I want my future to look like

This class this semester has profoundly effected me, I don’t want to come off sounding corny but I’m sincere in saying that I no longer look at the world around me in the same way. Just for starters I recently said to my husband that I don’t want our life to be one of consumerism, like having the feeling that we need to buy the biggest TV just because and we don’t need to feel like we have to have a humongous house to be happy in life. Five years ago I would never say something like that, five years ago I did want the 7 bedroom, 3 bath, house for four people. But college has changed my perspective of priorities. It is no longer a priority to consume and shop and work to the bone to support those habits. Its hard for my family to understand where I’m coming from, a lot of my collegiate associates get what I’m trying to say. For my husband this was a harsh realization that we will have to work hard at compromising about what I future holds and how we’ll meet all our needs. I want our future to be filled with satisfying work, like growing our own food and having an efficient farm and figuring out a way to become more sustainable, a sustainability that suits us. I’d rather splurge on energy efficient tools, like solar panels, than a 70 inch LCD T.V. with built in Blue-Ray. I’d rather build a small energy efficient home with a bit of land than buy a 300 sq. ft. house without a lawn. Somewhere between all of that lies a compromise that will suit our goal and pockets. None of this self realization would have been possible if I wasn’t exposed to many different ideas at college. .

Recycling facts

WATER

*Between 1950 and 2000, the U.S. population nearly doubled. However, in that same period, public demand for water more than tripled! Americans now use an average of 100 gallons of water each day — enough to fill 1,600 drinking glasses! (EPA, 2008)

*A recent government survey showed that at least 36 states are anticipating local, regional, or statewide water shortages by 2013. (EPA, 2008)

*Most people realize that hot water uses up energy, but supplying and treating cold water requires a significant amount of energy too. American public water supply and treatment facilities consume about 56 billion kilowatt-hours per year — enough electricity to power more than 5 million homes for an entire year. (EPA, 2008)

Appliances and Fixtures in General

*If all U.S. households installed water-efficient appliances, the country would save more than 3 trillion gallons of water and more than $18 billion dollars per year! (EPA, 2008)

*If one out of every 100 American homes was retrofitted with water-efficient fixtures, we could save about 100 million kilowatt-hours of electricity per year — avoiding 80,000 tons of greenhouse gas emissions. The greenhouse gas savings would be equivalent to removing nearly 15,000 automobiles from the road for one year! (EPA, 2008)

Bathroom: Sink, Toilet, Bath, Shower

*About 75 percent of the water we use in our homes is used in the bathroom. (California Energy Commission, 2006)

*If your toilet is from 1992 or earlier, you probably have an inefficient model that uses between 3.5 to 7 gallons per flush. Newer, high-efficiency toilets use less than 1.3 gallons per flush — that's at least 60 percent less water per flush! (EPA, 2008)

*If just 1 percent of American homes replaced an older toilet with a new WaterSense labeled toilet, the country would save more than 38 million kilowatt-hours of electricity — enough electricity to supply more than 43,000 households for one month. (EPA, 2008)

*The average bathroom faucet flows at a rate of two gallons per minute. Turning off the tap while brushing your teeth in the morning and at bedtime can save up to 8 gallons of water per day, which equals 240 gallons a month. (EPA, 2008)

*Letting your faucet run for five minutes uses about as much energy as letting a 60-watt light bulb run for 14 hours. (EPA, 2008)

*Leaky faucets that drip at the rate of one drip per second can waste more than 3,000 gallons of water each year; A leaky toilet can waste about 200 gallons of water every day. If your fixtures have leaks, you should get them repaired! (EPA, 2008)

*A full bath tub requires about 70 gallons of water, while taking a five-minute shower uses only 10 to 25 gallons. (EPA, 2008)

Other Household Water Needs

*The average washing machine uses about 41 gallons of water per load, whereas newer, high-efficiency washing machine models use less than 28 gallons of water per load. (EPA, 2008)

*The typical single-family suburban household uses at least 30 percent of their water outdoors for irrigation. Some experts estimate that more than 50 percent of landscape water use goes to waste due to evaporation or runoff caused by overwatering!
Consider installing a drip irrigation system to water your lawn and garden. These systems use between 20 to 50 percent less water than conventional in-ground sprinkler systems. They are also much more efficient than conventional sprinklers because no water is lost to wind, runoff, and evaporation. (EPA, 2008) http://www.oberlin.edu/recycle/facts.html

Black Friday

The book A Reasonable Life was very interesting and one part that I would like to reflect on is about “Sunday shopping” which I wanted to correlate to Black Friday. That one day a year we as Americans practically celebrate capital and consumerism, when we’re on a turkey high of tryptophan and wake in the wee hours of the morning to shop and shove all morning long. I myself woke at 3pm to stand in line at 5pm to purchase a PS3 Christmas bundle that came with two games. But I refused the temptation to shop and shove my way inside a big chain store like Wal-Mart and Target were people have actually died from being trampled to death so others can save and shop and save and shop.
I think we’re junkies for the bargain, we push physical limits to be able to say we made the best purchase possible. The disturbing part is that this happens at a national level, that people all over America shop and shop and shop on this one day, which makes a couple of other people pretty darn rich. It’s almost sickening to think that humans turn on humans to get the last really good deal, or people stomp over others to snag a bargain, but when something like 9/11 happens people donated blood beyond capacity and had to be turned away. Its not surprising that the theory of humanity has been pondered for centuries and has stumped the most intellectual of people.

December 12, 2012

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/11/091106-2012-end-of-world-myths.html

The end of the world is near—December 21, 2012, to be exact—according to theories based on a purported ancient Maya prediction and fanned by the marketing machine behind the soon-to-be-released 2012 movie. But could humankind really meet its end in 2012—drowned in apocalyptic floods, walloped by a secret planet, seared by an angry sun, or thrown overboard by speeding continents?

All of these are myths and people are afraid to the point they are contemplating whether they should kill themselves or not before this time is coming. The media has always scared people. We need to know fact from fiction. Go to the library and do some research. Find out on the citations and when it was published. If it comes from the government, university, or a professor from a university then you are in great hands.

Some people are so naive about science. They need to broaden their ideas and facts about the planet.

What I have to come appreciate more

This class has not only taught me a great deal about ecosystems and the environment, it has opened and broadened my mind. I have to come a point that our planet is a valuable source to us. I knew about certain things like green house gases and what not. I learned more about the Industrial Revolution and how the agriculture went from hunter-gatherers to being a huge civilization associated with technological advances.

I think that people's prosperity has narrow-minded some individuals. They are concerned about making more money, having more prestige, and wealth instead of spending time with their loved ones. That is another reason why our divorce rate is so high. I also think that advertising has corrupted our child's minds. This country is very liberal and we have alot of freedom to do basically what we want.

I have to come appreciate the planet as a whole and life itself.

People and Resource

I just want to say as final words about this class. This class was nothing like I thought it would be. In the beginning I thought blogging was something that we shouldn't take seriously. But when i start blogging, I didn't want to stop blogging. Every time I blog, I always find something interesting and learn something from it too. I felt proud of myself. Because I am not a big fan of reading books and learning all these information in a very little amount of time was something to be proud of to me. I read Ishmael and watched two videos because of this class. I feel like now I know the reason why Dr. Hirsch wanted everyone to blog every week. Normally I don't learn anything from my other classes because we just take the tests and forget about it after a week.
I just want to say Thanks to Dr. Hirsch for letting us to post blogs and I hope US will find solutions to the global crisis.

Animals Can Tell Before Disaster Strikes

There is evidence to support the fact that animals can sense things before we can. Earthworms come out of the ground before an earthquake, sharks flee the shore when there is a tsunami, birds waited to fly south when there were a series of hurricanes in Florida. There are many more examples of this in an article on mongabay.com. I found this very interesting in itself but it is also interesting in another way. For all of those people who do not believe that the Earth is in danger, they should look around them at the animals. We are in a period of mass extinction, marine life is in danger, biodiversity is decreasing, the rainforests and the creatures that reside in them are disapearring. It should be obvious that the animals are trying to tell us something. They are basically screaming at us that there is going to be a disaster if we continue on this path. We would not be able to exist without animals so not to care about animals is the same as not caring if you have water to drink. An example of a lack of biodiversity is monoculture when there is not enough biodiversity. This can lead to disaster in the form of a food famine. Having a lack of biodiversity led to the irish potato famione, the european wine industry collapse and many others.

