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1 Science and Sustainability: An Introduction to Environmental Science Chapter Objectives This chapter will help students: 1.1 Describe the field of environmental science 1.2 Explain the importance of natural resources and ecosystem services to our lives 1.3 Discuss population growth, resource consumption, and their consequences 1.4 Explain what is meant by an ecological footprint 1.5 Describe the scientific method and the process of science 1.6 Appreciate the role of ethics in environmental science, and compare and contrast major approaches in environmental ethics 1.7 Identify major pressures on the global environment 1.8 Discuss the concept of sustainability, and describe sustainable solutions being pursued on campuses and in the wider world

Lecture Outline I.

Our Island, Earth A. Our environment surrounds us. 1. Our environment consists of all the living and nonliving things around us. 2. The fundamental insight of environmental science is that we are part of the “natural” world and that our interactions with the rest of it matter a great deal.

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B. Environmental science explores our interactions with the world. 1. Understanding our relationship with the world around us is vital because we depend on our environment for air, water, food, shelter, and everything else essential for living. 2. Environmental science is the scientific study of how the natural world works, how our environment affects us, and how we affect our environment. 3. Environmental scientists study the issues most centrally important to our world and its future. C. We rely on natural resources. 1. Natural resources are the substances and energy sources we take from our environment and that we rely on to survive. 2. Renewable natural resources are replenished over short periods. Nonrenewable natural resources, such as minerals and fossil fuels, are in finite supply and are formed far more slowly than we use them. D. We rely on ecosystem services. 1. Earth’s natural systems provide services on which we depend. Such essential services are called ecosystem services. 2. Just as we may deplete natural resources, we may degrade ecosystem services when, for example, we destroy habitat or generate pollution. E. Population growth amplifies our impact. 1. Today, our population has grown beyond 7.5 billion people. 2. Two phenomena triggered our remarkable increase in population size. a) One was the agricultural revolution, which began about 10,000 years ago as people began to grow crops, domesticate animals, and live sedentary lives on farms and in villages; when they produced more food to meet their nutritional needs, they began having more children. b) The second, the industrial revolution, began in the mid-1700s and entailed a shift from rural life, animal-powered agriculture, and handcrafted goods toward an urban society provisioned by the mass production of factory-made goods and powered by fossil fuels.

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F. Resource consumption exerts social and environmental pressures. 1. Our ecological footprint a) Mathis Wackernagel and William Rees developed the concept of the ecological footprint, which expresses the cumulative area of biologically productive land and water required to provide the resources a person or population consumes and to dispose of or recycle the waste the person or population produces. b) Wackernagel and his colleagues at the Global Footprint Network calculate that we are now using 68% more of our resources than are available on a sustainable basis. The practice of consuming more resources than are being replenished is termed overshoot because we are overshooting, or surpassing, Earth’s capacity to sustainably support us. G. Conserving natural capital is like maintaining a bank account. 1. We can think of our planet’s vast store of resources and ecosystem services—Earth’s natural capital—as a bank account. To keep a bank account full, we need to leave the principal intact and spend only the interest, so that we can continue living off the account far into the future. H. Environmental science can help us learn from the past. 1. Historical evidence suggests that civilizations can crumble when pressures from population and consumption overwhelm resource availability. 2. In today’s globalized society, the stakes are higher than ever because our environmental impacts are global. If we cannot forge sustainable solutions to our problems, then the resulting societal collapse will be global. II.

The Nature of Environmental Science A. Environmental science is interdisciplinary. 1. Environmental science is interdisciplinary, bringing techniques, perspectives, and research results from multiple disciplines together into a broad synthesis. 2. Interdisciplinary fields are valuable because their practitioners consolidate and synthesize the specialized knowledge from many disciplines and make sense of it in a broad context to better serve the multifaceted interests of society.

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3. Environmental science is especially broad because it encompasses not only the natural sciences but also the social sciences. Most environmental science programs focus more on the natural sciences, whereas programs that emphasize the social sciences often use the term environmental studies. B. Environmental science is not the same as environmentalism.

III.

1. Environmentalism is a social movement dedicated to protecting the natural world—and, by extension, people—from undesirable changes brought about by human actions. The Nature of Science A. Scientists test ideas by critically examining evidence. 1. Science is a systematic process for learning about the world and testing our understanding of it. 2. Scientists examine how the world works by making observations, taking measurements, and testing whether their ideas are supported by evidence. 3. A great deal of scientific work is descriptive science, research in which scientists gather basic information about organisms, materials, systems, or processes that are not yet well known. 4. If enough is known about a subject, scientists pursue hypothesisdriven science, research that proceeds in a more targeted and structured manner, using experiments to test hypotheses within a framework traditionally known as the scientific method. B. The scientific method is a traditional approach to research. 1. The scientific method is a technique for testing ideas with observations. 2. The steps of the scientific method are: a) Make observations. Observations set the scientific method in motion and play a role throughout the process. b) Ask questions. Determining which questions to ask is one of the most important steps in the investigation process. c) Develop a hypothesis. A hypothesis is a statement that attempts to explain a phenomenon or answer a scientific question. d) Make predictions. A prediction is a specific statement that can be directly and unequivocally tested. e) Test the predictions. Scientists test predictions by gathering evidence that could potentially refute them and thus disprove

