmental issues?
Do you make a daily effort to conserve resources (e.g., water, electricity, fuel)? Please
briefly explain.
How regularly do you participate in outdoor recreation? Please briefly explain.
Do you have a favorite state park? national park? Please briefly explain.
Carefully consider the interview responses that you collected and
answer the following 2 questions:
Which question(s) resulted in the most different responses? Briefly discuss.
Which question(s) resulted in the most similar responses? Briefly discuss.
Take a look at some of the responses submitted by other students for
the same set of questions that you asked your interview candidate
and answer the following question:
Which question(s) do you think resulted in the most interesting responses?
Briefly discuss.
Take a look at some of the responses submitted by other students for
the other set of questions and answer the following question:
Which question(s) do you think resulted in the most interesting responses?
Briefly discuss.
WO assignment due before the start of class on Wednesday 2/6
2 wrap up questions
Was it a valuable experience interviewing 2 people
and then looking at some of the responses that other
students submitted? Briefly explain your answer.
If I use this assignment again, do you recommend
that I drop, add or edit any of the questions? Briefly
explain your answer.
Indigenous respect for the earth
"Treat the earth well: it was not given
to you by your parents, it was loaned
to you by your children. We do not
inherit the Earth from our Ancestors,
we borrow it from our Children.“
Have you read any books
about indigenous cultures?
Where is
Joel hiding
now?
Have you seen any movies about indigenous people?
Do you remember this scene?
Did the Mississippians take good
care of their land?
Noble savage = romantic but often inaccurate view of indigenous people
Henry David Thoreau
(1817-1862)
author, naturalist, philosopher
Thoreau wrote extensively (over 20
published volumes) about diverse
topics including personal experience,
historical lore, natural history, and civil
disobedience.
Thoreau is best known for his book
Walden, a reflection on simple living
on the banks of Walden pond.
For 2 years, he lived in a small, self-
built house on 14 acres of land owned
by Ralph Waldo Emerson, a fellow
philosopher.
Henry David Thoreau
(1817-1862)
author, naturalist, philosopher
“I went to the woods because
I wished to live deliberately..
to see if I could not learn
what it had to teach, and not,
when I came to die, discover
that I had not lived… I
wanted to live deep and suck
out all the marrow of life…”
Henry David Thoreau
(1817-1862)
author, naturalist, philosopher
Thoreau’s writings have had far reaching
influence. Political leaders and reformers
like Mahatma Gandhi, President John F.
Kennedy and civil rights activist Martin
Luther King, Jr. spoke of being strongly
affected by Thoreau’s writing.
“I went to the woods because
I wished to live deliberately..
to see if I could not learn
what it had to teach, and not,
when I came to die, discover
that I had not lived… I
wanted to live deep and suck
out all the marrow of life…”
“As a single footstep will not
make a path on the earth, so
a single thought will not make
a pathway in the mind. To
make a deep physical path,
we walk again and again. To
make a deep mental path, we
must think over and over the
kind of thoughts we wish to
dominate our lives.”
John Muir (1838 -1913)
author, preservationist,
founder of the Sierra Club
Muir was an early advocate
of wilderness preservation
whose letters, essays, and
books describing his
adventures in nature have
been read by millions.
His activism helped to
preserve the Yosemite Valley,
Sequoia National Park and
other wilderness areas.
The Sierra Club, which he
founded, is now one of the
most important conservation
organizations in the
United States.
John Muir (1838 -1913)
author, preservationist,
founder of the Sierra Club
“Thousands of tired, nerve-
shaken, over-civilized
people are beginning to
find out that going to the
mountains is going home;
that wildness is a
necessity; and that
mountain parks and
reservations are useful not
only as fountains of timber
and irrigating rivers, but as
fountains of life.”
John Muir (1838 -1913)
author, preservationist,
founder of the Sierra Club
“Thousands of tired, nerve-
shaken, over-civilized
people are beginning to
find out that going to the
mountains is going home;
that wildness is a
necessity; and that
mountain parks and
reservations are useful not
only as fountains of timber
and irrigating rivers, but as
fountains of life.”
“When we contemplate
the whole globe as one
great dewdrop, striped
and dotted with
continents and islands,
flying through space with
other stars all singing and
shining together as one,
the whole universe
appears as an infinite
storm of beauty.”
John Muir and President Teddy Roosevelt
at Yosemite in 1903
Have you ever looked at this magazine?
Gifford Pinchot (1865 -1946)
1st chief of the US Forest Service
Governor of PA
Pinchot’s father James, regretted
the damage that his family's
lumber company had done to
America’s forests and sent his
son to Europe to study forestry.