Marine Life in Danger Regardless of Global Warming

Al Gore touched on fisheries in his speech about global warming and implied that marine life was in danger due to global warming. New studies suggest that independent of global warming the carbon dioxide that is being absorbed from the atmosphere by the ocean is raising the acidity of the ocean. This is relevant because if the acidity raises too much it could pose a huge threat to shellfish. Their shells will literally disintegrate if the pH level gets too high. The pH level has been gradually rising but has begun to raise even more in the last 200 years. This article predicts that by the end of the century shellfish could be extinct if this pattern continues. This article can be found at science daily.com. It compares the disintegrating of the shells to chalk in vinegar. This is a scary thought because while it would not happen to us the same way, these creatures would literally just disintegrate. How can we let this happen. I found it interesting that Al Gore touched on fisheries but not so much on this because I think it is more attention grabbing to say that the fish could literally disintegrate. On the issue of fisheries I almost feel that it is selfish of people in developed countries to be buying fish and taking so much of the oceans supply when developing countries completely rely on fishing in some cases. Our demand is literally taking food out of starving peoples mouths when all we look at it as is another meal or a delicacy in some cases. This is a silly problem because it could be solved so easily with some regulation. I doubt that it will ever be completely regulated because the sad truth is that people can be truly greedy and just want to get as much as they can for themselves.

E.D.

As a child who attended the Earth school, i remember one of our special days that we celebrated being Earth day.  This is a day that a lot of people are not aware that it does exist and this may be the reason why we treat our environment the way we do and why the earth may soon be in shambles.  Earth Day is celebrated every year on April 22nd, and this day was created to inspire awareness and appreciation for the planet we live on.  It was founded in the year 1970 by a man named Gaylord Nelson who was in fact a senator of the united states.  The symbol that u can see along this blog is the symbol for the day which is a combination of E and O representing environment and organisms.  On this special day in school we were asked to plant trees, make everything natural, and were forbidden or at least try to not kill any creature.  We enjoyed the earth and were taught it's importance.  I believe if the world as a whole recognized this day and celebrated it like we do other holidays there would be a major difference in how we treated the earth and all of our natural resources.

New media spread the word on H1N1

“When you think of the Boston Public Health Commission, you probably think of a suit, very strict, very straight to the point,’’ said Ethan McCoy, a 22-year-old who stars in the YouTube video, which has drawn nearly 5,000 views. “When you loosen it up, and people realize the people relaying the message are from their community, they’re going to sing it to themselves over and over - ‘I’ll cough in my sleeve’ - and they’ll start coughing in their sleeve.’’

I thought after watching this video was every useful to spread the information to the public about the swine flu and the vaccination H1N1.

Importance of college education

Many students after high school think of starting an income. They may be repelled by the rising cost of tuition while it is true that the higher education is one of the largest expenses that we will ever face. The main reason of going to college is for better opportunities. As of today high school graduates are not able to find a high paying jobs like they used to. I feel like US has been changed from manufacturing based economy to to an economy based on knowledge and it serves as way to have better opportunities. There are many other reasons why college education is important too. Students will have the opportunity to read books and listen to lecture of top experts in the field. This encourages students to think, ask questions and explore new ideas.The more connections we are collected during the college career helps us a lot when we start looking for a job. (http://www.collegeview.com/importance_of_college_education.html)
Some people find college boring and they start doing their own business like Bill Gates. And some other become successful in life like Former US president like George.w.Bush. But those are risky. What if Microsoft wasn't success?. What would Bill gates has done?. I want to become a Doctor and I know without going to college, I can fulfill my dream. So education is everything that we need. Its not something tat we gonna lose after a while. We need it forever. Like Michelle Obama says, it is cool to be smart.

House Passes Financial Regulation Bill, 223 to 202

Today the house of representatives passed the Financial Regulation Bill, 223 to 202. According to the New York Times, "It creates a new agency to oversee consumer lending, establishes new rules for transactions that contributed to the meltdown, and seeks to reduce the threat that one or two huge companies on the verge of collapse could bring down the economy".
We need this bill to make sure major companies like Wal-mart doesn't take over our economy. We need to bring companies to the US. We need to go back to how we were a little while ago, and start to be the producers rather than the consumer. The US became a dependent nation and used to be a very independent nation. Now almost everything we buy is from overseas.
As we mentioned many times in class, we need to start buying from local farmers, and corner stores, so we can circulate the money that we are spending. We need to make sure that money can remain in our community instead of this money going into the pockets of rich CEOs of major companies. We should all start to buy little things we need from the cornor stores and from the farmers market and see how we can build relationships with our producers and how they look out for you. If you continue to buy something from the farmers, you can actually tell those farmers what you want, and the next time they have it available they will save it for u.
Lets hope this new bill brings the best for our economy.

Cry for help

I was searching the web and came across this disturbing headline "Enslaved children rescued from GAP sweatshop." In west Bengal 14 children were rescued ranging from ages 8-14.  The building where they worked had rooms crammed with embroidery tables.  The building smelled of a dirty bathroom and they all lived, ate and slept in these crammed rooms.  One of the boys who were rescued had open wounds on his face and had a severe case of chicken pox, and had not been taken to a doctor.  These children who were sold through trafficking are unpaid and malnourished, and sadly are working for one of the biggest clothing companies, GAP.  The GAP has admitted to condoning and participating in child-labor, but the question is when will they put a stop to it.  With the average child being 10-years old why is a corporation that is so large participating in this cruel act, and why are people still buying from this company.  When we purchase items we never realize the process behind it and who makes what.  We never consider that these items are sold for way more than what the people who are making it are getting paid.  Most of the products sold in the United States are not made in the states, and with corrupt governments and their lack of care for the children and their well-being but rather the money they will gain from it, there are no consequences.  There is no one listening to the cries of these young children.  Who will hear them and when?

leavers and takers.

Leavers and Takers in the novel Ishmael by Daniel Quinn, refers to primates and civilized people respectively. Charles A. Weiss, does a great job describing the difference between the two, in his brief take on Ishmael (http://www.mobar.org/journal/1997/mayjun/prezpage.htm).
He says "The premise of the Leaver story is that man belongs to the world. Right from the beginning, everything that ever lived belonged to the world — and that's how things came to be this way in the Leaver culture. The single cell creatures that swarm in the ancient ocean belonged to the world, and because they did, everything that followed came into being. Those club-finned fish off shore of the continents belonged to the world and because they did, the amphibians eventually came into being; and because the amphibians belonged to the world, the reptiles eventually came into being; and because the reptiles belonged to the world, the mammals eventually came into being; and because the mammals belonged to the world, the primates came into being; and eventually man as we know him today came into being. That is the way the Leavers lived for three million years — as if they belonged to the world. Under this premise, creation goes on forever. Each species has the opportunity to evolve to whatever state possible. Our culture, the Taker's view as to how things came to be this way, provides the rationalization for what appears to be the inexorable destruction of the community of life, including the devastation of the rain forest, the deterioration of the ozone layer, the pollution of the oceans and the disappearance of dozens of species of life every day."

I couldn't find any better words to explain this. We, the takers, want to find the reason behind everything. We have the brain capacity to do this. The primates didn't have the ability to research the history and discover the fossils and find the missing link, and map out the Earth from 4 billion years ago until now. In our Evolution class we were discussion the origins of life, and we were discussing how old the Earth earth really is and our teacher was trying to put it into an analogy that we can all understand. He, Professor McKeon, gave the example of taking a road trip that starts at California and ends at the top og the empire state building. This was very interesting because he along the way listed the important events that took place in the world. I think this was a great way for him to get his point across. His point was that the Earth is waaayyy older than us, and that the amount of humans have been on this planet is nothing compared to the age of Earth. In his analogy, middle of the empire state building is when humans came into being, and the last 3/4 of the bell tower, of the empire state building represents the last 20 years, which is how old we actually are.
Humans have been on this planet for not that long, but we made a huge impact on the development, and the shape of this world now. Some are positive but mostly we concentrate on the negative effects that the humans caused in the environment. Primates didn't care about what happens in the world and whether the water supply was depleting, all they cared about was saving themselves from predators. We concentrate on ourselves a lot but we do focus on the environment as a whole, because we want our future generations to survive.

Warming Of Arctic

ScienceDaily (Aug. 16, 2009)The warming of an Arctic current over the last 30 years has triggered the release of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, from methane hydrate stored in the sediment beneath the seabed.
Methane released from gas hydrate in submarine sediments had been identifies in the past as an agent of climate change. The release of methane this way had been predicted.
The results say that the warming of the northward-flowing West Spitsbergen current 1° since the last thirty years caused the release of methane by breaking down methane hydrate in the sediment beneath the seabed.
Methane hydrate is an ice like substance composed of water and methane which is stable in conditions of high pressure and low temperature. At present, methane hydrate is stable at water depths greater than 400 metres in the ocean off Spitsbergen. But thirty years ago it was stable at water depths as shallow as 360 metres.
This was the first time that such behavior in response to climate change has been observed in the modern period.
Most of the methane currently released from the seabed is dissolved in the seawater before it reaches the atmosphere, methane seeps are episodic and unpredictable and periods of more vigorous outflow of methane into the atmosphere are possible. And methane dissolved in the seawater contributes to ocean acididfication.

