Ecology and society

Ecology and society - Luke Martell (333.7 MAR)

Maria Hirszowicz (1981:1) defines industrialism as 'the new stage of social organisation in which human life is dominated by industrial production'.pg 17

Inter-relationship of industry and society - both the effects of the development of industry on society and of society on industry.  The effects of industrial production and economic and technological change on social structure and processes.

Richard Badham has argued that the central concerns of the sociology of industrialism are the 'social requirements of industrial development, social structures that either facilitate or hinder the efficient pursuit of industry and the impact of industrial development on society' (Badham 1984:2) pg 17

Effect of industrialism on social relations.  'Post-Fordists' see industrial societies as moving not beyond industrialism but from a Fordist mode of industrialism based on mass production standardization and uniformity in economic and social life towards greater diversification, flux and flexibility in production, consumption and social lifestyles.

Ecology is 'usually taken to mean the study of the relationship between humans, plants and animals and between them and their wider environment'. (pg21)

Three relationships -

1:            Nature on society

2:            Society on nature

3:            The effect of societies impact on nature back on society.

Sociologists have been well aware of the significance of technological developments, cultural conditions, the existence of specific social groupings and political choices in society as facilitating and driving social change.

Ecologists would identify the role of natural limits such as resource availability and finitude as affecting societal development.  The initial availability of resources will affect a society's industrial and social development. pg22

There are natural as well as economic, technological, cultural, social and political limits and influences on societal development.

Society has an effect on nature in the form of pollution and the depletion of resources.  The pursuit of particular paths of industrial development can lead to the pollution of the air, sea and land.

CFC and CO2 emissions involved respectively in ozone depletion and global warming.  The dumping of sewage and toxic waste in the sea and in landfill sites and the use of pesticides, fertilizers and such like, all of which affect the land, water and plant and animal life.  Not to mention car fumes and acid rain and many other examples of the environmental effects of social processes.

Pollution and resource depletion obviously affect 'nature'.  Yet they have a reciprocal effect on human societies.

'Social lifestyles are shaped in part by patterns of production and growth in the economy'. pg 23

The society - nature relationship is constituted by natural limits on society, society's effects on nature and the effects of society's impact on nature as they rebound on society.

'Club Rome' - The Limits of Growth Report.

The report highlights interdependency, the natural limits thesis, the notion of exponential growth and the significance of social as well as technical solutions.

Interdependency - the character of a system and each of its parts is constituted by the interdependent relationship between the parts.  Different elements are affected by others and each element affects others, often with a reciprocal effect back on itself again.  The structure of a system is as much constituted by the relationships and the dynamic interactions and 'feedback loops' between different parts of the system as by the parts themselves in isolation.

Problems with Capitalism

A New Brand World: Eight Principles for Achieving Brand Leadership in the 21st Century

Scott Bedbury

Bedbury, who headed advertising and marketing divisions for Nike and Starbucks during their phenomenal growth, coaches on establishing a memorable brand in this appealing, well-organized guide. Observing consumers overwhelmed by countless choices, he argues that now's the time to build a brand that evokes trust from its customers. "Unless your brand stands for something, it stands for nothing," he declares, as he explains methods for companies big and small to articulate their essence and ethos  to core customers, potential customers and employees. The inside stories on Nike and Starbucks constitute the bulk, but Bedbury elaborates his belief that "the brand is the sum total of everything a company does".  To Bedbury, brands have not only a genetic code but also karma. As strongly as he emphasizes the need to develop growth strategies that spring organically from a brand's core, he also believes that successful brands respect or meet customers' emotional needs. The histories of his companies have provided Bedbury with much material about a company's relationship to its community, and he's especially cogent on stewardship of a brand once it's established and growing, highlighting questions of leadership and responsibility to the world beyond the office. He calls for advertising and marketing that will inspire rather than merely inform (… la "Just Do It"). In the course of explaining his eight principles, Bedbury reminds aspiring industry leaders to pay attention to simplicity, relevance and innovation while counseling them to focus patiently on the long run.

