In his essay “Why Bother?” Michael Pollan issues a call for individual efforts as seemingly miniscule as planting a backyard garden to fight the global climate change crisis, positing that those small individual changes in lifestyle can swell not only into a wave of change worldwide but also reconnect people to their identities as consumers, producers, and citizens. Authors Seth Wynes and Kimberly Nicholas, in their academic article “The Climate Mitigation Gap: Education and Government Recommendations Miss the Most Effective Individual Actions,” agree that such lifestyle changes are crucial but point to more high-impact changes such as having one fewer child or eschewing airplane travel. Such changes may be difficult for older generations set …show more content…
in their fossil fuel-centric ways, but young minds are still malleable to such action. There is just one problem: Youth are not being taught such high-impact actions. This essay analyzes the likenesses and differences in Pollan’s essay and the Wynes-Nicholas collaborative paper, showing where they agree on proper individual actions to combat climate change, as well as looking at where significant differences exist. Pollan writes that, despite the formidable task before humanity regarding climate change, individuals should “bother” to do their part to fight it. While individual actions such as planting a garden may feel insignificant, the author maintains that it is quite the contrary, pointing to the example it sets for others and how it raises and perhaps even changes consciousness. Going further, Pollan writes: “Going personally green is a bet, nothing more or less, though it’s one we probably all should make, even if the odds of it paying off aren’t great. Sometimes you have to act as if acting will make a difference, even when you can’t prove that it will.” Wynes and Nicholas would argue that the action Pollan advocates would not make near the difference he thinks it would. The duo analyzed more than a hundred scenarios regarding behavior-change possibilities to fight climate change and ranked them from highest to lowest impact. The four most impactful actions found were having one fewer child, living without a car, avoiding one transatlantic flight, and eating a plant-based diet. Going further and considering that per capita emissions of carbon dioxide per year per person must decline to 2.1 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent by 2050 if global warming is to stay below 2 degrees Celsius, the authors estimated that a person who eats meat and takes one roundtrip, transatlantic flight would break that threshold and emit 2.4 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent—and that is without accounting for any emissions from his or her car or in other parts of their life. Despite those four actions listed above having the greatest potential impact in fighting climate change, an examination of Canadian school textbooks by Wynes and Nicholas found that 216 individual recommended actions focused on moderate- or low-impact climate-change solutions such as recycling and energy conservation. However, Pollan argues that while small actions such as planting a garden to fight climate change may not “virally rock the world,” they are “real and particular (as well as symbolic) and that, come what may, will offer [their] own rewards.” Some of those rewards may be physical in the form of production of one’s own food and the sharing of that bounty with neighbors and friends, the author writes, while other rewards may be abstract. Bonds are built, forged, and strengthened with those neighbors and friends through the sharing not only of the garden’s production but also through the community lending and borrowing labor and tools among each other. Through the cultivation of a corner of yard, Pollan says that the gardener relearns that our relationship with the planet “need not be zero-sum, and that as long as the sun still shines and people can still plan and plant, think and do, if we bother to try, find ways to provide for ourselves without diminishing the world.” Wynes and Nicholas would argue that Pollan’s plant-a-garden take trivializes the climate crisis in its advocacy of smaller action when higher-impact action is attainable.
Fighting climate change is hard, and thus it requires hard decisions and hard lifestyle changes to make a serious impact. According to the duo, textbook and government agency writers’ preponderance toward writing about small- to medium-impact actions against climate change may emanate from the want to promote easy-to-perform actions that are frequent and thus could lead to other behavioral changes. However, Wynes and Nicholas write that such a positive “spillover effect” from smaller actions does not happen as frequently as many hope, but that early research results on “high-commitment, pro-social behaviors are more likely to cause further positive spillover, which supports an emphasis on high-impact actions as a way to change overall norms.” Promoting or advocating high-impact actions such as eating a plant-based diet or eschewing air travel might be politically unpopular, Wynes and Nicholas write, but that does not mean it should be left out of the school lessons of the generation most likely and able to take on such behavior …show more content…
adaptations. Putting these pieces together for analysis further cements in my mind the difficulty in ascribing meaning to fighting climate change.
For many people set in their ways, making a monumental life change such as giving up meat products or living without a car could be next to impossible. But just because those high-impact actions may be unattainable on a personal decision level does not mean they should give up on or not do anything regarding climate change. There is value in doing taking part in the smaller efforts, even if part of the value is more on an interpersonal level. That has value. Still, Wynes and Nicholas make good points that, for high-impact actions to have a better chance at taking hold, such actions need to be presented as behavioral options to our youth when their tendencies and preferences are still in their formative stages. It seems logical that introduction to those ideas early on would allow greater opportunity for more meaningful, higher-impact climate change action by more people around the
world. The specter of climate change looms over the humanity this century as we as a civilization seek to come to grips with the dilemma and as well as ascertain what actions can be undertaken to combat the menace before us. Will it eventually unite us toward actions great and small in hopes of keep global temperatures from rising too high? Will we be paralyzed to inaction by the debate over the scale of the actions needed? How will humanity’s carbon footprint evolve in the 21st Century? The answers to those questions hold our fate. Works Cited Michael Pollan, The New York Times Magazine, April 20, 2008, et al. “Why Bother?” Wynes, Seth, and Kimberly Nicholas. The climate mitigation gap: education and government ... IOP Science, 12 July 2017, iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aa7541.