Graham Westbrook Professor of Geophysics at the University of Birmingham, warns: "If this process becomes widespread along Arctic continental margins, tens of megatonnes of methane per year – equivalent to 5-10% of the total amount released globally by natural sources, could be released into the ocean."

Summing Up This Class

Biology 230: People and Resources In Ecological Perspective. Overall this class taught me a lot that I would have never known. I had taken a Global Climate Change class previously here at the University at Albany, but it seemed to be a class based more purely on facts. While in Bio 230 we learned about these issues from all angles, in a more eye opening fashion. We learned about the issues and how they impact each of us personally. This way we can take the issues personally and become motivated to do something about them. Dr. Hirsch has given us a means of going about this change. We've had guest speakers who have given their methods of sustainable living. Through researching articles for my blogs I have also come across ways that other people make their lives work while living a better more fulfilling lifestyle than most of us. They come up with little inventions in order to use energy more efficiently. They shop organically, or produce their own food in a safe humane manner. If we could all find out ways to make our own lives more satisfactory in this way, this class has provided me with the insight and some ideas on how to do this.

I now have the knowledge on "Stuff" in a way to be more intelligent when making purchases. If only my head could be as good as the goodguide.com then it would be a lot easier to make decisions on shopping at the food store. One this website is able to expand to more than just food items and daily household items it will be able to help us make decisions on EVERYTHING we buy. Imagine going to the store, looking for a new laptop and being able to make a decision that is best for you and the environment in a minute. Stores like Best Buy should provide us with the Good Guide ratings on their products. All companies should take the initiate to do this because it will create a positive competition in the market to go "green". I think that ultimately while our market can stir up a big change, our government is going to play the biggest role in our country's ability to convert to more renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power. We all individually must contact our local government officials and let the people in power know what we want. We need to get this done to avoid a huge disaster that is headed our way. I don't understand why more people in our government don't understand the crisis like Al Gore does. His knowledge in itself is a powerful tool that he has been employing non stop to change the way people think about the environment. We need to stop the prejudice that people have about people like him as a crazy tree huger. Hes simply just aware of the issues at hand that other people think of as irrelevant. We need to change the general conception of this and do it fast. As Al Gore would say, "We need to go far and we need to go quickly."

Al Gore warns on latest climate trends | Video on TED.com

Al Gore warns on latest climate trends | Video on TED.com
This video is about the changing of climate. Burning coal is leading cause of global warming. Our economy, national security, and climate crises are because of carbon based fuels like dirty coal and foreign oil. In 1980 the arctic ice cap from 3 million years has been the size of lower 48 states, but in 2007 it has been shrunk by 40% . The ice is melting fast and a lot of glaciers are becoming lakes because we are putting 70 million tons of CO2 in the oceans every 24 hours.

Solutions to American crisis

There are few crisis that US is facing as of right now. Few of them are climatic change and Obesity. Climatic change is already happening and one of the greatest environmental, social and economic threats that is facing the planet. The European Union is committed to working constructively for a global agreement to control climate change, and is leading the way by taking ambitious action of its own. Since 1850, earth's surface temperature has been risen to .76 degrees. Most of the warming that has occurred over past 50 years has been cause by the human activities. To stop the climate change, global green house and gas emissions must be reduced significantly. The European Union has been at the front in the international efforts to combat climate change and it has been taking serious steps to address its own green house gas emissions since the 1990's. (http://ec.europa.eu/environment/climat/home_en.htm).
We can find a solution to Obesity by exercises, eating healthy food, avoiding junk foods. I dont understand that how people can get chubby after knowing the ad effects of it. Like I am sure everyone who eats junk food knows that its not good for our health but they still keep eating it. And blames it on the companies. The companies are not forcing any one to buy their products. So I say its our own fault that we become obese. We should know what to and what not to eat. Even if we eat, we need to burn our calories by doing some exercises. Another reason why people are obese is because of Internet and TV. People don't go outside of their house now because of TV. They got too lazy and they just want to stay in their house and watch TV. Even when i go home, i don't feel like doing anything else but to watch TV and go online.

Radical Reansparency and "Ecofeedback"

Radical Transparency, converts the chains that link every product and its multiple impacts, and “Ecofeedback”,looking out for number ONE and for OTHERS. Now that we are this age of radical transparency, how do we make our purchase choice? How we choose what to buy and what not to buy. Well The answer is something we discussed in class. Goodguide.com! Here we can find any product that we can possible buy and check how good it is for the enviornment and for the health of oneself. It is there to benefit the economy as a whole, but it targets individuals since we do look out for number one first.
Food Choices: From primates in the jungle to humans in a Wal-mart Super Center
Then and Now – what has changed? When primates used to be in the jungle there wasn't much of a choice on what to eat. You ate what you hunted, or what was naturally grown. Obesity was not a problem back then as it is now, but starvation was. Now, we have a choice on what to buy in everything we purchase. We can get anything and everything that is different in just a little thing. We can get foods with different flavor, clothing in different colors, etc etc. Anything that can be thought, can be purchased now a days. Along with this are the diseases that we also have developed from this. Now that we artificially make things, we have a disease to go with it also. People have allergies to different material, foods etc.
Do we have many more choices, and if so what are the differences really based on? Yes we do have many choices, the difference is really made by different taste, and by mood of the buyer.
How do we make “good choices”? Usually, we make our choices by media, and what's in style now. We make health choices by what our dietitian says, and also by what is advertised as "healthy choice".
Environmental impacts.... How would you know? We don't know! There are so many companies that are producing goods for us, that we have no way of really knowing how good that company is to the environment. Goodguide.com does have some major companies, but it doesn't have all the companies and how they are polluting the environment. The only place where we do know how the environment is being affected and all the facts about the company is local farmers. There you can actually visit the farm and see for yourself, firsthand, how they are treating their animals, or how they are planting, and what pesticides they are using. This is why, we discussed in class that we should purchase from local markets because we know where our goods are coming from rather than going to wal-mart and buying the same thing because it's cheaper. What we don't know is that good, environmentally cost us way more than what we pay for at the store.
We are at the age of Radical Transparency, and we need to be careful about who we purchase our goods from. And how good that company is to the environment. Goodguide.com is one of the friendly websites that might be a help in major companies, and major products that almost everyone purchases.

What's your carbon footprint?

Our first step is becoming aware, the next step is asking what can we do to help and make a change.  I believe to help the environment we first have to change ourselves.  But before changing ourselves we must learn what we are doing wrong, and how big are the choices we make hurting the environment. I found a website that i found useful in determining your carbon footprint.  Enjoy: http://www.carbonify.com/carbon-calculator.htm ...And if you want attach your results to the blog to see where we all stand

Global warming

What is global warming? Carbon dioxide and other gases warm the surface of the planet naturally by trapping solar heat in the atmosphere. This is a good thing because it keeps our planet habitable. However, by burning fossil fuels such as coal, gas and oil and clearing forests we have dramatically increased the amount of carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere and temperatures are rising. I found a website that provides more information on the climate crisis, and what is happening as we continue to live our lives as if everything is ok.  It also shows how we can all get involve to save our environment and presents a blog about the issue which reminded me of what our professor has asked us to do to become more aware of our environment, and communicate with others about the issue.  

http://www.takepart.com/news/blogs/itotd/

http://climatecrisis.net/photos-videos.php

Good 'ol American pie

I used to work at a store called American Apparel.  When most people visit the store they often get the wrong impression about the store and what it represents because of its explicit pictures, but they never realize that it is one of the most eco-friendly company, and does a lot for moral ethics.  A lot of their garments are made from recycled cloth, and they also have a lot of garments made from organic cotton.  Their factory contains a solar panel on their roof.  They have implemented daylight-harvesting technology that saves over a million kilowatt hours of energy every year.  Also donating to TFT which is Trash for Teaching a non-profit organization that teaches over 100 schools about resource management.  Not only are they environmental friendly with their employees by providing them with bikes to transport to and fro work, but they also hire immigrants with great pay and have form a campaign called legalize LA to fight for immigrant rights.

Their other campaign also includes legalize gay in which they produce t-shirts with the slogan and the proceeds go to Harvey Milk high school and gay-interest businesses, also protesting yearly for prop 8 to be passed, giving gays the rights to legalize marriage.  This company does so much more that i could go on and on and on.  But its saddening how a small company is doing so much more than these big corporations who could have a major influence on society.

http://www.americanapparel.net/contact/environment.html

Climate crisis

I enjoyed Al Gore's first speech so much i decided to look up more on his campaign to stop the climate crisis.  In this video attached he presents ways to avert a climate crisis.  Again using humor to capture his audience.  To name a few he presented the idea of reducing emissions from your home energy use, buy the most energy efficient products and appliances (such as light bulbs), and live a carbon neutral life.  After reading my fellow classmates blog about how much they also enjoyed his speech presented to us in class i I have attached the video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDiGYuQicpA

Historical ecologists map a changing landscape.