Made to Break: Technology and Obsolescence in America

Giles Slade

In 2004 Americans threw out 315 million computers and 100 million cell phones in 2005. Most were still usable, and all contain permanent biological toxins (PBTs). Electronic trash, or e-waste, is rapidly becoming a catastrophic problem. To understand how we ended up in this alarming predicament, Slade recounts the fascinating history of American consumer culture and the engineering of our "throw-away ethic."  Slade surveys the development of disposability as a consumer convenience, design feature, economic stimulus and social problem, from General Motors' 1923 introduction of annual model changes that prodded consumers to trade in perfectly good cars for more stylish updates, to the modern cell-phone industry, where fashion-driven "psychological obsolescence" compounds warp-speed technological obsolescence to dramatically reduce product life-cycles. He also explores the debate over "planned obsolescence".  "wearing things out does not produce prosperity, but buying things does."  Slade's even-handed analysis acknowledges both manufacturers' manipulative marketing ploys and consumers' ingrained love of the new as motors of obsolescence, which he considers an inescapable feature of a society so focused on progress and change.

The Waste Makers. 

Vance Packard

"The systematic attempt of business to make us wasteful, debt-ridden, permanently discontented individuals," The Waste Makers is Vance Packard's pioneering 1960 work on how the rapid growth of disposable consumer goods was degrading the environmental, financial, and spiritual character of American society.

The Waste Makers was the first book to probe the increasing commercialisation of American life—the development of consumption for consumption's sake. Packard outlines the ways manufacturers and advertisers persuade consumers to buy things they don't need and didn't know they wanted, including the two-of-a-kind of everything syndrome—"two refrigerators in every home"—and appeals to purchase something because it is more expensive, or because it is painted in a new color. The book also brought attention to the concept of planned obsolescence, in which a "death date" is built into products so that they wear out quickly and need to be replaced. By manipulating the public into mindless consumerism, Packard believed that business was making us "more wasteful, imprudent, and carefree in our consuming habits," which was using up our natural resources at an alarming rate.

Conscious Capitalism – Creating a New Paradigm for Business

John Mackey

He shares his philosophy of "conscious capitalism" a revolutionary mission-driven business model that unifies profitability with integrity, compassion, and global responsibility.  Mackey explores the stakeholder philosophy: how a company can benefit shareholders, employees, vendors, customers, and the environment without compromising its financial viability.

What types of ecosystems have been changed?

What types of ecosystems have been changed?

Virtually all of Earth’s ecosystems have been significantly transformed through human actions. In the second half of the 20^th century ecosystems changed more rapidly than at any other time in recorded human history. Some of the most significant changes have been the conversion of forests and grasslands into cropland, the diversion and storage of freshwater behind dams, and the loss of mangrove and coral reef areas.

The most rapid changes are now taking place in developing countries, but industrial countries experienced comparable changes in the past. However, current transformations seem to occur at a faster pace than changes prior to the industrial era.  The structure of the world’s ecosystems changed more rapidly in the second half of the twentieth century than at any time in recorded human history, and virtually all of Earth’s ecosystems have now been significantly transformed through human actions. The most significant change in the structure of ecosystems has been the transformation of approximately one quarter (24%) of Earth’s terrestrial surface to cultivated systems. More land was converted to cropland in the 30 years after 1950 than in the 150 years between 1700 and 1850.

Between 1960 and 2000, reservoir storage capacity quadrupled; as a result, the amount of water stored behind large dams is estimated to be three to six times the amount held by natural river channels (this excludes natural lakes).  In countries for which sufficient multiyear data are available (encompassing more than half of the present-day mangrove area), approximately 35% of mangroves were lost in the last two decades. Roughly 20% of the world’s coral reefs were lost and an additional 20% degraded in the last several decades of the twentieth century.

Although the most rapid changes in ecosystems are now taking place in developing countries, industrial countries historically experienced comparable rates of change. Croplands expanded rapidly in Europe after 1700 and in North America and the former Soviet Union, particularly after 1850. Roughly 70% of the original temperate forests and grasslands and Mediterranean forests had been lost by 1950, largely through conversion to agriculture. Historically, deforestation has been much more intensive in temperate regions than in the tropics, and Europe is the continent with the smallest fraction of its original forests remaining. However, changes prior to the industrial era seemed to occur at much slower rates than current transformations.