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the hypothesis. The strongest form of evidence comes from experiments. An experiment is an activity designed to test the validity of a prediction or a hypothesis. It involves manipulating variables, or conditions that can change. i. The independent variable is the variable that the scientist manipulates, while the dependent variable is the one that depends upon the first variable. Scientists conduct controlled experiments by controlling for the effects of all variables except the tested one. Often, controlled experiments have a treatment area that is manipulated and another that is not, called a control. f) Analyze and interpret results. Scientists record data, or information, from their studies and analyze the data using statistical tests to see if the hypothesis is supported. If experiments disprove a hypothesis, the scientist will reject it and may formulate a new hypothesis to replace it. If experiments fail to reject a hypothesis, evidence in favor of it accumulates, and the researcher may eventually conclude that the hypothesis is well supported. C. We test hypotheses in different ways. 1. A manipulative experiment is an experiment in which the researcher actively chooses and manipulates the independent variable. When we cannot, it is common for researchers to run natural experiments, which compare how dependent variables are expressed in naturally occurring, but different, contexts, and to search for correlation, or statistical association among variables. 2. Whenever possible, scientists try to integrate natural experiments and manipulative experiments to gain the advantages of each. D. Scientists use graphs to represent data visually. 1. To summarize and present the data they obtain, scientists often use graphs. Graphs help to make patterns and trends in the data visually apparent and easy to understand. E. The scientific process continues beyond the scientific method. 1. Peer review. Research results are submitted to a journal for publication. Other scientists who specialize in the subject area are asked to provide comments and criticism and judge whether the work merits publication. This process is known as peer review. 2. Grants and funding. To fund their research, most scientists need to spend a great deal of time requesting money from private foundations or from government agencies. Grant applications

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undergo peer review just as scientific papers do, and competition for funding is generally intense. Scientists’ reliance on funding sources can occasionally lead to conflicts of interest. 3. Conference presentations. Scientists frequently present their work at professional conferences where they interact with colleagues and receive comments on their research. 4. Repeatability. The careful scientist may test a hypothesis repeatedly in various ways. Following publication, other scientists may attempt to reproduce the results in their own experiments. 5. Theories. If a hypothesis survives repeated testing by numerous research teams and continues to predict experimental outcomes and observations accurately, it may be incorporated into a theory. A theory is a widely accepted, well-tested explanation of one or more cause-and-effect relationships that has been extensively validated by a great amount of research. F. Science undergoes paradigm shifts. 1. A paradigm is a dominant view regarding a topic, based on the facts and experiments known at that time. 2. Paradigm shifts demonstrate the strength and vitality of science, showing science to be a process that refines and improves itself through time. IV.

Environmental Ethics A. Environmental ethics pertains to people and the environment. 1. Ethics is a branch of philosophy that involves the study of good and bad, right and wrong. Ethical standards are the criteria that differentiate right from wrong. Some ethicists are relativists, who believe that ethics do and should vary with social contexts. Others are universalists, who maintain that there exists objective notions of right and wrong that hold across cultures and contexts. 2. The application of ethical standards to relationships between people and nonhuman entities is known as environmental ethics. 3. Anthropocentrism describes a human-centered view of our relations with the environment. 4. Biocentrism ascribes inherent value to certain living things or to the biotic realm in general. 5. Ecocentrism judges actions in terms of their effects on whole ecological systems.

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B. Conservation and preservation arose in the 20th century. 1. John Muir promoted the preservation ethic, which holds that we should protect the natural environment in a pristine, unaltered state. 2. Gifford Pinchot espoused the conservation ethic, which holds that people should put natural resources to use but that we have a responsibility to manage them wisely. C. Aldo Leopold’s land ethic inspires many people. 1. Aldo Leopold chose a more holistic perspective, maintaining that healthy ecological systems depend on protecting all of their interacting parts. 2. Leopold argued that people should view themselves and “the land” as members of the same community and that we are obligated to treat the land in an ethical manner. 3. Leopold intended the land ethic to help guide decision making. D. Environmental justice seeks fair treatment for all people. 1. Environmental justice involves the fair and equitable treatment of all people, with respect to environmental policy and practice. V.