This is a really interesting article to read about California. How California changed over time and new generations don't have a clue what was there before. This change is not just in California its all over the world.

This article was written on Friday, March 27, 2009 by Eric Simons.
In this article Robin Grossinger, a scientist at the San Francisco Estuary Institute did field work. He found old pictures about 150 years old pictures from local history books, looking for any landmark-a creek, a 200 years old oak tree. When he found one he took pictures to document the evidence. Grossinger is a historical ecologist, merging history and ecology to figure out the environment of our great, and great, great, great grandparents. When he compared those landscapes with the present, he was surprised to see how everything was changed. Streams that weren't streams, wetlands where there used to be beaches, thick groves of tree where there used to be plains and plains where there used to be thick groves of trees.

Grossinger's colleague Alisson Whipple, an environment analyst, studied the valley oaks area. Roughly the area along Highway 101 from Morgan Hill to Gilroy - using a 1939 aerial photo and a 2005 aerial photo. She found a decline from 1,976 trees in 1939 to about 1,000 trees in 2005. Grossinger and Whipple found a few
photographs from the late 1800s with dense oak forests and some explorers' accounts that mentioned thick, shady woodland. They decided to do more detective work. This led, late last winter, to one of Grossinger's field trips to find and photograph remnant oak trees. They'd both started to suspect that they were going to find evidence of higher tree density in the past, but Grossinger hadn't heard an actual number. Whipple, who was finishing the report, told Grossinger that she had an estimate: Something like 50,000 trees. Grossinger's eyes widened. "Fifty thousand," he said. "Wow." In fact, in the finished report, the number went to 60,000.

The central bay shoreline of a few hundred years ago was made up of lagoons and long, curling white-sand beaches, where native Californians picked strawberries out of sand dunes. The creeks that flow through the South Bay were mostly engineered by people in the last 100 years, and historically fanned out underground to create swampy wetlands. Less than 200 years ago, there were so many octopuses overflowing the bay's tide pools that settlers would walk around grabbing them for dinner.
"Knowing where wetlands are could be useful," Grossinger said. "You could bring back red-legged frog or tiger salamander habitat. That usually means creating artificial ponds, but if you could do that where there used to be a wetland, that's even better."

That's the main point of historical ecology: To give restoration planners a better idea of what they might try to bring back and what might succeed. Like the oak trees: You don't need to return to undeveloped land to bring back oak trees. You just need to plant the right kind of trees in suburban yards and street medians - the kind of thing that cities wouldn't know to do without the historical
context. And then, they suspect, if the oak trees make a comeback, so would a lot of the native species that once benefited from them - meaning that in this case, it wouldn't be just the past, but the future, that would be full of surprises.

http://www.sfei.org/inthenews/SFGate32709-HEmapchanginglandscape.pdf

Al Gore

In our class we viewed a speech given by Al Gore on TED.  I must say he is a phenomenal speaker, who captures a crowd with his charismatic attitude and humorous bits.  His attack on the issue of climate change keeps me intrigue on a subject that i often can not usually become fully interested in.  In the video Al Gore's New Thinking on climate crisis he presents the idea, evidence and realization that the pace of climate change may be worst than what researchers predicted and believed it to be.  What really captured my attention were the arctic sea ice extent.  The pole ice cap was equal to the surface are of the united states minus Arizona.  In 2005 the amount that disappeared was equal to everything east of the Mississippi.  And then presents the amount remaining could be gone in as little as 5 years.  If that idea isn't scary or life-threatening i don't know what is.  This could completely flood us out, and make a national case of Katrina in Louisiana.  We have all this information being presenting to us making us knowledgeable of what we are doing to the environment.  What will it take to make us want to change?

Continuing the pattern

For our midterm we were ask to live without the things we "can't live without."  Though it was weeks ago i find myself learning from the situation and living differently and living without the things i thought i couldn't live without.  When i first heard of the challenge i though i wouldn't be able to survive for a week, but surprisingly im surviving for a lifetime.  I'm not saying im completely independent on electronics but i definitely don't depend on it as much especially my computer and television.  I was often one who as soon as i walked in the room the first thing i would do was turn on the television before i even took my jacket off.  I now find myself barely watching television and instead entertain myself with other things.  I don't use my laptop as much, where before it was used for not only academics but for recreational use and entertainment, i now barely use it unless i am doing an assignment for school.

Another aspect that has changed is water usage and buying bottle water.  I would usually turn on the shower and have it running forever before getting in but i no longer do that, and i now even wash my hair in the shower to use less water.  As for my addiction to bottle water i won't say i've given up intentionally but rather by default.  The campus center no longer sells smart water therefore i barely drink bottle water unless i'm off campus which is a big change because i drank at least 3 bottles of water everyday.  I can say the assignment truly changed my lifestyle, surprisingly.  I hope to continue changing one day at a time and hopefully doing my part to help save our earth.

Main gases that affects Air pollution and its results

Main gas is carbon dioxide. Major sources are fossil fuel burning and deforestation. Less developed countries with 80% of world's people are responsible for 35% of carbon dioxide emission but may contribute 50% by 2020. Currently carbon dioxide is responsible for 57% of global warming trend. Sulfur dioxide is another major pollutant of air. It can injure man,plants and materials. These chemicals descend into earth's crest in the form of snow or rain and in dry forms as gases fog and dew or solid particles. But I feel like it affects the plants the most. Trees plays an important role in producing oxygen from carbon dioxide. As long as there are no wood burnt than is produced by the forests, no change in atmospheric CO2 will result. Pollutants that i discussed above can cause direct damage to the leaves of crop plants and trees when they enter leaf pores.
(http://healthandenergy.com/air_pollution_causes.htm)

Undercover Investigation

"This is a glimpse into what is often an overlooked stage in a farmed animals life, yet is speaks volumes of their misery as well as our own humanity." - anonymous

A few weeks ago, I collaborated with a group of women from the class Perspectives of Women, Feminism Theory 220. We were given the assignment of investigating and researching food politics. Food politics is a big umbrella term that implies the government, culture, ethics and religion surrounding food. Our group broke this assignment down into 4 distinct parts and we all became mini-experts in the field we researched. The first part was investigating the local beef and dairy industry second what is really in your food third how is effects your body and fourth how this all ties into the elements of oppression. My part was the local dairy and beef industry.

I had a great opportunity to do some “under cover” investigation, where my husband and I went to our local auction barn, located in Cambridge, NY four miles from where I live. I was able to video tape the conditions of the cows being auctioned. What I saw was unnerving for instance the utters on the dairy cows were bulging with milk which is known to be painful to a cow and the USDA 'suggests‘ that farmers milk dairy cows while waiting to be sold. In addition, their hoofs were rotted and I could see plain as day they were ducked taped back together. The cows were significantly under weight, grant you, dairy cows have hips bones that protrude, but it was very clear that these cows were too skinny; one could see every rib bone. Many people do not realize that 90% of the hamburger sold in stores comes from dairy cows just like this. Some footage of my investigation is posted on you tube, just follow the link.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zL0e3xzu0kw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MM00QGMXeQg

On November 22nd, my group presented a twenty-five minute presentation on this information to our feminism class and we were well received, I got especially great feedback about the video I shot.

Global Climate Change

I got this information in a email by a friend. And I was really interested to share it with the class, how the global temperature is increasing in some places and decreasing in other places.

"Scientists estimate that mean global temperatures have increased by 0.5 to 1.0 °F (0.3 to 0.6 °C) in the last 100 years." The temperature change has not been consistent across the planet. In fact, the temperature change has not been consistent across the United States. In the last 50 years, temperatures in the western United States have warmed. At the same time, temperatures in the eastern United States have cooled. The cooling in the southeastern United States may be due to excessive sulfates in the air. Sulfates can scatter the sun's light before it reaches the earth's surface. Without heat from the sun, the earth's surface will cool.

The map at the right displays temperature trends across the United States over the last 100 years. Red circles represent temperature increases, while blue circles represent temperature decreases. Large circles represent a 3°C change, medium circles represent a 2°C change, and small circles represent a 1°C change. Map courtesy of the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

The increase in temperature has not been consistent through time, either. Some periods during the year have experienced greater and faster temperature increases than others. Average winter temperatures in areas between 50 and 70 ° North latitude have been increasing quickly, while summer
temperatures have hardly changed. Rates of temperature change even vary according to the time of day. Throughout the world, nighttime lows are rising about twice as quickly as daytime highs.