Major World Ecosytems

Ecosystem Services

The international community of nations has committed itself to achieve, by 2010, a significant reduction of the current rate of biodiversity loss at the global, regional, and national level. And yet despite growing awareness and major efforts in all countries, the latest evidence indicates that biodiversity continues to be lost at a terrifying pace, resulting in what some call the greatest mass extinction since dinosaurs roamed the planet, 65

million years ago.

There are many reasons for the gap between aspiration and reality. One of the most important is that economic policies and markets generally fail to value biodiversity or the conservation of ecosystems. With few exceptions, there is little financial reward for conserving biodiversity, nor much penalty for destroying it. Policy incentives to encourage nature conservation are emerging around the world, and yet this trend remains handicapped by a lack of understanding of the economic benefits of conserving natural ecosystems, or the costs of biodiversity loss.

Ecosystems and biodiversity more generally, matter for many reasons. Ecosystems provide a wide variety of

useful services that enhance human well-being.  Without these services, we would be worse off in many ways. At the limit, we may not survive.  But even degradation of ecosystem services falling well short of outright destruction would significantly affect our welfare.

Ecosystem Services

The world’s ecosystems provide a huge variety of goods and services. We are all familiar with the valuable commodities that natural ecosystems provide, such as edible plants and animals, medicinal products, and materials for construction or clothing. Many of us likewise value the aesthetic or cultural benefits provided by natural ecosystems, including beautiful views and recreational opportunities. What is less well known is the extent to which human economies depend upon natural ecosystems for a range of biological and chemical processes. These ecosystem ‘services’ are provided free-of-charge as a gift of nature. Examples of ecosystem services include the purification of air and water; regulation of rainwater run-off and drought; waste assimilation and detoxification; soil formation and maintenance; control of pests and disease; plant pollination; seed dispersal and nutrient cycling; maintaining biodiversity for agriculture, pharmaceutical research and development and other industrial processes; protection from harmful ultraviolet radiation; climate stabilization (for example, though carbon sequestration); and moderating

extremes of temperature, wind, and waves.

Despite the services they provide, natural ecosystems worldwide are under tremendous pressure. Forest ecosystems are being converted to other uses; wetlands are being drained; and coral reefs are being destroyed. Freshwater resources are increasingly modified through impoundment, redirection, extraction, land use changes that affect recharge and flow rates, and pollution. Agricultural soils and pasture lands are being degraded from over-use. Some of these pressures are intentional effects of human activities, others are un-intended.

Ecosystem

What is an Ecosystem?

Most of us are confused when it comes to the words ecosystem and biome.  What's the difference?  There is a slight difference between the two words.  An ecosystem is much smaller than a biome.  Conversely, a biome can be thought of many similar ecosystems throughout the world grouped together.  An ecosystem can be as large as the Sahara Desert, or as small as a puddle or vernal pool.

Ecosystems are dynamic interactions between plants, animals, and microorganisms and their environment working together as a functional unit.  Ecosystems will fail if they do not remain in balance.  No community can carry more organisms than its food, water, and shelter can accommodate.  Food and territory are often balanced by natural phenomena such as fire, disease, and the number of predators.  Each organism has its own niche, or role, to play. 

How have humans affected the ecosystems? 

We have affected ecosystems in almost every way imaginable!  Every time we walk out in the wilderness or bulldoze land for a new parking lot we are drastically altering an ecosystem.  We have disrupted the food chain, the carbon cycle, the nitrogen cycle, and the water cycle.  Mining minerals also takes its toll on an ecosystem. 

Marine ecosystems

Human-dominated marine ecosystems are experiencing accelerating loss of populations and species, with largely unknown consequences. Local experiments, long-term regional time series, and global fisheries data to test how biodiversity loss affects marine ecosystem services across temporal and spatial scales. Overall, rates of resource collapse increased and recovery potential, stability, and water quality decreased exponentially with declining diversity. Restoration of biodiversity, in contrast, increased productivity fourfold and decreased variability by 21%, on average. We conclude that marine biodiversity loss is increasingly impairing the ocean's capacity to provide food, maintain water quality, and recover from perturbations. Yet available data suggest that at this point, these trends are still reversible.