Pinchot served as the first Chief
of the Forest Service from 1905
until his firing in 1910. He served
as Governor of PA from 1923 to
1927 and again from 1931 to
1935.
Pinchot is known for reforming
the management of forests in the
United States.
“The outgrowth of conservation,
the inevitable result, is national
efficiency.”
“ Conservation means the wise
use of the earth and its
resources for the lasting good of
men”
Gifford Pinchot (1865 -1946)
1st chief of the US Forest Service
Governor of PA
“Conservation is the
application of common sense
to the common problems for
the common good.”
Two opposing perspectives emerged within the
early environmental movement in the US:
the conservationists vs. the preservationists.
The conservationists (e.g., Gifford Pinchot)
focused on the proper use of nature, whereas
the preservationists (e.g., John Muir) sought to
protect nature from use.
Put another way, conservationists sought to
regulate human use while preservationists
sought to preserve wilderness areas as
undisturbed by human impact as possible.
Loss of old growth forest
http://mvh.sr.unh.edu/mvhinvestigations/old_growth_forests.htm
Each dot represents 25,000 acres
Yellowstone National
Park, established by the
U.S. Congress and signed
into law by President
Ulysses S. Grant on
March 1, 1872 is widely
held to be the world’s first
national park.
Theodore Roosevelt had an impact on the national park
system extending well beyond his presidency.
As chief executive from 1901 to 1909, he signed legislation
establishing 5 national parks: Crater Lake in OR; Wind Cave
in SD; Sully’s Hill in ND (later redesignated a game
preserve); Mesa Verde in CO; and Platt in OK (now part of
the Chickasaw National Recreation Area).
Another Roosevelt enactment actually had a broader effect,
the Antiquities Act of June 8, 1906. While not creating a single
park itself, the Antiquities Act enabled Roosevelt and his
successors to proclaim historic landmarks, historic or
prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific
interest in federal ownership as national monuments.
On August 25, 1916, President Woodrow Wilson
signed a bill creating the National Park Service as a
separate bureau of the Department of the Interior
http://www.pbs.org/harriman/images/film/filmhist_leopold_lg.jpg
Aldo Leopold
(1886 – 1948)
author, wildlife biologist,
professor at UW
and environmentalist
-best known for his book A Sand
County Almanac (1949), which has
sold over two million copies.
-influential in the development of
modern environmental ethics and
the science of wildlife management.
“That land is a community is the basic concept of ecology, but that
land is to be loved and respected is an extension of ethics.
That wildlife is merely something to shoot at or look at is the
grossest of fallacies. It often represents the difference between
rich country and mere land.
In dire necessity somebody might write another Iliad, or paint an
Angelus, but fashion a goose?... If, then, we can live without goose
music, we may as well do away with stars, or sunsets, or Iliads.
But the point is that we would be fools to do away with any of
them.
A land ethic, then, reflects the existence of an ecological
conscience, and this in turn reflects a conviction of individual
responsibility for the health of the land. Health is the capacity of
the land for self-renewal. Conservation is our effort to understand
and preserve this capacity.”
The ceiling of the Sistine Chapel was
painted by Michael Angelus aka Michelangelo
1) The article describes how Aldo Leopold's childhood experiences influenced his interest in nature.
Briefly explain how personal experiences have shaped your interest in soil and/or water resources.
2) According to the article, Leopold believed that industrialization,urbanization and abundance of material
blessings obscured people’s understanding of their connection to the land. Do you share this view? If so,
propose a strategy for reconnecting urban and otherwise disconnected people with soil and water
resources.
3) Differentiate between the “community” and “commodity” concepts of land discussed in the article.
4) Describing Aldo Leopold, Fred Kirschenmann, Director of the Leopold Center for Sustainable
Agriculture wrote: “he had that incredible gift of looking at things as a whole”. Briefly comment on how you
think advances in technology since Leopold’s time (for example satellites) have affected current thinking
about soil and water resources.
5) Briefly comment on how Iowa middle schooler Stephen Frese was able to develop such an impressive
understanding of Aldo Leopold’s life (you may want to skim the primary source information for the article).
6) The article states that more than half of the nation’s virgin forests had been cut down when Theodore
Roosevelt became president in 1901. Curious about that statement, I tracked down a set of maps showing
changes in old growth forest area over time. It is estimated that the old growth forests remaining in the US
in 1990 (~ 30 million acres) represented less than 4 % of the area covered by old growth forest in 1620.