Graph: Atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration (ppmv) and temperature change (°C) observed during the past 160 thousand years and predicted during the next 10 thousand years. Historical carbon dioxide data was collected from Antarctic ice cores; temperature changes through time are relative to the present temperature. Graph adapted from the Whitehouse Initiative on Global Climate Change.

Changes in temperature appear to be closely related to concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2). The figure below displays the concentration of atmospheric CO2 as well as temperature changes observed during the past 160 thousand years and predicted during the next 10 thousand years.

As concentrations of CO2 in the air decrease, so does the temperature. As concentrations of CO2 in the air increase, so does the temperature. Concentrations of atmospheric CO2 are expected to increase dramatically in the future. Even if emissions of CO2 stay the same as they are now, concentrations of atmospheric CO2 will increase to 700 ppm by 2100 (see Remote Sensing: Carbon Dioxide. As a result, mean global temperatures will increase by 3.5 °F (1.9 °C) over the next 100 years.

How can you save children from eating junk food?

I found this article interesting and funny. I actually smiled when i saw the ways to prevent children from eating junk food. Children may not know the consequences of eating junk food. It is the duty of the parents to warn them from such bad eating habits. When i meant take care of children, i didnt mean that have a fat child or have an under weight child by reducing required amount of diet from fear of obesity. It can be done in different ways too. By giving them enough nutrients, in the form of calcium is good during their growing period. They could follow the diet health weight chart or nutrition chart plan. Below are the few tips parents can use to take care of their kids.
1)Do not bring junk food at home
2)Replace chips with child crackers and peanut butter for children.
3)You can replace fat cookies with vanilla wafers, animal crackers, graham crackers and fig cookies
4)Instead of eating chips or crackers jack, you can use pretzels in your food

Al Gore

Our Last class, we watched Al Gore's presentation on climate change at TED talk. As i mentioned before TED talk is very knowlegdable nonprofit website, and the main goal is to get the word out to everyone about everything. The only thing they don't like to put up is political things, with an exception of Michelle Obama, which we discussed before in class.
Al Gore, style of presenting an arguement is remarkable. I was reminded of Colin Powell, when I was watching Gore's presentation. They both have a similar style of speaking and they have this leadership charisma that atracts attention from the viewers. Gore, presented many concerns that e have a lready discussed in our class. He talked about e verything from recycling cans to the loss of ice masses around the world. The most interesting thing that he does is show the pictures of the extremely climate affected places, like the land becoming desert, and some with ice masses raising the water level.
My main interest was Greenland, so I did some research and I found that "the temperature in Greenland have risen 4.4 degrees F in the two decades". (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/09/060920193210.htm). This website article is from science direct journal, and it predicts that if this increase in temperature continues then the northern hemisphere will be severly effected. The same is true for the ice sheets in antarctica. But in Antarctica the rate is unknown. Another article posted on, http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2007/sep/08/climatechange, also talks about the effects of this massive melting, but here the writer, paul brown, concentrates on the physical damage. He states that the melting of the ice at such high rate is triggering earthquakes and large peices, several cubic kilometers, are breaking off.
What can we do? Our governemnt needs to start taking this topic seriously, and have a plan to execute. We need to be like Cuba, and start community gardens, and conserving energy in order to keep the pollution down and our air clean. We can't elimate pollution, because then we couldn't function. In my microeconomics textbook, we were talking about negative externalities, and pollution was the main topic. In that it stated that even environmentalists don't believe we need to be pollution free, we just need to take what is efficient for the total social benifit, not our own benifit. We need to walk to the corner market insteasd of driving to it. We need to stop burning fuel if we don't have to.
If everyone does there part, as Al Gore states, we can prevent these climate changes and our future generations can enjoy a somewhat clean environment.

Hawaiian Coral Reef Ecosystem a Unique Treasure

I was watching TV on Tuesday on national geography channel about Hawaii and it was so interesting to see this information. They were showing the island of Hawaii will continue to grow. A new volcano, and potentially the next Hawaiian Island, will form to the southeast. This and many other island are made from volcanoes. "Most of the main Hawaiian Islands have reefs of this type, but as time goes on and the islands move further from the hot spot the islands begin to sink and erode." They found old pieces of the land in the ocean and they tried to figure out what could have happened to that land. Because the land was made out of volcanoes and it was not good foundation as the time went by the land slides in the ocean very fast causing big waves in the ocean. It caused tsunami in California millions of years ago. If this happens again we could lose California.

i have found the article about the same thing on this site, the link is below.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/07/0714_030714_hawaiicoral_2.html

Obesity

I am currently taking ANT319 called Human growth and development. Last week we were learning about Obesity and I found some interesting infromation and I thought to share it with my class. Obesity depends on SocioEconomic Status(SES). Children of high SES has more subcutaneous fat than low SES. It represents the under nutrition among low SES groups and over nutrition and Obesity in high SES groups. The main factors that contribute to the Obesity are food which are cheap now and abudant and excercise are expensive now. Among food, fats and sugars are chaep and fruits and vegetables are expensive too. Excercise costs time and often money to excercise. I completely agree with it. If exercising wasn't that much expensive, most of the obese people can go to gyms and try to lose their weights. Since most of the Obese people are poor, they can't afford to go to gyms. Another thing we can do is that make cheap food little bit more expensive or make it healthier. So people can atleast eat some healthy food.

Effects of having junk food

Here are some of the effects of junk food just incase noone knows about it. I found this very interesting and learned something out of it too.
1)Junk foods are made of saturated fat and such are unhealthy and on digestion can release a lot of toxins in our body.
2) Junk food are made of ingredients that are no clean and in long run it can spoil ouir liver,stomachs and intestines.
3)Junk food makes you put on weight. People who have obesity or morbid obesity are those who have a preference for junk food and snacking.
4)Packed junk food contains preservatives and coloring, both of which contain carcinogenic substances.(http://www.helpfulhealthtips.com/what-are-the-ill-effects-of-junk-food/)
Children, teenagers and young adults are the ones who take junk food more and we can tell on their health during the long run. The main thing that attracts them is its taste. I totally agree with it. I wish eating junk food isn't that bad. Because everytime I eat some chocolate or chips, I dont want to stop but I have to knowing all the bad effects of it.

Australia shipping alert over massive iceberg

Another news about iceberg. I went on yahoo page and saw this news about Australia shipping alert over massive iceberg. I began reading it and it seemed interesting to know what's going on around us. A NASA satellite took a image of iceberg floating southwest off the West Australian coast. The experts believe the iceberg known as B17B will enter warmer waters nearer Australia, creating hundred of smaller iceberg in a hazard to passing ships.Its not really near yet, but it is coming close. Because of the change in weather the icebergs are coming in north before they only floated around Antarctica. This is only happening because sea temperatures are rising through global warming. "Its discovery comes after two other large icebergs were spotted further east, off Australia's Macquarie Island, followed by more than 100 smaller chunks heading towards New Zealand," glaciologist Neal Young said on Thursday.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20091211/wl_afp/australiaantarcticaiceberg

Air

Humans first experienced their first harmful air is when they built fired in poor ventilated caves. After that time, we have been polluting air more and more. The main air pollutants found in urban areas are carbon monoxides, nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons. I was surprised when i read this article. It says EPA has found that air in some office buildings are 100times polluted than air outside. Poor ventilation is the main cause of these indoor air pollutions.

A reasonable life

After reading a Reasonable life by Ferenc Mate and hearing Al Gore's inspiring speech in class on Monday, I have spent some time processing everything that the author and the speaker have to say to us. It really boils down to a simple question- Can we live a reasonable life and still have enough to eat, live with, and enjoy life? I believe that the answer is, to borrow the cliche "Yes we can!"

Can people be happy even though they have less- less cars, less time on the internet, less plane travel, less "stuff"? Yes we can. Can people live without eating meat, without eating genetically modified food, and ridiculous junk food? Yes We can. Can we drive less, stop living in suburbs, and live in higher density cities where transit is more sustainable? Yes we can. (Farm lifestyle is also acceptable). Can we "save the planet" if we all together do these things and combine this change in lifestyle with an advance in new technologies (nanotech, renewables)? Yes, I believe that we can.

The two factors needed here are education and willingness. People are slowly getting more educated about the realities of the problems that we are facing- through people like Al Gore, Ferenc Mate, and many other like them. But as Al Gore pointed out, even though we are aware of the problem many of us do not put it on the top of our list of priorities. The environment and climate change was second to the bottom in a list of 20 priorities during the 2008 presidential election, starkly pointing out that our priorities are misarranged. We need to have the willingness to change and make changes in order to confront problems of this magnitude. And we solidarity, cooperation, trust, and efficiency to accomplish that.