Worm, B  (2006) Impacts of Biodiversity Loss on Ocean Ecosystem Services. Science; 314(5800): 787-790  Sciencemag Source ID 5314

Biocentric Focused Theories and Movements

Ecopsychology


The basic idea of ecopsychology is that while today the human mind is shaped by the modern social world, it is adapted to the natural world in which it evolved. According to biologist E.O. Wilson, human beings have an innate latent instinct to emotionally connect to nature, called the biophilic instinct, particularly aspects of nature that reflect our Environment of Evolutionary Adaptiveness (EEA)


Deep ecology


Deep ecology is a contemporary ecological philosophy that recognizes an inherent worth of other beings, aside from their utility. The philosophy emphasizes the interdependence of organisms within ecosystems and that of ecosystems with each other within the biosphere. It provides a foundation for the environmental, ecology and green movements and has fostered a new system of environmental ethics.


Proponents of deep ecology believe that the world does not exist as a resource to be freely exploited by humans. The ethics of deep ecology hold that a whole system is superior to any of its parts. They offer an eight-tier platform to elucidate their claims

1. The well-being and flourishing of human and nonhuman life on Earth have value in themselves (synonyms: intrinsic value, inherent value). These values are independent of the usefulness of the nonhuman world for human purposes.
2. Richness and diversity of life forms contribute to the realization of these values and are also values in themselves.
3. Humans have no right to reduce this richness and diversity except to satisfy vital human needs.
4. The flourishing of human life and cultures is compatible with a substantial decrease of the human population. The flourishing of nonhuman life requires such a decrease.
5. Present human interference with the nonhuman world is excessive, and the situation is rapidly worsening.
6. Policies must therefore be changed. These policies affect basic economic, technological, and ideological structures. The resulting state of affairs will be deeply different from the present.
7. The ideological change is mainly that of appreciating life quality (dwelling in situations of inherent value) rather than adhering to an increasingly higher standard of living. There will be a profound awareness of the difference between big and great.
8. Those who subscribe to the foregoing points have an obligation directly or indirectly to try to implement the necessary changes.

The philosophy of deep ecology helped differentiate the modern ecology movement by pointing out the anthropocentric bias of the term "environment", and rejecting the idea of humans as authoritarian guardians of the environment.




Land Ethic


Land Ethics is a philosophy that guides your actions when you utilize or make changes to the land. This specific term was first coined by Aldo Leopold (1887–1948) in his book A Sand County Almanac (1949). Within this work, he wrote that there is a need for a "new ethic", an "ethic dealing with man's relation to land and to the animals and plants which grow upon it"

Leopold argues that the next step in the evolution of ethics is the expansion of ethics to include nonhuman members of the biotic community, collectively referred to as "the land." Leopold states the basic principle of his land ethic as, "A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise."

He also describes it in this way: "The land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries of the community to include soils, waters, plants, and animals, or collectively: the land...[A] land ethic changes the role of Homo sapiens from conqueror of the land-community to plain member and citizen of it. It implies respect for his fellow-members, and also respect for the community as such."

Ecocentrism


The ecocentric ethic was again conceived by Aldo Leopold and recognizes that all species, including humans, are the product of a long evolutionary process and are inter-related in their life processes. The writings of Aldo Leopold and his idea of the land ethic and good environmental management are a key element to this philosophy. Ecocentrism focuses on the biotic community as a whole and strives to maintain ecosystem composition and ecological processes. The term also finds expression in the first principle of the deep ecology movement, as formulated by Arne Næss and George Sessions in 1984 which points out that anthropocentrism, which considers humans as the center of the universe and the pinnacle of all creation, is a difficult opponent for ecocentrism.