Based on the map at the following link, estimate the total # of acres of old growth forest in 1620, 1850 and
1926. Show your calculations.
http://www.lawrencehallofscience.org/gss/dew/mvhinvestigations/images/oldgrowthforests.png
Reading questions – answers should be submitted on WO by Friday 2/8
By the 1920’s, severe land
degradation by wind and
water erosion was well
documented in county soil
surveys and USDA
erosion inventories.
Soil Survey of Louisa Cty, VA 1911
“90,000 acres of formerly cultivated
land so cut to pieces with gullies that
it must be classified as non-arable
rough gullied land”
Hugh Hammond Bennett
Soil scientist and showman
HH Bennett was born near
Wadesboro in Anson County,
North Carolina and graduated
from the University of North
Carolina in 1903. Immediately
upon graduation, he became a
soil surveyor, and conducted soil
studies, both in the United
States and in other countries,
that eventually convinced him
that soil erosion was an
extremely serious problem.
From “Soil Erosion:
A National Menace (1928)
“What would be the feeling of
this Nation should a foreign
nation suddenly enter the
United States and destroy
90,000 acres of land, as
erosion has been allowed to
do in a single county?”
“To visualize the full enormity
of land impairment and
devastation brought about by
this ruthless agent is beyond
the possibility of the mind. An
era of land wreckage destined
to weigh heavily upon the
welfare of the next generation
is at hand.”
On September 13, 1933, the Soil Erosion Service was
formed in the Department of the Interior, with Bennett as
chief. The service was transferred to the Department of
Agriculture on March 23, 1935, and was shortly
thereafter combined with other USDA units to form the
Soil Conservation Service by the Soil Conservation and
Domestic Allotment Act of 1935.
Hugh Bennett continued as chief, a position he held
until his retirement in 1951.
On October 20, 1994, the agency was renamed the
Natural Resources Conservation Service to reflect its
broader mission.
One of the most original and
lastingly influential books of the 20th
century, a work that is often credited
with launching the environmentalist
movement.
Rachel Carson (1907-1964)
“Man's attitude toward
nature is today critically
important simply because
we have now acquired a
fateful power to alter and
destroy nature. But man is
a part of nature, and his war
against nature is inevitably
a war against himself…[We
are] challenged as mankind
has never been challenged
before to prove our maturity
and our mastery, not of
nature, but of ourselves.”
marine biologist, author
First published in 1962
Even before Silent Spring appeared
in bookstores, there was strong
opposition to it.
Carson was violently assailed by threats of lawsuits
and derision, including suggestions that she was a
"hysterical woman" unqualified to write such a
book. A huge counterattack was organized by
Monsanto, American Cyanamid and other chemical
companies.
Biochemist and chemical industry spokesman
Robert White-Stevens stated, "If man were to follow
the teachings of Miss Carson, we would return to
the Dark Ages, and the insects and diseases and
vermin would once again inherit the earth.”
“No responsible person contends that insect-
borne disease should be ignored. The question
that has now urgently presented itself is
whether it is either wise or responsible to attack
the problem by methods that are rapidly making
it worse.
The world has heard much of the triumphant
war against disease through the control of
insect vectors of infection, but it has heard little
of the other side of the story—the defeats, the
short-lived triumphs that now strongly support
the alarming view that the insect enemy has
been made actually stronger by our efforts.
Even worse, we may have destroyed our very
means of fighting. ... What is the measure of
this setback?
The list of resistant species now includes practically all of the insect groups of
medical importance. ... Malaria programs are threatened by resistance among
mosquitoes. ... Practical advice should be 'Spray as little as you possibly can'
rather than 'Spray to the limit of your capacity' … “
Rachel Carson – excerpt from Silent Spring
Tragedy of the Commons (Hardin, 1968)
“Before I flew I was already aware of how small and vulnerable
our planet is; but only when I saw it from space, in all its ineffable
beauty and fragility, did I realize that human kind's most urgent
task is to cherish and preserve it for future generations.”
Sigmund Jähn, German astronaut
“The Earth was small, light blue, and so touchingly alone, our
home that must be defended like a holy relic. The Earth was
absolutely round. I believe I never knew what the word round meant
until I saw Earth from space.”
Aleksei Leonov, Russian astronaut
“A Chinese tale tells of some men sent to harm a young girl who,
upon seeing her beauty, become her protectors rather than her
violators. That's how I felt seeing the Earth for the first time. "I could
not help but love and cherish her.”
