“It is a vision, a dream, if you prefer, like Martin Luther King’s, and it means clustering on a planetary scale.” (Nash) In Historian Roderick Nash’s essay entitled “Island Civilization: A vision for Human Occupancy of Earth in the Fourth Millennium,” Nash not only proposes the ideology of Island Civilization but also challenges readers to be informed of the rights of nature. Gaining insight on the options of preservation and nature from masterminds like John Muir, Henry David Thoreau, and Wallace Stegner. Nash devises a plan of action for Earth during the fourth millennium. Realizing the illustrate of our worlds “wilderness” Nash educates on the ways in which the natural world will evolve one thousand years from now.
In the wasteland scenario, earth is almost entirely neglected. Civilians no longer live amongst the wonders of nature instead live amongst trash and poison. A product of continual growth which led to the butchering of the ecosystems. From my perspective this scenario is the most logical for the future of Earth. At the rate of population growth, expansion and resource consumption, the inability to sustain our population seems to be leading to milking the Earth completely dry.
The second future envisioned scenario by Nash is that of the ‘garden scenario.’ In this situation, humans seem to have achieved their absolute potential in technological ways. Rather than living as one with the environment humans will have replaced necessary environmental processes with artificial ones, or eliminating all things unnecessary to personal survival. Diversity will have been eliminated and only wilderness will aid human civilization. This scenario could never happen because the food web of the Earth is co complex, by removing ...
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... the world that these scenarios can keep the wilderness safe and from our cancer-like tendencies to self destruct.
Island Civilization is an excellent idea for a science fiction movie, but as for a legitimate plan for the future of our planet the idea is simply unachievable. Roderick Nash appears to have been as optimistic about the future as possible, but he forgets the physical restrains that our planet allows. Although most of the scenarios Nash describes seem impossible, the waste land seems the most achievable from my point of view, even if people do not want to achieve this scenario.
Works Cited
Roderick Nash. ISLAND CIVILIZATION A VISION FOR HUMAN OCCUPANCY OF EARTH IN THE FOURTH MILLENNIUM. 2001. .
. Worldometers. December 18, 2013 at 6:50:52 PM. .
When the Europeans traveled to the New World, they expected the wilderness to resemble the Garden of Eden. The reality was a rude awakening. They found the vast lands of the new world to be full of uncultivated
Cronon, William “The Trouble with Wilderness; or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature” ed., Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature, New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1995, 69-90
In the article "Island Civilization: A vision for human occupancy of earth in the fourth millennium" a very good point was made about how humans are not treating the earth with respect, however our generation still has a chance to turn the earth from cancerous to healthy.
In your essay “Island Civilization: a Vision for Human Occupancy of Earth in the Fourth Millennium”, several proposals are brought up with seemingly impossible solutions to the problem of environmental decay that is currently consuming, endangering and threatening our planet. Dr. Nash, you believe that humans have to do what they are capable of in order to restore the planet to its “natural” once prosperous condition. When humanity came into the picture, it began to manipulate the environment for its own personal benefits. The essay makes the point that the world is not ours to destroy and take from, but rather that people live alongside nature without disturbing it. You state that your proposal may be controversial due to some major changes, and that the ” whole purpose of this essay is to put forward for discussion a strategy for occupation of this planet that will work in the very long run, and for all the natural world.” The concepts brought up are quite controversial, and for that reason your points are arguable.
He believes that the wilderness has helped form us and that if we allow industrialization to push through the people of our nation will have lost part of themselves; they will have lost the part of themselves that was formed by the wilderness “idea.” Once the forests are destroyed they will have nothing to look back at or to remind them of where they came from or what was, and he argues everyone need to preserve all of what we have now.
Kirby, Brendan. "Point Clear : Shrinking island in a sea of growth ." Mobile Press-Register 26 March 2001.
In recent decades, the contentious issues surrounding climate change and the corresponding effects it likely exerts upon contemporary civilization has developed to become one of the most pressing areas of concern afflicting humanity (Armstrong, 1). Currently, climate change has started to demonstrate its potentially calamitous consequences upon human subsistence practices, and has even begun to alter the very environments that entire societies reside in, theoretically endangering them in both instances (Armstrong, 1). Though the hindrances inherent in climate change are potentially devastating to the preservation of modern society, the problem of climate change itself is not one that is exclusive to the contemporary era. Rather, the harmful
In Roderick R. Nash’s essay “Island civilization: A vision for human occupancy of earth in the fourth millenium” he quotes “Of course a change like this one [Island civilization] involves compromises with human freedom.” Nashs plan for the future is to make self-sustaining “islands” of civilization. These civilizations would be clusters of the population, and quite similar to cities. His plan also relies on advanced technology that would not harm the Earth and that the “islands” remain isolated from each other. All food production, manufacturing, sanitation, and other services would take place directly within the civilization. This would mean that we as humans would lose many rights that we have had for hundreds of years such as human freedom. I do not believe that with all of the people obsessed with their rights that anything like island civilization will happen anytime soon.
