Jonathon Porritt Summary

In order to preserve our resources, environmentalists use the concept of sustainable development-sustainable development is a development that satisfies our current needs without compromising the future availability of natural resources, or our future quality of life. Our consumption rates have risen significantly higher; according to the World Watch Institute, and their article The State of Consumption Today, the rate has gone up thirty-five percent, and we are now ecologically at risk. Nevertheless, who can we blame but

Another problem that we may stumble upon would be relying on other people to be ecologically responsible instead of ourselves. We often believe that there are other people out there in the world who are making a difference and so we passively sit back and do nothing. However, we are all accountable for our own actions. Palmer (2015) is a man who worked around the world with people from every major religion from Daoism to Zoroastrianism. He has witnessed many religious environmental movements emerge and grow. He states that the basis of the environmental

Environmentalists worry so much about the well-being of the planet for merely the human species’ survival. Things such as natural disasters, which reasons.org say “Part of that response acknowledges that the forces behind these ‘natural disasters’ play a critical role in Earth’s capacity to support life.” If people are so concerned about the planet, then people should realize that these natural disasters actually help the Earth regenerate itself. Without these natural ‘disasters’, the planet would not be how it is today. As Nash continues to criticize humans, he states, “...capitalist-driven culture in its cancer-like tendency to self destruct.” Pollution and destruction of wildlife is a problem, but it is something that can be fixed, or having Earth fix itself. Nash is saying that humans are destroying the planet entirely, which is kind of ridiculous. If people were really destroying the Earth as much as Nash says, Earth itself would have already gotten rid of people through things like natural disasters, disease, or natural selection. The Earth will take care of itself and as Tom Haering says, “Nature plays no favorites: Survival of the fittest.”

“Many current discussions about sustainability focus on the ways in which human activity...can be maintained in the future without exhausting all of our current resources… there has been a close correlation between the growth of human society and environmental degradation - as communities grow, the environment often declines” (603).

Do we have hope for our resources and our environment? I think it truly depends on all of us as the upcoming generation to make sure that our resources are used properly. For me it means using the resources, while not depleting all of them. The Earth doesn’t have to be raped, for us to live comfortably. Sustainability is made up of multiple different parts not just a single part.

Many people have come to believe that the murderer hit JonBenet's head with a flashlight causing her death.

Jeffrey Wasserstrom is a pretty good author , he offers a lot of insight without overloading you with to much unessesary information. His writing style makes it so much easier to understand China. When I first think of China the first word that comes to mind is oppression. Because of the media I see china as a country that doesn't care about the individual rather than the growth of the whole. I wonder how unlike most western countries China was unable to evolve into a more democratic country. One of the first lines you read when opening Jeffrey Wasserstroms writing was that China wasn't force to be the country it is today but rather he opens of the readers mind to understanding different aspects of life in China in its evolution. One great point

If we choose to keep cutting down trees and consuming natural resources then they won’t be able to replenish fast enough and there will be none left, posing many problems like having fresh water available to drink, wood to build products, and land to farm on. Obviously not many people are properly educated on environmental issues and how they make them worse but if we as a society choose not to educate those who aren’t then they will continue to use too many resources and not think about how their lifestyle is hurting our environment, which will make environmental problems even worse than they are today. Now as humans we’ve always wanted to get bigger and better, but if we keep expanding and building as much as we are then there won’t be as many resources available because we’ll have taken over spaces and land that was needed for those natural environments to live. Although this seems like a drastic point and something that we can’t really stop, if we always think that we need to keep building, someday we just won’t have any land to do it and also at the same time realize that we don’t have resources

The definition of sustainability is the ability to support a long term ecological balance while not harming the environment or depleting its natural resources. According to Robert Goodland and his essay “The Case that the world has reached limits” the world is currently being run unsustainably, “being fueled by inherited fossil fuels is the best single example” (Goodland 602). Fossil fuels are non renewable gases and oils and we are using them to provide 60 percent of the global energy, because of the extensive usage of these nonrenewable fossil fuels, we barely have fifteen years left of reserves. Goodland uses his essay to build on Brundtland’s leads to gain and maintain sustainability, claiming that we need a “new era of economic growth” to meet the needs of sustainability (Goodland 602). Goodland

Have you ever had a pen pal? Imagine writing to someone and never being able to meet them. This is the story of how Oliver Paulot (Ollie) a hermit from America who is deathly allergic to electricity began to write to Moritz Farber from Germany who has a pacemaker and doesn't have eyes. They can never meet in person because Ollie is allergic to electricity and Moritz has a pacemaker so meeting in person can kill them both. This is a very exciting book because you get to live their lives through reading this book.

A key tenet of Beckerman’s ideology is that a future that is only as good as the present is a failure. “Sustainability” is an empty term that is impossible to fully define

The average human being, multiplied by the Earth’s population, would need to have about four Earths just to supply enough resources (Footprint Calculator). Thinking of people around the world, the people of the United States seem to take a lot of their life for granted. Many people when they hear of the polar ice caps melting wave it off and either don’t believe in it or believe it is not their problem. Well it is their problem and if we don’t jump on the issue soon we will not be giving our future generations much of a life. This brings me to the idea of sustainability. A simple description of the word means that what we have today we will also have tomorrow, next week, next year, or even the next lifetime. Although that is the modest version sustainability is much, much more than just that. Sustainability is derived from three main parts of the human life: environmental, social, and economic. Each being just as important as the other. Environmental is the most well-known aspect of sustainability in human life, but both social and economic take their place in keeping this Earth sustainable.

Sustainability is a topic that has become very important in recent years. Sustainability is defined as, “the ability to continue a defined behavior indefinitely.” ("Finding and Resolving the Root Causes of the Sustainability Problem", 2014)

Every living being are directly or indirectly depend on natural environment. Sustainability helps to balance financial, social, and environmental factors to facilitate responsible business decision making over the immediate and long term. . Sustainability refers to meeting the needs of present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs (Oxford University press 1987, p.43). Sustainability is also being protective and aware of use of natural resources and development that meets the need of present and everything that is need for our survival and well being depends, directly or indirectly on our natural environment. According to Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Sustainability is

The concept of sustainability is becoming an ever more relevant and popular ideology today. Many college campuses take great pride in their sustainability, they take many steps to ensure that their garbage output, water usage and other various items are sustainable or working towards that goal. In areas outside of the college camps setting however, sustainability is often hard to reach due to a wide array of concepts, including deep ecology and environmental pragmatism. I believe the two “key points” (of the 8) behind deep ecology is that humans have no right to reduce the richness and diversity of our natural resources, and that human interference with the non-human world is excessive (Naess 3). Simply put, deep ecology is a push back against our over use of resources, with a goal to hardly use them at all. This concept occasionally goes together with the view held by many on environmental pragmatism, but the two often collide with each other. Environmental pragmatism involves the basic concept that humans are part of the environment and that this must be taken into account with its management (Light 3). This means that humans historical and cultural uses of the land must be taken into account with its management, even if it is not the “best” option for the land management. These two perspectives can come together to create a more sustainable environment, but they more often have very extreme differences of how to manage an area, and this is when “wicked problems” can