The ecocentric argument is grounded in the belief that, compared to the undoubted importance of the human part, the whole ecosphere is even more significant and consequential: more inclusive, more complex, more integrated, more creative, more beautiful, more mysterious, and older than time. The "environment" that anthropocentrism misperceives as materials designed to be used exclusively by humans, to serve the needs of humanity, is in the profoundest sense humanity's source and support: its ingenious, inventive life-giving matrix. Ecocentrism goes beyond biocentrism with its fixation on organisms, for in the ecocentric view people are inseparable from the inorganic/organic nature that encapsulates them. 

System

A system is defined as a collection of interrelated part forming a synergistic whole that jointly perform functions that each part by itself cannot perform

Paul Taylor - Biocentric Egalitarianism

Biocentric Outlook on Nature: A biologically-informed, philosophical worldview about humans, nature, and the place of human civilization in the natural world. It's four components are:

• One: Humans are nonprivileged members of the earth's community of life. (This perspective, acknowledge differences, but focuses on similarities.)
• Humans as contingent, biological beings: Humans share with other organisms biological requirements for life that are not completelly under our control. We, as they, are vulnerable. We share with them an inability to guarantee the fundamental conditions of our existence. In many respects, humans are importantly creatures of forces we do not control.
• Kinship: We share the same origin as other creatures and so have ties of kinship with them. The earth's life processes (evolution) brought all of us into existence; knowing how they came to be is knowing how we came to exist as well.
• Newcomers: One difference is that we are recent arrivals. The earth was "teeming with life" long before we arrived and when we did, we entered a place others had resided for hundreds of millions of years.
• Humans are not the ultimate purpose: The idea that humans are the final goal of the evolutionary process is absurd; as if the rest of nature was waiting on our arrival and applauded when we finally appeared.
• We depend on them: Humans are absolutely dependent on other forms of life; without them we would cease to exist. We are needy dependents on the fabric of life around us. (E.O. Wilson thinks that without invertebrates, humans--and other vertebrates--have a couple of months to live.)
• They don't depend on us: Life on this planet is not dependent on us; in fact, it would do much better without us.
• Two: The natural world is an interdependent system--the basic insight of the science of ecology (Barry Commoner's first "law" of ecology--"everything is connected to everything else").


• Three: All organisms (and only organisms) are teleological (=goal-directed) centers of life (think of plants seeking light) that have goods of their own (=welfare interests) that we can morally consider for their own sake. Organisms have a (non-subjective) "point of view" we can adopt by judging events as good or bad depending on whether the organisms are benefitted or harmed. (Crushing the roots of trees with bulldozers or carving drive-through sequoias harms--not hurts--these organisms.)
• Having preference interests (conscious desires or wants) is not necessary for being morally considerable. Thus insentient organisms (plants, fungi, microbes, and many invertebrate animals) aren't ruled out of the moral arena.
  • In contrast, sentience-centered philosophers argue that if organisms don't care about what happens to them, why should we? They ask: If nothing matters to a plant, how can we harm it? The biocentrist's reply is: We can harm its welfare interests, whether or not it has preference interests.
• Having welfare interests is a necessary condition (a prerequisite) for being morally considerable. If a being doesn't have a good of its own, then there is nothing to morally consider; no "point of view" to adopt. It can't be benefitted or harmed; it has no welfare we could protect.
• Thus stones or piles of sand aren't morally considerable--their value is purely instrumental to organisms.
• Nonliving natural entities including species, ecosystems, and biological/geological entities and processes are also not morally considerable, since they too have no good of their own (no genetic program that specifies what that good is). (Here Taylor rejects Leopold's holism.) "Their good" is reducible to the average or total good of the individual organisms that comprise them.
• Machines also don't have welfare interests and hence aren't morally considerable either (not even teleological machines like guided missiles). "My car's need" for oil is not it's own, but rather my need. (This is a response to the objection that if nonconscious plants plants have interests based on their needs and welfare, then so do some human created artifacts, which is absurd) 
• Four: The belief in human superiority is an unjustified bias; we should be species impartial and egalitarian.
• To argue that humans are superior because we have capacities nonhumans lack (e.g., we are moral agents), ignores that they have capacities we lack (e.g., the ability to photosynthesize, to live 10,000 years, to produce 20 million offspring, or regenerate oneself after being put in a blender).
• To argue that humans are superior because our capacities are more valuable (e.g., that the human ability to do mathematics is of greater value than the monkey's ability to climb a tree) is to illegitimately judge the value of capacities from the perspective of what is good for human life. From the perspective of what is good in a monkey's life, tree climbing ability is of greater value.
  • Is there a species independent criterion of the value of a capacity?
• To judge that humans are superior not because of some quality or capacity we have (merit), but simply because we were born human (a more noble species with greater inherent worth) is an arbitrary prejudice analogous to noblemen (in the Middle Ages) thinking they are more valuable than peasants simply in virtue of their birthright.