Taylor Wang, Chinese-American astronaut
Ask an older person about the first time they
saw a view of the earth from outer space
1970
Initiated by US Senator Gaylord
Nelson from Wisconsin, the first
Earth Day celebration occurred on
April 22, 1970. Over 20 million
people on 2000 college campuses
participated. Earth Day is now
observed each year on April 22 by
more than 500 million people in
175 countries.
The US Environmental Protection
Agency (US-EPA) was established
in 1970 by President Nixon through
an executive order which created a
single, independent agency from a
number of smaller arms of different
federal agencies.
Prior to the establishment of the
EPA, the federal government was
not structured to comprehensively
regulate the pollutants which harm
human health and degrade the
environment.
The EPA is led by its Administrator,
who is appointed by the president.
Lisa P. Jackson is the current
Administrator.
The agency currently has an annual
budget of ~ $7 billion and has
~18,000 full-time employees.
More than
half of the EPA’s staff are
engineers, scientists, and
environmental protection
specialists; other
employees include legal,
public affairs, financial,
and computer
specialists.
What does the US-EPA do?
The agency conducts environmental assessment, research,
and education. It has primary responsibility for setting and
enforcing national standards under a variety of environmental
laws, in consultation with state, tribal, and local governments.
It delegates some permitting, monitoring, and enforcement
responsibility to U.S. states and Native American tribes.
Enforcement powers include fines, sanctions, and other
measures.
The agency also works with industries and all levels of
government in a wide variety of voluntary pollution prevention
programs and energy conservation efforts.
As a follow-up to the environmental permit streamlining law signed and
championed by Governor Pat Quinn in July 2011, the IEPA is pleased to
launch a new environmental permitting portal. Development of this portal
is a major step in the goal of making compliance with environmental
regulations less burdensome and encourages economic and job growth
without sacrificing our mission of protecting the state's environment.
John J. Kim
Interim Director, IEPA
Farm leaders in Illinois have identified government regulations as the
biggest threat to farm profitability in the state in the next decade.
In all, 399 farmers completed a survey gauging their outlook on the
agriculture industry during Illinois Farm Bureau's annual meeting
Dec. 3-6 in Chicago. The survey was completed by voting delegates
and by other leaders at the county farm bureau level.
In answer to the open-ended question about profitability in the next
ten years, slightly more than four in ten respondents said regulations
are the biggest threat.
Thomas R. Sadler
Associate Professor
430m Stipes Hall
309/298-1734
Ph.D., University of Tennessee, 1998
Dr. Sadler received his Ph.D. in 1998 from the University of
Tennessee. He teaches microeconomics and applied-micro courses,
focusing on the economics of energy and the environment.
Dr. Sadler will be joining us to lead a
discussion of the economic impact of
environmental regulations
Today, the Cuyahoga is home to more than
60 species of fish, said Jim White,
executive director of the Cuyahoga River
Community Planning Organization, a
nonprofit group that coordinates cleanup
efforts. Beavers, blue herons and bald
eagles nest along the river’s banks.
“We’re very impressed with the progress
made in the Cuyahoga,” said John
Perrecone, a manager of Great Lakes
programs for the E.P.A.
The short-lived fire in 1969 was out
before the local press reached the
scene to record images of its blaze.
The Cuyahoga River also caught on
fire in 1868, 1883, 1887, 1912, 1922,
1936, 1941, 1948 and 1952!!!
Rivers in Maryland, New York and
Michigan have also caught on fire.
City
Percent of city's population
with sewage treatment in 1940
Population in
1940
Milwaukee 85 780,000
Cleveland 75 1,200,000
Columbus 75 320,000
Indianapolis 75 420,000
Chicago 70 4,400,000
Baltimore 70 750,000
Minneapolis-St. Paul 40 700,000
Washington, D.C. 35 550,000
Buffalo 30 600,000
Denver 30 280,000
Toledo 30 300,000
New York 25 8,100,000
Philadelphia 15 2,000,000
San Francisco 10 780,000
Seattle 10 400,000
Los Angeles 5 1,300,000
Detroit 0 1,600,000
Boston 0 2,000,000
Pittsburgh 0 750,000
Cincinnati 0 500,000
Kansas City 0 450,000
The only
US cities
with any
sewage
treatment
in 1940
Birds
DDT is most famous for its effect on birds. Research has shown that for some species
of birds, DDT causes the thinning of eggshells.
Species most strongly affected by DDT include:
osprey, eagles, pelicans, falcons, hawks
Mammals
Historically, DDT was used to control mice, rats, and bats.
Bats are especially sensitive to DDT. Very low doses of DDT can affect them severely.
A lot of current research deals with DDT's effects on larger mammals.