Many years ago, people saw the wilderness as a savage wasteland, but today, it is viewed as “the last remaining place where civilization, that all too human disease, has not fully infected the earth.” (Cronon) He discusses this changed point of view by stating the difficulties that society will have rectifying environmental ailments if it stops viewing wilderness as “a dualistic picture in which the human is completely outside the nature.” (Cronon) This is understandable because humans rely on others to create opinions, and they do not know how to form their own thoughts and solutions to issues such as environmental ones. Therefore, it is with great importance that humans begin to learn how to formulate their own thoughts and share those personal thoughts with others, such as sharing solutions about environmental
The article by Jared Diamond called “The End of The World as We Know Them” explains to us we have the chance to change our future from previous civilianization like Mayans. One alternative that we can infer is a stronger focus on benefiting the earth and not our self. For example instead of using war to gain more resources from other countries and cause more damage to other civilization, we should all live in peace and live natural energy from the sun like solar panels. If we keep the ground that we live on, we can keep our lives that we dwell on.
Leopold defends his position the advent of a new ethical development, one that deals with humans’ relations to the land and its necessity. This relationship is defined as the land ethic, this concept holds to a central component referred to as the ecological consciousness. The ecological consciousness is not a vague ideal, but one that is not recognized in modern society. It reflects a certainty of individual responsibility for the health and preservation of the land upon which we live, and all of its components. If the health of the land is upheld, its capacity of self-renewal and regeneration is maintained as well. To date, conservation has been our sole effort to understand and preserve this capacity. Leopold holds that if the mainstream embraces his ideals of a land ethic and an ecological consciousness, the beauty, stability and integrity of our world will be preserved.
the island. The people are aware of the power that the island holds but they
The term serves as an alternate for other phrases referring to the era of modern man, such as “anthropocene” or “capitolocene,” which Haraway disagrees with. Rather than the ominous implications of the anthropocene and capitalocene, the Chthulucene is precarious, but not yet doomed because it consists of “ongoing multispecies stories and practices.” The concept of the Chthulucene implies a one-ness shared by all beings, human and non-human. By rejecting the anthropocene and capitolocene, Haraway also rejects the notion that dictates define the age we are currently living. “Anthro-“ and “capital-“ place a certain amount of blame on single entities, namely humans and capitalism, but in the rest of her work, Haraway suggests that recognizing unity and networks is ultimately more important than assigning fault. While the other terms seem to identify a cause for the modern age, Haraway’s Chtulucene emphasizes a method of thinking about and living with the present. In Haraway’s view, the Chtulucene is a vital part of reimagining our existence in the world. She goes on to discuss “tentacular thinking” and “making kin” as other aspects that are key to creating a sustainable world. In order to continue existing,
Manufactured buildings, transportation, and innovations need room to grow, humans expand by conquering what does not belong to them. Storms, tornadoes, hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, wildfires are nature’s way of taking it back, of starting fresh. The circle created by Mother Nature is simple: birth, survival, and death. Both nature and humans start with birth, survival is encompassed with growth and discovery, death is removal of the old and decaying for a new birth, and so the cycle repeats. Just as humans give life to future generations, nature gives life to new species. New generations create new discoveries, regrowth freshens the air and life of the once destroyed. The beginning sets the path for what is to come, what is to be discovered, what is to be destroyed, and what is to, eventually, be
It can be difficult to imagine a world where almost half of all human life has ceased to exist, regardless of the cause. Over the course of existence, humans have managed to work themselves up to the top of the food chain with the help of evolution and conscious development. In doing so, they have also contributed to significant loss of habitat and the extinction of thousands of species in just the last 50 years. Some studies have demonstrated that within the next 50 years, a quarter of the earth’s land animals and plants will become extinct. As we read Brooks’ World War Z, we are confronted with the idea of what life would be like if we were forced out of our homes, dealing with starvation and attempting to find a safe environment away from the fear of being hunted and