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Protecting the environment through technology
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Humans have always been motivated by the concept of progress, which can be defined as meeting a community’s needs through positive changes. The alterations made should be sustainable and provide for future generations to be progress and not simply change. Since every group has different needs, progress should not have one standard definition and should be viewed as a relative term. To create a progressive, sustainable future, resolving trade-offs is essential, and conservation must become a core value in every community. Sometimes, progress is not always obvious, even when a society is meeting its needs. Noosa, Australia, for example, has established a population cap of 60,000 residents to maintain its biodiversity and village-like atmosphere. While some believe this cap limits the city’s growth, Noosa is progressive because it has accomplished its residents’ desires of conserving the unique biodiversity. Noosa’s population cap also ensures that the city will not become overcrowded; by meeting both present and future needs, the city creates a manageable future for its citizens. …show more content…
In the 1940’s, demand for electricity led to the construction of a dam and the artificial raising of water levels in Lake Tekapo. These actions brought important development to the area but affected the lake’s ecosystem, which questions whether unsustainable progress creates more problems than solutions. Today, economic growth is no longer the sole indicator of progress; other elements such as environmental protection have become more popular, revealing that citizens desire a multi-faceted progressive society. Lady Elliot Island, for example, has 85% of its electricity coming from solar energy, and the island aims to have 100% solar energy by 2020. This change moves the island toward a sustainable future and brings more awareness to the importance of conservation to
Finally in 1991, the federal government initiated a ‘Better Cities Program’ which aimed to make Australian cities sustainable and more liveable. It encoura...
Ronald Wright’s A Short History of Progress gives an overall view of the world’s history of progression since mankind has entered the earth. He discusses the argument whether human’s progression has been beneficial or resulted in many catastrophic mistakes. He uses examples to back his argument up such as the civilizations in the past and how their progression also was their reason for their downfall. A civilization needs to handle progression in their society responsibly. Wrights contributions to this argument have been able to lead to further discussion in relation to being a responsible citizen in our world today.
achieving the goal of sustainability. 12th ed. of the 12th e ). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall.
The term, progress, is synonymous with phrases that denote moving forward, growth, and advancement. It seems unorthodox then that Ronald Wright asserts the world has fallen into a progress trap, a paradox to how progress is typically portrayed as it contradicts the conventional way life is viewed: as being a natural progression from the outdated and tried towards the new and improved. Wright posits that it is the world’s relentless creation of innovative methods that ironically contributes to the progress trap rather than to progress itself, the intended objective. Wright’s coinage of the term “progress trap” refers to the phenomenon of innovations that create new complications that are typically left without resolve which exacerbate current conditions; unwittingly then, matters would have been much better if the innovation had never been implemented. In his book, “A Short History of Progress,” he alludes to history by citing examples of past civilizations that collapsed after prospering, and ones that had longevity because they avoided the perilous progress trap. Wright recommends that societies of today should use indispensable resources, such as history, to learn and apply the reasons as to why certain societies succeeded, while also avoiding falling into the pitfalls of those that failed, the ones that experienced the progress trap. This can easily be interrelated with Godrej’s concept of “the overheated engine of human progress,” since humans for centuries have been risking environmental degradation for progress through ceaseless industrialization and manufacturing. This exchange is doomed to prevent improved progress and will lead to society’s inevitable decline since it is unquestionable that in the unforeseeable future, cl...
(7) Adams, W. M. The Future of Sustainability: Re-thinking Environment and Development in the Twenty-first Century. Rep. The World Conservation Union, 22 May 2006. Web. 23 Oct. 2013.
...t of the condition of the mankind, it involves learning, and the outcome is discovering the yet unknown. And it seems that progress is the highest when freedom is present, in other words we can not get the most out of ourselves if we have constraints. So by the definition of progress we are unable to say what good is it going to make us, but it will do something generally valuable.
Rogers, DS., Duraiappah, AK., Antons, D.C., Munoz, P., Bai, X., Fragkias, M., Gutscher., H (2012) A Vision for Human Well-Being: Transition to Social Sustainability: Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 4(1) pg 61-73.