Not to mention scientists. I sometimes regret not going for a BS, knowing that we lack math and science majors. (I'm lazy and let my brother do the hard work). Obama is correct that we need more indigenously-produced math and science-studying people. These are theones who will be the future's scientists and engineers who will hopefully look for new ways to solve these problems.

Peak Oil is real, and will affect our lives faster than we can imagine. Are our current biofuel and renewable energy efforts enough? Why are major organizations like OPEC still denying the figures? The issue of energy will be equally as critical as the heating of the earth's atmosphere inthe upcoming fifty years. Will the planting of biofuels to save the enviroment be a burden for the many who will lose food because of the lost farmland? How will we grow enough food to support a population of 8 billion by 2040? Will we construct urban gardens and "farmscrapers" in cities to cope with the need for agricultural production combined with the lack of build space? We have to start looking for solutions now- because good solutions always require decades to take effect.

Ultimately, if we as a species decide that we can change lifestyles and our civilization as a whole in response to the crisis confronting us in the 21st century, we will. The challenges confronting us and merely a matter of human will.
Yes We can.

Nike sweatshops..forced labor

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9ZktmrGGMU

Its so sad that a company so huge and rich could something like this. The head quarters are in the US and they have people making millions of dollars like Tiger Woods to represent the Nike Swoosh. Where has the world come to? Child labor, cheap wages, poor living conditions, long hours of work, forced labor, fraud contracts promising them something in return, and also they recruit people to work off of the street.
Reason behind this whole thing is that Americans do not want to make these things. For example shoes, clothes, and other things. Americans want to just buy these goods from a local mall and call it a day. Americans in comparison to people seen in this film are lazy. We have it so easy here. So Nike recruits people that need money to live and who will make it. Cheap labor=selling them for more than what they are really worth to= a rich, successful company.

After I think about this it makes me kind of think that I will never wear Nike shoes again. I haven't boughten Nike products since 2007. It wasn't that long ago but I'm trying to keep it that way.

Vacation on a Farm

After hearing Professor Kleppel speak so passionately about his farm I became envious of his lifestyle. I realize that it is not all fun and can be a lot of draining work much of the time but he seemed genuinely happy to share his experience with the class. There is a certain glow you can see on peoples faces when they are talking about something that makes them truly happy and I could see that when he was speaking. Growing up in New York City I have sometimes longed for a simpler life. I think the farming lifestlye is something I would like to try for a while and possibly make a lifestlye out of. I can see how someone could get so much gratification from working for everything they have because I have held a job and supported myself from the age of 14. My parents paid the bills but I was raised in a house with 4 children and the mentality that if you wanted something that was not a necessity you had to work for it. I appreciate this ideal because I think it has prepared me for life in a way that my friends who never had to work for things are not. I had a huge sense of pride after saving my money and buying my own car when I turned 17. I felt a sense of responsibility and even though it was a crappy car I took care of it much more than my friends took care of the brand new cars their parents bought them. I would imagine that this same sense of pride is felt when you grow almost everything you consume. I found a place that allows you to take a vacation to a farm and live the lifestyle for a short period of time. I think that instead of a vacation to the beach this summer I might think about going to one of these farms to experience a different lifestyle. I think experiencing other lifestyles is one of the most interesting things you can do. For more information on these farm vacations visit http://www.pafarmstay.com/

Man vs. nature

When are people going to realize that man can not win? We have done so much damage and chaos to this planet to the point where we now want to make changes to protect it and maintain it. Nature is a topic and a thing not to quarrel with. It all started with the Industrial Revolution. New technologies came about and advances in everyday life which is great. Half of the things that we think that we need, we don't need. We are constantly trying to control life. Stem cell research is great to cure people with certain illnesses and diseases. What happened to nature taking it's course? What more can we do to to alter the changes in life?

Outdoor Activities for Happiness

We have talked a lot about happiness and taking care of the environment. I am surprised we have no connected the two ideas. There is a lot of evidence to support the fact that leading an active lifestyle can lead to happiness. We can all use more exercise in out busy lives, why not take it outside? I think by getting outside to go jogging, biking, walk your dog or just go for a walk we can feel more connected to the environment and the world that we live in. I know that when I am exercising regularly I feel better and on the rare occasions that I get outside to just enjoy the outdoors it makes me feel happy. We all focus so much on school work and our jobs but what about the time in between those things. I am going to make more of an effort to get outside and go hiking and visiting parks because I know that it has a positive effect on not only my physical health but my mental health as well. By feeling more connected to the environment we can become more aware of it. We do not need to spend money to enjoy ourselves. When we think of things to do with friends we usually think of going out to eat or a movie or something that costs money. Next time I am going to try something like going for a walk or a local park. There is an interesting article that compares things we spend money on and things we find the most happiness from and how they overlap. The research done for the article suggests that many of the things that make us most happy are not our most expensive items. Many of the things that bring people the most happiness were experiences. The article can be found at http://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/29/when-money-buys-happiness/

The air that I breathe

The obstacles in life are faced with energy.
They are done by human hands and great minds.
There is no other than a vital organism that can make decisions for themselves.
Why are we able to make all these great contributions to life?
It's because of the money that we have, how many cars that we are able to own, or how much we have done?
But what about that the reason we are able to overcome so much is because of life itself.
The air that we breathe, is because we are able to do all of this miraculous things.
The hero, the athlete, the doctor, or the philanthropist.
Without air we are nothing. Our cells would choke. Our bodies would be just dust.
Give thanks to air.
Keep it sustainable by keeping sustainable biological systems healthy.

Why Is Biodiversity Important? Who Cares?

Biodiversity is important to everyday life because then we as human would not be here. We would not see different species and different medical advances. People would be sick. Bacteria such as the bacteria on your skin or mainly part of a person's normal flora. They are good bacteria that work wonderful miracles for our bodies. Bacteria are living to the contribution and maintenance of human health. Basically all creatures and living things on this earth work together to make the living cycle continuous. When people do not appreciate biodiversity they do not understand the meaning of what it is like to be a vital organism.

There are so many other life forms out that are so interesting that scientists have not explored yet. The fact that about only 5 percent of the ocean or bodies of water have only been explored. There is so much more out there and beyond. This is why I think Biodiversity is important and is essential to life. Without it we are nothing. Like bread without the yeast.

Biodiversity supplies us with everything that we live off of or on. It supplies us with everything that we need. Remember that everything counts. So appreciate biodiversity and the planet that we live on.

Al Gore

I thoroughly enjoyed Al Gores speech in class on Wednesday. I think he is an excellent speaker and truly passionate about his opinions and position. I had never really heard him speak before but knew that he held a position about global warming awareness. I honestly thought that he was just taking a controversial political position to be in the spotlight. My opinion was changed after watching his presentation because I saw his passion. I do not think he could have faked that. The way he was speaking to people and talking about urgency you could almost feel how he was feeling. I also think he made himself very easy to relate to. He spoke in simple terms and just laid out the facts. I think this passion is what we need to make serious changes. We can all say we are going to do things to make a difference but I do not think you can make any kind of serious dent in the problem unless you are truly passionate about it. I am not saying everyone should go into a career in the environmental field or dedicate all their free time to picking up garbage but we all have to get serious. I think the most important point Al Gore made was about urgency. He talked about how over 60% of us have acknowledged the problem but there has not been much action. This just goes to show how wrapped up people are in their own lives or other petty matters. This issue is going to be life and death for us and it would be sad if people did not realize that until it was too late.

"Losing our children", Mate

I have difficulty determining what our society is about. I
mean, if our children are placed "at the very bottom of
our agenda," what on earth do we value more than them?
What are our priorities? What do we live for? What gives us pride?-Mate

I was thinking about what Mate was meaning by this quote. I for one do not have any children but one day I know that I will be proud to have raised such intelligent children, or I hope to one day. In our society I tend to see "some" people that do not put their first priorities on their children. For instance some of them were not planned or were a mistake. I seem to think that people conceiving children take this whole topic as a game or a joke. It's ok for a teenage female to have a child as such a young age. Some of those teen mothers want better for their young but others don't care. They keep having one child after another.

I see a difference in Europe or in another foreign country. Families over their are a lot closer and they eat dinner together, mostly every night. They are a lot happier, stable, and some are less materialistic. Over in the US we just want, want, want. Over in Europe they are happy with what they have. I do believe that poorer, third world countries live healthier, more stable, less dramatic and happy lives. They know they have nothing else in the world but one another. I think that some families here in the US take their family members for granted. They forget or don't acknowledge that blood is thicker than anything. Family doesn't come first and friends do. Some single parents that I see tend to think that their boyfriend or girlfriend comes first before their children.

Things have changed now but what happened to being old school?