BIOCENTRIC PERSPECTIVE PRESENTATION

"Since early history, the earth was esentially a closed system and materials were recycled and reused in this closed sytem" (pg2)

Environmental Engineering -  By D.Srinivasan

ISBN 978-81-203-3600-1

The Gaia hypothesis, also known as Gaia theory or Gaia principle, proposes that all organisms and their inorganic surroundings on Earth are closely integrated to form a single and self-regulating complex system, maintaining the conditions for life on the planet.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_hypothesis

In contrast to modern approaches to political economy, Gaia interprets life as the ability of cooperative networks to simultaneously adapt to, alter and enhance their environments to their natural benefit.  A sustainable global economy, by way of contrast, would consist of symbiotic networks acting in harmony with Gaia.  In living systems, networks continuously reconstitute their elements in cyclical processses.  In ecosytems, and in Gaia as a whole,  recycling is the rule: one species waste is a lways another species' source of nourishment.  Cyclical exchanges of energy and resourses in a living system are sustained by pervasive cooperation.

Gaia in turmoil: climate change, biodepletion, and earth ethics in an age of Crisis.

 By Eileen Crist, H. Bruce Rinker, Bill McKibben (pg206)

Ecological systems are extremely complex. Their working is a function of myriad inter-relationships between and within their biotic and abiotic components.

"All life is one.  This is not a cliche but a biologival fact.  Over

Species diversity not only stabilizes ecosystem processes in the face of annual variation in environment but also provides insurance against drastic change in ecosystem structure or processes in response to extreme events (Walker 1992, chapin et al. 1997).  Any change in climate or climatic extremes that is severe enough to cause extinction of one species is unlikely to eliminate all members from a functional type (Walker 1995). The more species there are in a functional type, the less likely it is that any extinction event or series of events will have serious ecosystem consequences (Holling 1986).

Differences in environmental response among functionally different species may accentuate ecosystem change.

The species diversity of earth is changing rapidly due to frequent species extinctions (both locally and globally), introductions, and changes in abundance. We are, however, only beginning to understand the ecosystem consequences of these changes. Many species have traits that strongly affect ecosystem processes through their affects on the supply or turnover of limiting resources, microclimate, and disturbance regime. The impact of these species traits on ecosystem processes depends on the abundance of a species, its functional similarities to other species in the community, and species interactions that influence the expression of important traits at the ecosystem scale. Diversity per se may be ecologically important if it leads to complementary use of resources by different species or increases the probability of including species with particular ecological effects. Because species belong to the same functional type generally differ in their response to environment, diversity within a functional type may stabilize ecosystem processes in the face of temporal variation or directional changes in environment, introduction of functionally different species to an ecosystem, in contrast, may accelerate the rate of ecosystem change. The effects of species traits on ecosystems processes are generally so strong that changes in the species composition or diversity of ecosystems are likely to alter their functioning, although the exact nature of these changes is frequently difficult to predict.

Aldo Leopold (1949:203) observed that our "land-relation is still strictly economic, entailing privileges but not obligations". The traditional capitalist economic ethic has indeed shaped the path of development and dominated the social ethic in industrialised countries. As Leopold points out, this ethic has been largely exploitative, with little concern for "obligations" to the land. The general "mind-set in which economic thinking determines objectives" means that the basic capitalist drive for growth takes precedence over environmental concerns (Gauthier 1991:122)