Sustainability in urban areas has many perspectives in business including: ecocentrism, technocentrism and ecological modernisation (University of Technology Sydney 2011). There are also major global initiatives that have shaped our understanding of sustainable development such as: Our Common Future; The Rio Convention Agenda 21; and the Millennium Development Goals (University of Technology Sydney 2011). There is no universal agreement on the definition of sustainable development hence makes urban sustainability a wicked problem. Urban areas “comprising thousands of minority groups, each joined around common interests, common value systems, and shared stylistic preferences that differ from those of other groups.” (Rittel & Webber 1973, p.167)
The progress we’ve made in the last two hundred years is greater than thousands of years before that. A draw back with the progress however, is that with more innovations, the natural resources are being forgotten about. People don’t have foresight, most aren’t looking toward what could happen if we stay on this road. We need to be looking toward the future, so we don’t waste our resources. We won’t our children, grandchildren, great grandchildren, etc. to have all the resources we have today.
With an abundance of garbage and waste throughout the island, as well as unstable contaminate levels in drinking water; the government is making little if any effort toward attempting to improve the island’s environment for the Kiribati people which contributes to extreme pollution levels and ultimately to climate change. Additionally, there are a large percentage of resources being used up without renewing them and the government seems to be overlooking concerns regarding ongoing health risks that have caused the people to develop illnesses. “Speaking at the annual South Pacific Forum in Fiji, Mr. Tong, the president of Kiribati, stated that rising sea levels would create countless environmental refugees.” (Marks, K, 2011) Therefore, one can conclude that without changes being made, not only locally, but also on a grander scale by developed nations, regarding the environmental impact of pollution, the sea level will eventually overlap the island and people will be forced to relocate or face
As previously implied, cities are currently the antithesis of even the barest sense of sustainability. To succinctly define the term “sustainability” would be to say that it represents living within one’s needs. When it comes to the city, with almost zero local sources of food or goods, one’s means is pushed and twisted to include resources originating far beyond the boundaries of the urban landscape. Those within cities paradoxically have both minimal and vast options when it comes to continuing their existence, yet this blurred reality is entirely reliant on the resources that a city can pull in with its constantly active economy.
Moore said that we can understand sustainability as “a storyline, a narrative thread that people use to understand how the past, present, and future can be connected in different ways” (Moore 2007). Since the understanding of sustainability has been changing, we can neither predict what will happen in the future nor establish a set of rules for the future generation to follow. As Norton argued, sustainable activities can be conducted in the present “without negatively impacting the range of important choices that should be left open to the next generation” (Norton 2005:432). Therefore, it’s crucial to apprehend the nature of sustainable cities in order to set up the framework while never kill
According to the International Institute for Sustainable Development, sustainable development is defined as development that meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. If we follow this definition, it becomes easy to see that the vast majority of the “developed” world has not, and is not developing sustainably. The idea of sustainable development requires us to consider how our action of developing will affect other countries, and future generations. Many people believe in “the butterfly effect”, where the flapping of a butterfly’s wings in one part of t...
By showing the world the severity of our need for conservation, we will be able to save the earth and get the most out of our resources. We need to fix this problem before it becomes uncontrollable to the point of having no resources to supply our needs. By reducing our consumption of resources, we will be able to become closer to fixing the problem of global warming, high gasoline prices and pesticide filled meats. The outcome of respecting our world and “going green” will better how we live our lives, our communities and the environment. The concept of “going green” is a necessity for the future because “our children deserve cities as beautiful as they are.
Conservation is defined as the saving of resources. The term ‘resources’ can mean several things, but for this particular essay I will be using it to mean the same thing as Diane Hunt talks about in her work, energy and materials- with energy referring to oil, coal, electricity and natural gas - and materials being biological things such as ‘wood, soils and food sources’. It is of the utmost importance that we realise the value and importance of conservation, because if we don’t then our resources can quickly disappear. Hunt raises the point that conservation is often seen directly in contrast with ‘development’, and whilst this is a valid point, it is not particularly true- both are actually resource management concept, with the only difference being the rate at which materials and resources are being used. Development generally conjures images of rapid resource use, but as long as the resources used are being carefully monitored and replenished when applicable there is no reason for development to be opposed by conservationists. It is a fact that we need development as a species to continue thriving and to continue growing. It is also important that we conserve our resources so that we can continue developing, and so that our future generations have the ability to continue developing. By conservation we offer our future generations the same opportunities that we have, and offer