City Recycling

As a Floridian whose used to the laws of recycling down there I am appalled that the state of New York has no law on recycling. In Florida it is mandatory to recycle all recyclables. There are two different pick-ups. There’s the normal weekly trash pick-up and along with that on the same day there is a recycling pick-up. Everyone is mandated to have two types of recycling bins. One blue bin for cans, plastic bottles and other types of recyclables and there is one red bin for paper recycles. In Florida when the trash guys come to pick up the trash if they were to so happen to pick up a bag filled with cans they would refuse to put it in the truck. They would just leave the bag on your lawn until you fix the issue and put it out for next week. I have also even heard of people getting fines for continuously refusing to recycle. Why doesn’t New York State do this? Instead we charge a five cent deposit for every can or bottle. Why don’t we just enforce a law stating that everyone must recycle? I feel if people knew it was the law to recycle they would feel they had an obligation to recycle. It seems to work down in Florida and it’s not like it’s even that hard to fulfill such a task. I feel instating such a law would encourage people and even make them feel better about helping the environment. Our ways of life that deplete the environment could simply be avoided and our quality of living could increase instead of the opposite.

Awareness by Word of Mouth

I can only speak for myself but I imagine that this class has affected everyone in some way. I admit that I have not become an environmental maniac who stopped driving and using paper products. I have however become aware of my surroundings and my usage. I think that since everyone in the country is not going to take this class it is important that we take the small step of spreading the things and ideas that we learned by word of mouth. It is just one of those small steps we can take as individuals to try and make a difference. I know it seems crazy that any of us as individuals can make a difference but there are already about 50 of us. So if each of us tells 20 people and out of that 4 people become aware they will spread these ideas as well and so on. The video in class on Monday was an example of how just one person can make a difference. I think that it is each of our responsibility to be accountable for our actions as human beings. A lot of the things we learned in this class have really put things into perspective for me. I do not think the world is going to end tomorrow but I do have a sense of urgency that I did not have before. It is almost a sense of fear because I do not think the Earth can last much longer if we continue on this path because it would just be impossible. The facts just do not allow us to believe that we will be able to live this lifestyle forever. There is an article that explains how word of mouth is becoming the most popular reason for consumers to purchase certain products. The article is at http://www.hear2.com/2003/11/some_amazing_st.html. If word of mouth can work with what car you should buy there is no reason why it should not apply to spreading important ideas. Sure we are going to come across people who say they do not care or someone else is going to fix the problem but we should go back at them. We should challenge them to tell us how the problem will get fixed and use our new knowledge to shoot them down so they can see that there is a sense of urgency and action must be taken.

Motivation

It is sad to say but I think that if there were rewards for doing things to help the environment we would be in much better shape. When we think about doing things like volunteering to help the environment or taking the bus instead of driving we usually like to think that we'll get around to it or it would be a nice thing to do but we never really do it. However when it comes to things like going to work so we can make money to buy a new ipod or clothes we are all over it. I don't think this necessarily makes us bad people. I think we just look for things that will give us instant gratification. We like to do things and see the results immediately or have some sort of material item to show for it. There are certain tax breaks for people who make eco-friendly purchases. I think the government or businesses should come up with some sort of discount at their stores or giveaway items for people to motivate everyone to take small steps toward helping the environment. It sounds like its shallow but it is just the way things are. We have been made into a selfish shallow self interested country and I think it is important to realize that when going about trying to get everyone to change their habits. For example some insurance companies will offer a discount on isuring a car if it is a hybrid. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124035526071440855.html

Biofuels?

If we were to replace oil with biofuels such as ethanol and biodiesel all of our problems would not be solved. Because biofuels are derived from agricultural crops they are essentially renewable. Since they are grown domestically biofuels will reduce our dependence on foreign sources. They also emit less pollution than traditional petroleum-based gasoline and diesel fuels no contributing to the issue of global climate change. Yes these are all good things and they may be easy to use but they are hard to find especially when it comes to filling up your traditional gasoline car. The lack of ethanol or biodiesel pumps is what is very complicating. Another complication derived from switching to biofuels involves the challenge of growing enough crops to meet demand. We would need to create much open land through deforestation in order to accumulate for the demand. Due to the fact that corn would be in such high demand in order to be converted into ethanol the price of corn as food would increase. Many people dependent on these crops would see a tremendous rise in the price of these crops. Additionally does producing ethanol really generate all that much energy? Some say that the amount of energy in order to produce ethanol outweighs that of which ethanol itself would generate. If this were the case this would just not add up. Biofuels are still being researched but it seems that we would have to find other alternatives additional to biofuels in order to resolve our current issues.

Michelle Obama

Michelle Obama the first lady told the girls in London that "I want you to know that we have very much in common. For nothing in my life’s path would have predicted that I would be standing here as the first lady of the United States of America. There was nothing in my story that would land me here. I wasn’t raised with wealth or resources of any social standing to speak of…

“If you want to know the reason why I’m standing here, it’s because of education. I never cut class. Sorry I don’t know if anybody here is cutting class. I never did. I loved getting As. I liked being smart. I loved being on time. I loved getting my work done. I thought being smart was cooler than anything in the world.”(http://www.thefword.org.uk/blog/2009/04/michelle_obama_3).

After listening to her speech, I thought of myself that I have a dream too. I study very hard to be something in medical field like a doctor or PA. I believe that in order to have our dreams come true, we need to have education. So I thank my parents for letting me having the education that I needed and do want I want to do in my life.

Algore

Our former senator Al gore in his presentation states that the pace of climate change maybe even worse than scientists recently predicted. He says that in order to solve the climate crisis, we need to solve the democratic crisis first. Climate crisis is the global crisis and it is the most important and rare crisis in the world as of right now. I feel like climate crisis is been going on for very long time since the ice-age. I have seen in the movies where ice-berg split into half and has flood everywhere. I feel like if US build nuclear power plants more, we can try to reduce the crisis. Nuclear energy is one of the most viable source of energy today and it is clean even though there are other energies like solar and wind power.

plastic trees

The video "The man who planted the trees" by Christopher plummer was very uplifting and made me analyze things.  The main character Bouffier takes 30 years to make a forest.  He planted over 100,000 oak seeds and out of that only 20,000 grew to become trees. This short cartoon film showed me one person can make a huge change.  And if we dedicated our lives to saying the forest and the environment we can better it.  If we all planted just one tree we can stop the process of deforestation.  Deforestation causes disturbance in the environment as far as the carbon dioxide and oxygen cycle.  i believe the cartoon aspect of the film made it easier to interpret and can be related to all age groups especially the younger demographic and i believe thats where this way of life of helping the environment should start.  The movie had a positive message and made me have faith that there is possible to make a change, one person at a time.  Here is an article i found on the benefits of planting trees. 

http://www.cleanairgardening.com/plantingtrees.html

Go green

Here is a website i found interesting about how college campuses can go green.  Though Albany campus claims they go green i feel they can do a little more and make a little more efforts to make the campus environmental friendly.  I noticed one of the easiest ways to go green is to recycle, but our campus lack having recycling garbage disposals all around the campus.  They could also change the lightbulbs.  I have seen some changes such as the paperless course evaluations, and handing out energy bills to those who live on empire to make us aware of how much energy we use.  

http://www.justaskasa.com/wp/?p=1047

I want it all

With the discussion on last Wednesdays class I can say success, and fitting into societies mold is something that I think about everyday.  Why do I feel so pressured to be successful and what is the real definition of success?  We are continuously pressured to grow to a higher social class and are often taught that the only way we can make it is to go to college and become a doctor, lawyer or politician.  Never realizing that maybe that is not the real meaning of success.  With money and power comes a lot of responsibility and with this comes sacrifices such as family.  It is known that the more “successful” a woman is as far as in the career setting the least likely she is to have a family.  The meaning of success has changed throughout the generations and between the sexes.  Our parents all want us to be better than them and to have the best, but if we continue this pattern the best will never be enough and will always want more.  I believe the pressure for me to be successful is not more from societal views but rather my parents and grandparents.  In a family where my grandmother threatens to disown her grandchildren if they are not successful and don’t attend college.  In a family full of surgeons, doctors, lawyers and business owners I often wonder are they happy because of their status and career or is it something else.  Here I found an article that what sums up the meaning of success, or at least what it means to me. 

http://www.thewisdomjournal.com/Blog/how-do-you-define-success-six-factors-to-consider/

GoodGuide.Com

Its about time there’s a website that helps us find safe, healthy, and green products that are better for us and our planet. After discussing about goodguide.com in class I realized how important it was to keep this website running. I feel this is the perfect tool on how to educate consumers and help us to identify with the products we buy on a daily basis. Goodguide.com is a great way to educate people about the products they consume. Before goodguide.com became available researching our cosumptions took too much time and energy as well as the question concerning on how to retrieve this information. With GoodGuide.com we can now simply search for a product and find all types of information on health risks, environmental impacts and even societal reviews based on philanthropy, customer satisfaction and other factors. Applications for the iPhone’s are now also available allowing a consumer to take a picture of a products barcode and receiving information based on that product. In my opinion this will change shopping habits as well as consumer consumptions. I’m sure many of these companies are not too happy with the fact that GoodGuide.com exists due to the fact that they do not want the public to know this information but I believe it is for the better of all people in this world. GoodGuide.com hopefully reaches out to many people on educating on what people are buying and will force companies to comply with the changes in which people desire.