Mr. McKibben provides a strong argument call of action for everyone to take action against global warming. But he doesn 't just want action, Mr. Mckibben is demanding action now, and lots of it. Throughout the passage, Meltdown: Running Our of Time on Global Warming, the reader can examine the many ways that McKibben attempts to persuade others to join his movement. When one examines Bill McKibben 's use of rhetoric appeals, persuasive fallacies, and counter augments, A reader can analyze and understand the real claim that the writer is attempting to address.
Many people’s opinions are influenced by political leaders and their beliefs, which can have a negative effect on science’s efforts. Mere word changes have shown to make a difference in people’s willingness to pay for taxes that they don’t necessarily support or are even aware of. The use of storytelling has shown to be a powerful means in communicating science to the public as well. Although education and science understanding are not directly correlated with the acceptance of climate science, there is evidence that shows that a brief explanation of greenhouse effects “enhance acceptance across the political spectrum”. Researching source credibility has also boosted the political acceptance of certain scientific information.
In Michael Pollan’s “Why Bother?” Pollan argues that each person can contribute to helping to the environment by erasing their carbon footprints. In my everyday life I experience the choice of driving my car to work or riding my bike. More often than not I choose to drive my car because it is the easier option. I, along with many other people, believe that my individual impact will not cause a larger impact on the global scale. In Pollan’s essay, he makes each person think about the effect they are leaving on the environment and how each person, as an individual, can change his ways before it is too late. Wendell Berry, a naturalist and well-respected and influential writer, was a key factor in recognition of the environmental crisis and how to solve the problem.
This article “young people” by David Suzuki is a persuasive/argumentative article instilling the future of the environment to the young people of the world. David Suzuki also shows us the issues regarding unnecessary and unsustainable waste pollution. David uses young people like a 14-year-old David grassby as an example of how young people can make an impact on society. The article takes a look at the present and focuses on the future. I agree with the statement “Youth speak with power and clarity that only innocence confers and because we love them, adults have to make changes to the way we live” because young youth think they know everything and that they’re always right but they really aren’t. For example, when I was younger I used to think I was old enough to watch rated r horror movies but i really wasn’t, I remember getting really scared and my parents would say “I told you so”, I also used to believe that I didn’t need to go to school, that it was a waste of time but as I got older I realized that school is very important and
Will this century mark the decline of society? Is the future safe from the mistakes of mankind? In “Learning How to Die in the Anthropocene”, Roy Scranton suggests that the question we should be asking ourselves about global warming is not whether it exists or how it can be stopped, but rather how are we going to deal with it. The purpose of the article is to convince everyone that current life is unsustainable, and that nothing can be done to reverse the process; we must acknowledge that the future will be drastically different and plan in advance if civilization is to keep moving forward. Dr. Scranton develops a realistic tone that relies on logos, pathos, and ethos appeals to persuade readers of his claim. Scranton sufficiently backs up
The modern lifestyle, full of one time use items and pollution generating machines, is harming our environment, and, without a plan, the death of our planet is certain. Environmentalist and author, Derrick Jensen uses a comparison of possible outcomes to persuade his readers to take action that would help stop climate change; political resistance is his preferred and recommended course of action for his audience. Throughout his essay, “Forget Shorter Showers”, Jensen makes clear his desire to reduce or even reverse the effects industrialization (476-478). He advocates an approach where society makes changes to industry and to government over the current methods of voluntary
Bill McKibben's "The Environmental Issue from Hell" argues that climate change is a real and dire concern for humanity. His essay deals with the methods and persuasive arguments needed to spur American citizens and the government on to change to more eco-friendly choices. The arguments he proposes are based largely upon emotional appeals calling for empathy and shame, and examples of what in our daily lives is adding to the changes we're seeing in the climate.
At my school, I am an active member of a program called S.E.E.D., which stands for Students Ending Environmental Destruction. As a group, spread awareness about recycling, water conservation and remediation, climate change, and other environmental problems the world faces today. We make sure that every classroom has a recycling bin and informative posters above them. We have hosted movie nights where we provide healthy, GMO-free refreshments and show an educational film that relates to a current issues to spread awareness. We have also convinced our school to install stations that are specifically meant to refill water bottles as it encourages students to stop buying plastic bottles and wasting plastic. Taking care of the environment and educating our youth, the congressmen, women, and voters of tomorrow who will be the deciding factors of the earth’s health, and consequently the people’s health, is crucial to me.
