The Drowned World, Comedy, And Elegy

The environmental history novel Eaarth, written by Bill McKibben, illustrates the history of global warming and the pressuring impact that climate change currently has on society. For centuries, we, human beings, have continued to stain the purity of nature with our fingerprints. The continuous manipulation of the environment overtime has altered our planet so significantly that McKibben believes we have created a new planet. Rather than “Earth”, its scientific name, McKibben refers to it as “Eaarth”—in honor of its new characteristics. In the Preface, McKibben states, “Instead of a world where rain had an independent

McKibben implicitly states that humans have “killed off nature,” (pg. 82) and details that we stand at a cusp ushering in a new era of change. McKibben expresses uncertainty in the accurate reading from the changes soon to come, and implies that developments will happen in eventually. Regarding the considerable concern for rising sea levels, McKibben refers to his previously mentioned gases found in the atmosphere and correlates them to the an increase in sea levels in the future. (pg. 94) Arguably, there is no obsolete notion that this will happen, but McKibben’s statement of confidence persuades readers effectively. Furthermore, McKibben frequently visits back to topics he mentioned before and addresses in which specific fashion this will affect the environment. (ie. DDT-pg. 126, Artic ice pg. 84) In a sense, McKibben makes sure that readers remain focused and understands the true outcome of both laziness and action.

“We are a detrimental virus for our mother Earth”. Clarke’s “If I Forget Thee, Oh Earth” and Carson’s “Silent Spring” explore environmental danger, each one in their own narrative style , sending a dismal but honest message: we are consuming this planet and its end is coming soon.

The Climate Crisis at the End of Our Fork by Anna Lappé is an argumentative article that gives an unorthodox view to the probable causes and potential solutions of global warming. In the article, Lappé argues that many modern procedures for food production and distribution across the world have an astronomically negative effect on climatic change. Three different “connections” between food production, food distribution, and negative climatic change arise from the article: the “land use connection”, the “agricultural connection”, and the “waste and transportation connection.” Lappé also insists that changing the way food is produced and distributed around the world could decrease the harmful consequences of global warming rapidly, and ultimately

Amidst the melodramatic narratives and heightened realism of these cinematic texts, global warming becomes something that audiences can grasp onto and wonder if perhaps this is what their world might actually look like in the not-too-distant future. (Rust, 26)

To begin with, Scranton describes the scenery of war in Iraq and if he would have survived and persevered this journey. Humans would have to embrace the modern advancements today’s society to outlast the Anthropocene. As a matter of fact, struggles, consequences, obstacles and death are various aspects of life that we should embrace and not ignore. The understanding of civilization is very important and acquiring the knowledge to be aware of major concerns and issues of the environment is substantial. Scranton emphasizes that humans have not progressed to avoid the “unmanageable global warning”, but humankind could live and adjust to the changes of the environment (Scranton 24). The is future is always a concern but uncertain, whereas we cannot disregard our destinies.

For "Field Notes From a Catastrophe," Elizabeth Kolbert journeys to Alaska, Greenland, Iceland, Yorkshire, Oregon—amongst other places—introducing her readers to a slew of individuals either studying or simply experiencing, aspects of global warming.

Has Earth entered into a new geologic epoch, characterized by human influences? A recent study, spear-headed by the British Geological Survey, has come to the conclusion that man’s global impact has become distinct enough to end the Holocene and effectively begin the Anthropocene. Published in Science, the study identifies how man’s impact on our oceans, resources, climate, and vegetation has altered the sedimentary makeup of the planet. Massive species invasions, increased rates of extinction, genetically modified plants, redistributed metals, sediment, hydrocarbons, fossils, increased levels of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus all combine to create signals that geologists interpret to denote a break in the Holocene

The first way that Atwood attempts to incorporate problems that humanity is facing in the futuristic setting of the book is by displaying the effects of global warming as researched, predicted and imagined. Atwood tries to show what happened to the spaces of the world that we are familiar with “It was like going to Harvard had been, before it got drowned” (173), in this small sentence Atwood speaks volumes on the effects of global warming that will be discussed further in detail in the next paragraph. Another example of this can be seen here: “A mile or two to the south, a salt marsh is forming on a one-time landfill dotted with semi-flooded townhouses” (148). Another part of the global warming phenomenon is the rising temperatures on the planet

Anthropocene is a time period where the “effects of the humans on the global environment have escalated” (Crutzen 23). The Earth is no longer in its natural state but is “moving into a less biologically diverse, less forested, much warmer, and probably wetter and stormier state” (Steffen 614).

Summary: In a first person journey that brings her readers around the world, Elizabeth Kolbert researches and explains the effects of human domination on the planet and its resources. Using historical findings of previous extinctions in comparison to earth’s present state she attempts to provide cause and warning for mankind’s seemingly apocalyptic future. Her book, “The Sixth Extinction: an Unnatural History” delves deep into the idea that humanity is currently in the midst of the sixth period of extinction since the beginning of all life. Determined to warn the world of its destructive path, she examines the effects the human race has had (and will continue to have) on other species such as frogs, coral reefs, plants, water creatures, and many mammals while giving a brief yet thorough history lesson of the past five major extinctions that occurred prior to the appearance of Homo sapiens.

This paper will reflect on the readings that we have done thus far, as well as ask the important question of how our daily lives, the things that we buy, use, and throw away, are all intertwined and built to impact climate change. Readings such as: Poverty, the environment, and the market, Tangled routes, the story of stuff, and This Changes everything gave us a glimpse into how humans are the primary contributors to climate change. Also, the movie; These changes everything, builds upon the image that humans are the primary contributors to climate change.

The Authors main point is that the world that we all know or think we know exists no longer. Bill McKibben talks about the infamous picture of Earth that makes it look as though it is rising in a black sky, is not the earth that exists today. He states that humans, “by burning fossil fuel, have raised the temperature of the planet nearly a degree Celsius” (McKibben, 2010). And it is this human implication that has caused the world to exhibit strange and completely altering affects. Because of the fossil fuel consumption of the people on Earth we are now seeing ice sheets melting at an unprecedented rate of 40% more (a recorded 1.1 million square miles smaller). We are witnessing rain droughts in places like northern China who didn’t experience rain for a hundred days, which is a

Contemporary scientist Edward O. Wilson captures the opposing viewpoints of environmentalism based discourses through satirical language. In Wilson’s literary work The Future of Life, the author, by use of candid tone, frequent hyperbole and an appeal to pathos, is able to satirize the unproductiveness of such discussions.

Since before the industrial evolutions humans have been pumping green house gasses—carbon dioxide, water vapor, methane, nitrous oxide, and chlorofluorocarbons— into the atmosphere however, it wasn’t until recently that the amounts being produced are shoving the Earth into a sixth extinction. While the causes of this upcoming extinction are constantly debated on it has earned itself the name Holocene extinction. This name is derived from the theory that humans are the main contributors to this extinction. To investigate the cause Elizabeth Kolbert, and American journalist and professor at Williams College, took the world on a wild and saddening journey on the human contribution to this looming extinction in her novel, The Sixth Extinction; An Unnatural History. Not only does Kolbert’s book explain how humans have contributed to global warming and its effects on life on land but also ocean acidification and how life under the sea has changed over the years.