Sustainability and Our Future A. Population and consumption drive environmental impact. 1. Sustainability is a guiding principle of modern environmental science that means living within our planet’s means. 2. Every day, we add over 200,000 people to the planet. 3. Our consumption of resources has risen even faster than our population. 4. The world’s people have not benefited equally from society’s overall rise in affluence. 5. Our growing population and consumption are intensifying many environmental impacts. B. Energy choices will shape our future. 1. Our reliance on fossil fuels intensifies virtually every impact we exert on our environment. 2. However, in extracting coal, oil, and natural gas, we are splurging on a one-time bonanza, because these fuels are nonrenewable and in finite supply. C. Sustainable solutions abound. D. Students are promoting solutions on campus.

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1. As a college student, you can help to design and implement sustainable solutions on your own campus. Proponents of campus sustainability seek ways to help colleges and universities reduce their ecological footprints. E. Environmental science prepares you for the future. VI.

Conclusion A. Finding effective ways of living peacefully, healthfully, and sustainably on our diverse and complex planet requires a solid ethical grounding as well as a sound scientific understanding of natural and social systems. B. Science in general, and environmental science in particular, can help us develop balanced, workable, sustainable solutions and create a better world now and for the future.

Key Terms agricultural revolution anthropocentrism biocentrism campus sustainability conservation ethic control controlled experiment correlation data dependent variable descriptive science ecocentrism ecological footprint ecosystem services environment environmental ethics environmental justice environmental science environmental studies environmentalism ethical standards ethics experiment fossil fuels hypothesis hypothesis-driven science

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independent variable industrial revolution interdisciplinary Leopold, Aldo Muir, John natural capital natural resources natural sciences nonrenewable natural resources overshoot paradigm peer review Pinchot, Gifford predictions preservation ethic relativists renewable natural resources science scientific method social sciences sustainability theory treatment universalists variables

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Teaching Tips 1. Begin class by asking the students to define the term environment in their own words. Bring old magazines for the students to clip out a picture that matches their definition. Ask students to put their definitions and pictures on a note card to be submitted. At the end of the semester, return the note cards to the students and ask them to redefine the term based on what they learned during the course. Lead a discussion about how their definitions changed. 2. Print pictures of radically different environments—a human eyebrow, a sulfur spring, an apartment, etc. Have students judge whether or not the pictures represent environments, and if so, why they do (or do not). This helps students understand an all-encompassing definition of the term environment. 3. To teach the scientific method, present a situation to the class and ask students to work in groups to address the issue using the scientific process. For example: A farmer in South Carolina notices that the pond on his property has an unusually high amount of algae in it. Because of the algal growth, his cattle will not drink from the pond. What is happening, and what could he do? Based on this information (the observation), ask students to formulate a hypothesis, make a prediction, and design an experiment. 4. To make environmental science more appealing to students, present information about local environmental issues. When students are faced with environmental problems where they live, they see how they relate to them personally and realize that they can make a difference. One possibility is to look at the Environmental Protection Agency’s Superfund Sites in your state. The National Priorities List of sites in the United States can be found at: https://www.epa.gov/superfund/search-superfund-sites-where-you-live. From there you can choose your state or territory. Click on any site shown on the state map to see site names and locations, and then click on the site name to go to a page devoted to that site, its description, cleanup approach, progress, potentially responsible parties, and many other site-related documents. 5. Ask students to conduct Internet research on Easter Island. What is it like today? How many people live on the island? What are the main resources? Now research one of the success stories, the island of Tikopia, which lies in the Pacific Ocean east of Australia and New Guinea, west of Tonga and Fiji. Look in Jared Diamond’s book Collapse (2005, Viking Press) or at the Internet site: http://tannerlectures.utah.edu/_documents/a-to-z/d/Diamond_01.pdf. Compare and contrast the stable culture that has lasted at least 3,000 years on Tikopia with the fallen and failed culture of Easter Island. What are the major differences in how the people approached the idea of sustainability?

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6. Quick feedback: Use a technique known as “muddiest point” to assess student understanding of the material. During the last 5 minutes of class, pass out 3 × 5 cards (or have students use their own paper, but in a large class 3 × 5 cards will be faster to assess) and ask students, anonymously, to write down the one point from the day that they don’t quite grasp—the “muddiest point.” Students leave cards in a pile as they exit. You don’t need to read every one of them in a large class—a random sample of 20 will give you a good indication of whether there are a couple of concepts that many students find unclear and you need to go over again, or whether most students understood almost everything. The technique has two benefits: First, the students must engage in some higherorder thinking to quickly review the lesson and their notes, assessing for clarity; and, second, you will get a snapshot of whether there are small, scattered misunderstandings or a single issue that needs to be revisited. (From Thomas A. Angelo and K. Patricia Cross, Classroom Assessment Techniques: A Handbook for College Teachers, 2nd ed., 1993. Jossesy-Bass Publishers, San Francisco.) 7. Divide the class into six teams. Assign a chapter from Overshoot by William Catton, Jr. (see Suggested Texts below) to each team. Ask students to summarize the main points, analyze the information presented by the author, and explain if or how the text is relevant today. Encourage discussio...