Human Beings
In the early to mid 1950s, DDT became one of the most widely used pesticides. This
was when we thought it was completely harmless to human beings. When used to
control lice, people appeared to be unaffected even though DDT was applied directly to
their bodies.
Impacts of DDT
What is bioaccumulation?
Organics like DDT and PCBs and
inorganics like mercury bioaccumulate
1987
Earth
systems
analysis
The investigator is dressed
as a doctor for two reasons.
First, current investigation of
the “health” of Earth systems
is in many respects
reminiscent of the early study
of human health hundreds of
years ago. Science historians
looking back 100 years from
now will certainly tell a tale of
both delusions and triumphs.
Second, an important driver
of Earth systems analysis is
the insight that the health of
Earth systems may be
disrupted significantly by
human activities.
Society is currently struggling with how to rationally
respond to the emerging science of complex systems.
Public access to scientific information is greater than
ever due to the internet and science is struggling to
deal with this new transparency and associated public
scrutiny.
What is a
macroscope ?
Bird’s eye approach
Lilliputian
approach
Modeling
approach - a tool or process that makes
very large or very complicated
things understandable
Where microscopes and telescopes allow
observation of things that ordinarily are too small to
see, macroscropes allow interpretation of things
that are ordinarily too complex to understand.
Macroscopes combat the over-specialization
prevalent in modern science and the
compartmentalization of scientific education. They
facilitate a new interdisciplinary approach to scientific
research.
Macroscopes reveal the interconnections and
interactions that produce the emergent properties
of systems (e.g., the strange nonlinear, chaotic
effects that clearly impact weather, the economy,
biological processes…).
Landsat 1 - 7
Spot 1 - 4 Terra
Aeolus
Earth
observation
Are these just pretty pictures?
Fires in the Amazon
Image from 2000 Image from 2009
http://classnotes2.wikispaces.com/Brazil
http://classnotes2.wikispaces.com/Brazil
2010
So what is the status of environmental movement in IL today?
Center for Neighborhood Technology
Champaign County Audubon Society
Chicago Audubon Society
Chicagoland Bicycle Federation
Chicagoland Environmental Network
Chicago Recycling Coalition
Chicago Wilderness
Citizens for Conservation
Conservation Foundation
Corlands
Decatur Audubon Society
Earthshare of Illinois
Environmental Education Association of Illinois
Environmental Law & Policy Center
Environment Illinois
Evanston North Shore Bird Club
Fox Valley Land Foundation
Grand Prairie Friends
Illinois Audubon Society
Illinois Environmental Council
Illinois Native Plant Society
Illinois Raptor Center
Illinois Student Environmental Network
Jo Daviess Conservation Foundation
John Wesley Powell Audubon Society (Bloomington)
Lake Bluff Open Lands Association
Land Conservancy of Lake County
Land Conservancy of McHenry County
Lake County Audubon Society
Liberty Prairie Conservancy
McHenry County Defenders
Natural Land Institute
Nature Conservancy of Illinois
Northwest Illinois Audubon Society
Openlands Project
Peoria Audubon Society
Peoria Wilds
Pierce Downer's Heritage Alliance (DuPage County)
Prairie Enthusiasts
Prairie Rivers Network
Prairie Woods Audubon Society (Arlington Heights)
Republicans for Environmental Protection - Illinois
Save the Prairie Society
Sierra Club
Sierra Club - Alton
Sierra Club - Carbondale
Sierra Club - Chicago
Sierra Club - DeKalb
Sierra Club - Geneva
Sierra Club - Glen Ellyn
Sierra Club - Kaskaskia Group
Sierra Club - Moline
Sierra Club - NE Illinois
Sierra Club - NW Cook County
Sierra Club - Peoria
Sierra Club - Rockford
Sierra Club - Springfield
Sierra Club - Urbana
SOLID
Thorn Creek Audubon Society (Park Forest)
> 100 environmental organizations in IL today
Are you familiar with any of
these organizations?
Today, the organization has grown to include 10 full-time
employees and a fleet of 4 barges, a towboat, 6
workboats, 2 skid steers, 5 work trucks and a large box
truck. With this equipment, the crew is able to travel and
work in an average of 9 states a year along the
Mississippi, Illinois, Ohio, Missouri, and Potomac Rivers,
as well as many of their tributaries. Since the project’s
inception, Chad, his crew, and over 60,000 volunteers
have collected over 6 million pounds of debris from our
nation’s greatest rivers. Most recently, Chad expanded
the mission of the organization to include Big River
Educational Outreach, The MillionTrees Project, and the
Adopt-a-River Mile programs.
