La Fontaine tells a tale of a man who owns a hen that laid eggs of gold. The man becomes wealthy from the eggs produced by his hen. The man then becomes greedy and wants all the golden eggs that the bird possessed. Blinded by his new wealth and stupidity, the man kills his hen so he can open her up to get all of her golden eggs. Sorrowfully, the goose was just a goose on the inside. The man's mistakes produce a valuable lesson; do not maim the origins of wealth for a quick profit. However, this story makes one wonder “does a bird like this really exist?” The answer to that question is yes and we treat it in much the same way. In America, we deal with problems of greed on a daily basis, whether we realize it or not. The biggest issue that …show more content…
“When greed attempts to win all, greed Loses all.”
As in The Hen That Laid The Golden Egg, when you take everything away you are left with nothing in return. As things go greed has left our natural forests bare because of the demand for wood and its products. It may not seem like a big problem, especially day-to-day when we use the by-products of wood; paper, however, the problem is affecting us negatively. Temperatures are rising and animals are losing their homes. Our demand for this natural resource is devastating our planet. When we have successfully cleared all the forests of its trees, the success will not compare to the ruin that will be left in its wake. There will be nothing left, except the thought of “why did we not stop this sooner when there was still a chance?” Plastic lined beaches, waves scattered with candy wrappers and bottles, and the remains of the animals that have mistaken the garbage for food. The scene being painted is what is happening to our white sandy beaches and our salty oceans. La Fontaine described the man what effect greed and stupidity had on the mans hen, “Thus he destroyed Through his own fault The great bonanza he’d
Society does not appear to be worried about how nature has vanished. Recently, most humans are only worried about the development in technology and how it benefits them. The world of the feed has become so consumed in their precious technology that oxygen factores need to produce artificial air. For example, when Violet was having a conversation with Titus father on how Jefferson Park was being destroyed to create oxygen factors, Titus father says, “it’s inefficient to have trees next to an air factory” (Anderson 125). Ironically, trees produce oxygen, yet humans are destroying trees to build oxygen factories. Trees clean the atmosphere by absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing the oxygen that living creatures breathe in. Ever since humans learned how to utilize an a hatchet, humans constantly cut down trees without seeing the impact it has on the earth and our society. Moreover, due to society’s overpopulation humans utilize the advancement of technology to replace forests with numerous factories and skyscrapers. As Titus father describes, the trees are “nice, and it’s too bad, but like...Do you know how much real estate costs?” (Anderson 125). The earth has slowly deteriorated due to mankind abusing natural resources and transforming them into our everyday
The greed was evident when the Taliban went in and took control of Afghanistan: “The only people in Kabul who get to eat lamb now are the Taliban (Khaled Hosseini).” The Taliban took all of the wealthy parts of Afghanistan and claimed it as their own. These actions put the rest of Afghanistan in shambles with beggars on most street corners, people living in refugee camps etc..; “Rubble and beggars. Everywhere I looked, that was what I saw (Hosseini).” The Taliban stripped not only Afghanistan of their wealth but the people's wealth as well, making everyone no better than the beggars on the streets of Kabul in earlier years. Some individuals describe Greed like: “lust and gluttony, a sin of desire (Wikipedia).” The Taliban were compelled through longing and used Afghanistan, the people and even the children to gain control and wealth which leads to poverty in the country on which they stand on. The Taliban's audacity stripped people and their country of wealth and left everyone and everything in nothing but destruction, rubble, and countless other evils. In the novel the Sacred Leaf, the greed of money from the Coca leaves landed most of the Bolivian people in jail. This was due to the inappropriate use of Coca leaves which were sometimes turned into a paste which then was turned into cocaine: “Diego wondered how much a bus ticket to Cochabamba would cost… and save the coca money to give to his mother to pay the fines she’d been given because of his carelessness (Ellis).” The Ricardo family was in just as much debt as Diego and his family was but Diego didn’t think about that when he planned to take the all of the funds from the coca money and run while he had a chance. The greed for the coca money ended up with all the crops being confiscated by the government due to Diego's actions against this new law. Diego put the Ricardo’s and him in poverty stripping them of everything and his only way home:
The crew commonly sees sea gulls near the dinghy and the gulls are a source of anger for the men. The men see the gulls as “gruesome and ominous” (1335) because the birds are “uncanny and sinister in their unblinking scrutiny” (1355). The gulls represent nature’s indifference to humans. The captain wanted to knock the bird away, but the dinghy could easily be capsized, so he was stuck powerless against the gulls. The gull sat down on the captain’s head as if the man was an inanimate object. This shows that man is unable to change nature and that we are s...
that human nature seeks to dominate. Greed and money are often at the root of such efforts. The
“The Earth is 4.6 billion years old. Scaling to 46 years, human have been here 4 hours, the industrial revolution began 1 minute ago, and in that time, we’ve destroyed more than half the world’s forests.” - Unknown. One major environmental problem in our world is deforestation - what is that, you ask? According to the Merriam Webster Dictionary, deforestation is the action or process of clearing of forests. Some consequences of this include a large contribution to global warming and climate change (about 1.5 billion tons of carbon dioxide each year), loss of biodiversity especially in tropical rainforests, and the extinction of many known or yet to be discovered species. But, through some Debt-for-Nature Swaps, leaving forests
On average millions of hectares of forests are destroyed each year resulting in severe consequences that will affect not only our lifestyle, but also all the animals with which we share our planet. Many species of animals and plants will become extinct and if we continue with the destruction of our forests, earth will be unable to sustain life.
