Focus on The History of Environmental Science

Fundamentals, Extensions of information, ideas found in each chapters

More detail, More Facts and Figures to support concepts discussed.

Lots of charts and maps

• Supplement 3: Economic, Population, Hunger, Health, Pollution maps, data

• Supplement 4: Biodiversity, Ecological Footprints, Environmental Performance Maps

• Supplement 5: Basic Chemistry*• Supplements 7 and 9: Biology topics • Supplements 8, 10: Climate, energy maps

info• Supplement 11,12: Trade, Religion and the

environment

Only 1 supplementary is required reading…

#5 Environmental History

• Recent work points to numerous connections between environmental problems and the collapse of past civilizations.

• Easter Island• Greenland, Iceland, Vikings in America• Saharan cultures (Romans) • Samaria and the first civilizations in the Iraq• Anasazi (cliff dweller indians in NA)

• Some revisions in a popular environmental story1. Polynesians arrived about 800 years ago, not

29002. Population may have reached 3000, not 15,0003. Used trees in an unsustainable manner, but

rats may have multiplied and eaten the seeds of the trees, permanently keeping the island deforested

4. Disease and Slavers from SA did most the depopulating of the island, not cannibalism

Specializes in Biogeography

Focused on societies, their interaction with each other and the environment

Iceland

North Americans who played an important role promoting environmental awareness…

Henry David Thoreau wrote “Life in the woods”John Muir, Founder of Sierra Club, preservationistTeddy Roosevelt , conservationist, forest service GCFDR and the Great Depression, CCC, gov depts, P

healthRachel Carson “ Silent Spring” effects of DDT, quality70’s presidents, Nixon, Ford, Carter EPA, Energy,

AlaskaTheo Coburn “ Our Stolen Future” Hormone and

chemicals

Herbert Hoover: return all federal land to the states to be sold

Ronald Reagan (Sagebrush Rebellion) Increased sales, reduced funding

George W. Bush, Actions like RR, withdrew from Kyoto accords concern global warming

Killer fog/smog in London (1880,1952, 1956)

A polluted river near Cleveland catches fire (1969)

Love Canal housing project abandoned because of toxic wastes (1978)

Three mile Island Nuclear Accident (1979) Bhopal, India (1984) Chernobyl (1986) Coal seem fires in WV and Centralia PA

25 yrs on: Bhopal water still toxic

The air pollution in major Chinese cities starting to make its way to the west coast

George Bush and the Marine Reserve Park he signed into law

Connected to the information presented in this chapter

1. Read supplement 5

2. From all the items listed on the time line, select the 10-12 people, actions or events in North American Environmental history you consider most important.

3. For each, write a comment why you personally think the items you selected are important

4. Pick one items from your selection and be prepared to talk about it in class (pictures, email)

1. Purpose: To better understand the interactions between environment, people and nations of the world

2. Completed by END of School YEAR

3. The other side of the UN besides peacekeeping and humanitarian aid

4. Job: each student selects a Country, collect info about country and its environmental issues

5. By the end of MAY: Prepare environmentally focused resolutions to place before the council to be debated and voted upon.

6. Each chapter we cover in class will introduce new questions on which you need to gather information

7. Use any source, but document, double-check (bibliography)

8. Place info in a separate section of comp books, notes (will check periodically)

Choose 4 countries, eventually you will concentrate on just one

Pick numbers from 1-192

Answer the following questions

1. What is the country’s location, neighboring countries, and major types of topography

2. Copy or draw its flag, and indicate major languages, religions

3. Is this country developed, MDC, LDC?

4. Form of government, ideal and in reality

5. Is there economic growth? If there is, is it sustainable? What are the largest employers?

6. What is your estimate of the ecological footprint of the average person in the country?

7. Wide spread diseases throughout country?

8. Any notable environmental problems disasters, events that have occurred?

Read up on the 4 countries selected

Pick the most interesting one or two

Remember, when you attend the council in MAY, you represent the country from the viewpoint of what’s best for the country, not your own philosophy