“Climate Debt”

I found an article on NYTimes.com which stated that some of the developing counties believe that the developed countries and worlds rich owe them a “climate debt”. I found this to be very interesting and had me thinking is the argument causable. The developing countries do suffer climate changes just as we have, but we have put out more harmful environmental gasses into the atmosphere. But also if we do pay these “debts” wouldn’t that help advance these countries to where we are and they would become just as guilty as us. Not only have we become aware of these issues but I believe we are trying to fix it by creating new ways and new technology less harmful and more helpful to the environment. The article can be found at http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/09/update-on-copenhagen-and-the-climate-files/.

Small steps to saving our planet

After this semesters course we have all learned a lot about environmental issues as well as other topics. I wanted to talk about just a few things I have done in order to help live a healthy sustainable life both for the good of myself as well as the environment (which ultimately relates to the condition of my health). Although I may not be able to stop global warming, end pollution and save endangered species single-handedly I sure will be able to send a clear message to businesses, politicians and governmental agencies that value me as a customer, constituent and citizen. My first step to helping sustain the environment is to lower greenhouse gas emissions by not driving my car so much. Instead I walk or ride a bicycle for short trips and take public transportation for longer ones. Research has actually shown that people who use public transportation are healthier than those who don’t. On the other hand when it comes to eating I try to less meat and more fruits and vegetables. Eating meat, eggs and dairy products contributes heavily to global warming because raising animals for food produces many more greenhouse gas emissions than growing plants. Enormous amounts of land, water, grain and fuel are used to raise these animals. When at the grocery store I now try to bring my own re-usable shopping bags. Many natural resources are used in producing plastic bags and at the end most of these bags are discarded in landscapes, clog waterways and sometimes they even kill thousands of marine animals that mistake the bags for food. According to statistics up to a trillion plastic bags are used and discarded every year. Re-usable bags on the other hand don’t need to be discarded after each use. They reduce pollution and save resources. Now this one we have all heard: changing your light bulbs. Incandescent bulbs, which we have been using since Thomas Edison invented them, are not that energy efficient. Compact fluorescent light bulbs and light-emitting diodes (LEDs) are more energy efficient and less expensive to use than the traditional incandescent bulbs. Although they may be a bit more expensive to buy, in the end they are worth it since they are more energy efficient (meaning less electricity used on your monthly bill) and they last about ten years. Compact fluorescent light bulbs use at least two-thirds less energy than standard incandescent bulbs and they provide the same amount of light. Compact fluorescent light bulbs also generate 70 percent less heat which comes in handy during the summer months when you have the air conditioning on high. As for the last thing I have been trying to continue doing is paying my bills online. Although we did not talk much about this in class but I figured since we do these blogs in order to prevent paper from being used why not use it for other purposes. Many banks as well as other companies now offer their customers the option of paying bills online. This eliminates the use of paper and eliminates the need to write and mail paper checks and to keep paper records. This helps reduce forestation which ultimately leads to the reduction of global climate change. There are many things we encounter in our everyday life in which we could use substitutions for for the better of our environment.

What really makes us happy

Like professor Hirsh said “is that 25,000 dollar driveway really worth all the money it costs?” Putting this in an environmental perspective, is that gas guzzling Hummer people drive really making them happy? Our society has a problem, we want it and we want it now. Maybe this is what drove America to have the highest GDP but on the other hand, is this what we really want? In order to consume more goods and services we need to make enough money. Now for the most part people go to college and get a job when they are finished with their education, those that have highly succeeded are the ones destroying the environment with their Hummers. Now I know we all destroy the environment but as we further and further progress we come up with new technologies that deplete the condition of our environment. Some people think in order to be happy we need to be that guy/girl driving that hummer or consuming these new technologies. Due to this false notion we want more and more in order to be happy. This is what leads to the depleting condition of our environment. Now I know this from first hand that you do not need a lot of money or new technologies or fancy cars in order to be happy. I have been working in restaurants as a cook the past six years and most of the people in which I work with are those that live pay check to pay check. Although these people may not have a lot of money in order to even buy a car or afford insurance, it does not mean that these people aren’t happy. The bottom line is just because you may not have the latest technologies or you do not have a car it does not mean that you cannot be happy. Most of these people I have worked with are some of the happiest people I have ever encountered. They have just enough money to get buy and I bet if I were to calculate their ecological footprint I am sure it would be much less than most of ours. Most of my co-workers took public transportation to work or rode a bicycle. Just because they didn’t have a car it didn’t mean they weren’t happy. If we continue to use and want these new technologies we have to figure out a way to do it efficiently and sustainably.

What you know or who you know?

Internships allow us to get our foot in the door with whatever career we may be pursuing. Some people got their job solely based upon that internship. This brings up the idea that it isn’t what you know it’s who you know. Many employers employ internships solely based on the fact that they feel these people are suitable for the job regardless if they finish their schooling (since most internships take the internship to build a good resume while they’re still in school). As for schooling and education why are we taught things we don’t necessarily need to know for that job? Our education system basically follows a set curriculum. This brings up what we discussed in class and how it is not socially acceptable to not go to school. We are all expected to go to college but many colleges don’t offer classes that pertain to what our passion may be. The discussion in class on how the girl’s brother didn’t pursue a higher education but instead focused on his art work and became a successful tattoo artist presented an issue in education to all of us. Why can’t there be classes that pertain to our interests? Maybe this is the reason why so many college students change their major on an average of three times by the time they graduate. What we discussed in class really affected the way I thought about how we educate. If a person wanted to become a farmer and produce fruits and vegetables for the purpose of supplying its community with locally produced foods wouldn’t it be a good idea to offer these types of courses to the public? Using this example is just a way to show how we could educate in ways that may not involve finding the analysis of variance but instead figure out how to resolve other issues in our world.

"Ishmael" by Daniel Quinn

“Nobody’s out to save the world, because nobody gives a damn about the world, that was just a bunch of goofy kids talking. Get a job, make some money, work till your sixty, then move to Florida and die.” - (p. 5)

“Only one thing can save us. We have to increase our mastery of the world. All this damage has come about through our conquest of the world, but we have to go on conquering it until our rule is absolute. Then, when we're in complete control, everything will be fine. We'll have fusion power. No pollution. We'll turn the rain on and off. We'll grow a bushel of wheat in a square centimeter. We'll turn the oceans into farms.” - (p. 80)

“Acceptance has nothing to do with it. You may as well talk about a man stepping off of a cliff not accepting the effects of gravity. The Takers are in the process of eliminating themselves, and when they’ve done so, the stability of the community will be restored and the damage you’ve done can begin to be repaired.” - (p.145)

After reading the book, I realized how important biology is to the world. I quickly understood that biology is not just another science that we study to learn about our environment, but it is the tool we need to use to protect our land and promote positive actions to help preserve the earth and keep it a suitable habitat for the human race. This book changed my views of biological sciences by making me look at it from a completely different aspect than I always had. It opened my eyes to how other animals may view the world and how people contribute everyday to destroying what we have little by little. It truly shows how biology is not just a class or science that one should simply study for to be prepared for tests.

Ishmael showed me that Americans, myself included often take the world we live in for granted. We don’t appreciate everything that is so readily accessible to us, and as a result over use the resources provided to us. In doing so, we are depleting the earth of the resources it needs while simultaneously depleting the resources we as humans need to survive for years to come. I realized that the earth will not be here forever as we all think it will, especially if we continue our practice of ruining it.

Ishmael helped me to realize that everyday every person on earth contributes to the slow depletion of everything we have today and need in the future. I realize that I, myself am a part of the problem and that needs to change. It helped me to realize this process can be slowed with simple daily changes that all people can be involved in.

This book relates to our class because of the problems we have discussed in class and also the solutions we could use. We need to conserve what we have and look to better ways of going about our daily business. We need clean renewable energies that can last us for years to come without CO2 emissions and other bad effects on our environment. For example, do not flush the toilet when it’s not crucial because fresh water is not an unlimited or reusable source or car pool with friends instead of driving separately to school everyday to reduce carbon dioxide emissions into the air (and stop polluting!) If people do not recognize this extreme concern of pollution, use of natural resources, overpopulation, endangering animals, and generally ruining the only planet that we can survive on.