Humans are destructive. Not a lot of us think about how what we do affects the world around us. We almost act like we are the only ones on this planet. We go around polluting and destroying our world with no regard for our actions. The things that live out in the wild are paying the price for it. Every day that passes there is another animal or plant that is placed on an endangered list. This is happening at an alarming rate. Because of man’s desire to expand and conquer their surroundings, there are animals and plants that are on the brink of extinction that will not be around for our kids and future generations to enjoy if something is not done about it now. This problem has been going on for hundreds of years. There are animals and plants that can only been seen in paintings or early photography. It is because of our early ancestors that we have this problem today and we have to do more to prevent more animals and plants from disappearing forever.
Therefore, the consequences of destroying it will be very harsh on us humans. If we take the resources such as wood from the rainforest, for our everyday use now, we will be the ones suffering in long term. Rainforest use to cover 14% of our earth, and now its left with only 6%. From looking at the rainforest from different perspective actually tells us a lot.
A problem America is experiencing is the economic growth, it is a problem because the wealth growth is only affecting the rich. It is as simple as this, the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. Robert Reich points this out in his text, Why the Rich Are Getting Richer and the Poor, Poorer. This has been a problem recurring since the industrial revolution, because of the labor groups being stuck in that position. Also, the mergers, and lawyers cycle around their money through lawsuits, and takeovers.
What is also becoming increasingly clear is the effect that forests have on the climate and the climate has on forests, and how changes in one system will affect the other. Losing forest makes it worse. Clearing forests also releases large amounts of carbon dioxide. Worldwide deforestation means we don’t have as many trees to absorb the extra CO2. This means more of it stays in the atmosphere, trapping more heat. Forest are cut down for many reasons, but most of them are related to money or to people’s need to provide for their families. The biggest driver of deforestation is agriculture. Farmers cut forest to provide more room for planting crops or grazing livestock. Often many small farmers will each clear a few acres to feed their families by cutting down trees and burning them in process known as “ slash and burn” agriculture. Therefore, not all deforestations is intentional. Some is caused by a combination of human and natural factors like wildfires and subsequent overgrazing, which may prevent the growth of young trees. Deforestations has many negative effects on the environment. The most dramatic impact is a loss of habitat for million of species. So seventy percent of Earth’s land animals and plants live in forest, and many cannot survive the deforestation that destroy their homes. A more workable solution is to carefully manage
One of most popular issues in the economic world is greediness and selfish as Laura Hansen and Siamak Movahedi mentioned in their article, Wall Street Scandals: The Myth of Individual Greed. The politicians and the greedy bankers are taking advantages of the economic problems in the U.S. Wall Street movie created a movement in the main street to save these poor victims’ money. Many of them lost millions of dollars, investments, and house mortgage; they became homeless with no help just to get out of this greedy economy. However, this greediness became less in the 20th century. January 20, 2009, Obama’s speech had some questions about the economy structure problems to solve them and start a new page that full of responsibilities. Even people divided into two categories as some may say that greed is may only found in specific social class and status, and some say it is a public issue. Zakaria, who is a writer of Newsweek articles in 2009, wrote that ‘’ in business, greed is
Greed, being a key human condition, has shaped society from the very start. In fact, some scholars believe that greed was the first major milestone of human success, when the first human wondered why he/she had to scrounge around for necessities; it is a part of being human to be greedy. Wanting a new car, to be loved by another, or to desire the feeling of well doing when feeding the needy, these are all factions of greed...
There is a little too much greed going on in society. My definition of greed is when a limitless person selfishly wants something and the obsessive addictions is that enough is never enough. The dictionaries definition is ‘an inordinate or insatiable longing, especially for wealth, status, and power.’ People do not realize that greed concentrated too much on earthly thoughts. People think the need of wanting something is just a thought, however if you continue to think about it, eventually the person will find a way to allow greed to take over the thoughts. Greed can make a man, but it can also destroy him ten times over. It is one thing to want money or materialistic ideals, but the necessity almost unavoidably becomes greed. Greed is something
“Money is number and numbers never end if it takes money to be happy your search for happiness will never end.” (Bob Marley). For the majority of people in our modern-capitalist world, money is the first thing, and sometimes the only thing that measures success in life. Money can buy power. Money can buy fame. Money can buy time. Sometimes money can even buy a life. So money has become the first common goal for everybody. There are many different perspectives, and how people view the world, in terms of success, and money. Money is not the root of all evil, but the love of money is the root of all evil.
... foreign and mysterious. The people of that time period didn’t really know what to expect. They sought the sea as a counter-purposive nature - a wild, sublime nature which its audience could imagine as being so very unlike the familiar and domesticated nature of pastoral England. They simply didn’t know enough about it and had the worst fears about it. Their fears proved somehow true and real in the incident shown in the painting. The view we should follow in the 21st century is that of the depiction in the Old Man and the Sea. We need to learn how to deal with the sea; how to live with it, cherish it and protect it because the sea is a gift, a gift of wonder. We can’t do without it. We need it. We need to learn how to protect it and leave the humans’ selfish ways out of it. The old man fished and left behind some for the future; we need to do the same.