We, as human beings, tend to take advantage of the things that we receive in this world. Due to this reason, we do not seem to care about the problems occurring amongst us, but instead only complain and point fingers when a problem occurs. In Why Bother by Michael Pollan, he brings up a point explaining how we rely on the specialist to fix our problems as we do not bother to fix the problems on our own. With the term of specialization, it is an act of being restricted to something specific meaning in this case a study of something specific so that there is more of an understanding. This is viewed as a negative term in Pollan’s view because with specialization, everyone in the society thinks that any problem we have has its own specialized person that can work on it. Due to that reason, no one will step up and fix the problem right in front of them because they assume someone else got it. An example he brought up to visualize his point of how a change can make a difference is the idea of planting a garden. There is no specialization there, but what is needed is the shining of the sun, the planning, and planting of people. With this, a garden is made by just a typical person as all was required were their own thoughts and actions. Just like the visualization of the garden, I believe if small changes are done, this will help improve the world making it a better and healthier place rather than relying on someone else since that really would not bring any changes. Also, the people who makes the changes will also gain positive aspects out of this doing. We should not always rely on other people to make changes, but instead “do bother” according to Pollan.
Obesity has been forever altering our society. People are being approached by their physiques. This is making a negative impact on climate change. Ultimately, people want to have the ideal body. In order to do this, they need to tweak their behaviors in order to change society for the better. This complication can be altered and justice can be done. In the article “Why Bother?” by Michael Pollan, he discusses how people are in an environmental crisis. A justification or explanation to this change is due to the facts behind the types off physiques. People are realizing that there are opposing challenges
Is climate change real? Are we at fault? Most of us don’t go to bed at night thinking about those questions, but, should we be thinking about those questions? Should we ask ourselves what we are doing to the planet we live on, also, what are we doing to this one body we are given or do we just turn the other cheek and ignore what going on around us? . Should we be blind to all the things going on environmentally, like we did years ago to slavery, or should we stand up and speak out in mass? This is the question that Sandra Steingraber an ecologist, mother, and cancer survivor ask us in her article for an online journal In These Times: Despair Not.
Living off the grid is slowly becoming more prevalent, and there are a growing number of people embracing this lifestyle because they desire to live The Good Life. Many are discovering ways to appreciate off-grid living, rather than assessing the disadvantages of it. It is obvious that people are removing themselves from the grid in order to combat global warming and climate change, but those who have a stronger appreciation for nature are willing to make sacrifices to live off the grid. People who have a positive attitude toward this way of living are more likely to relate it to pursuing the Good Life. Even though “living completely off the grid isn’t for everyone,” those who dream of living a sustainable lifestyle are determined and fully committed to doing so (Bodkins 1). A vast majority of people dream of becoming wealthy and living lavishly, but that dream does not appeal to everyone. Some people are content without owning a mansion, multiple cars, or earning millions of dollars. Things of monetary worth are not important to those ...
61). Moreover, it can also be seen “as presenting us with the largest collective action problem that humanity has ever faced, one that has both intra- and inter-generational dimensions” (Jamieson pg. 61). Thus, climate change will not only affect us but our children, and their children’s children, for generations to come. So is this it? Have we as humans sold our souls to the climate change devil? Is this something that we will always have to deal with and if so then why should we even bother trying to prevent it? Dale Jamieson philosopher and author of the book, Reason in a Dark Time, argues that we have sold our souls to the climate change devil and will be stuck with this problem for eternity. However, just because we are stuck with climate change, Jamieson argues, we should not give up on trying to slow down its effects. In addition to Jamieson the Federal Republic of Germany also believes that we are stuck with climate change and have developed their own solutions to help mitigate the effects. Throughout this paper I will present a descriptive and normative analysis to help address the environmental justice claims that both entities are making. I will then go on to show the instability of Dale Jamieson’s argument in both his descriptive and normative analysis through the development of my own
The Earth is currently locked in perpetuating spiral of climate change. While the global climate has unarguably been changing since the dawn of it's manifestation, the once steadied ebb and flow of climate change has become increasingly more unpredictable.The risk of rising sea levels, and drought plaguing the fresh water supply, during the time that flooding and sporadic storm conditions turn once fully inhabited regions into uninhabitable death traps. Climate change catalyzed by human's increased production of carbon dioxide, is more noticeable than ever in our recorded history (United States, 2014 National Climate Assessment). Thankfully however, with the changing weather conditions due to carbon related emissions, the change in public opinion about their personalized influence on climate change is also increasing. Kevin Liptak Jethro Mullen, and Tom Cohen note that In reaction to the most recent governmental report on climate change, even the U.S. government believes that a stronger approach needs to be taken to correct our self-generated cataclysm.
Although more people are aware of the impacts we have on our environment, there are still people that choose to ignore scientific evidence, or do not fully understand the consequences. Further education and research are critical components in an effort to become more sustainable. Fortunately, younger generations are learning about the need to address environmental issues so that changes can be made to ensure our way of life is sustainable.