Chapter 1

Question 1

What is environment?

Answer 1

Circumstances or conditions that surround an organism or groups of organisms

Question 2

What are the components of environment?

Answer 2

Soil, air, water, biodiversity, population, energy

Question 3

What is environmental science?

Answer 3

Systematic study of our environment and our proper place in it

Question 4

What is environmentalism?

Answer 4

Working to influence attitudes and policies that affect our environment

Question 5

What is carrying capacity?

Answer 5

The maximum number of organisms that can be maintained in an area without degrading the environment

Also refers to the maximum number of people who can live in an area

(“How many can be supported?”)

Question 6

What is sustainability?

Answer 6

The ability of a system to survive for an extended period of time

(“How long can a system survive?”)

Question 7

What is an environmentally sustainable society?

Answer 7

Meets the basic resource needs of its people indefinitely without degrading or depleting the natural capital that supplies these resources

Question 8

What is the exponential growth rate?

Answer 8

1.2%

Question 9

What are the causes of environmental problems?

Answer 9

1. Rapid population growth
2. Unsustainable resource use
3. Poverty
4. Not including environmental costs in market prices
5. Trying to manage/simplify nature with little knowledge about how it works

Question 10

What are the major human impacts on the environment?

Answer 10

1. Depletion/destruction of renewable resources
2. Depletion of non-renewable resources
3. Pollution (air/water/soil/food)
4. Global warming and ozone depletion

Question 11

What do many of the world’s poor people do as a result of being desperate for land to grow enough food?

Answer 11

Deplete and degrade forests, soil (depletion of nutrients), grasslands, and wildlife for short-term survival

Question 12

Many of the world’s poor do not have access to what?

Answer 12

Basic necessities

Question 13

What are components of poverty?

Answer 13

1. Living in areas with high levels of air and water pollution (large, metro cities)
2. Great risk of natural disasters such as floods, earthquakes, etc.
3. Take jobs with unhealthy and unsafe working conditions with very low pay
4. Affects population growth
5. No retirement plans, social security, government-sponsored health plans

Question 14

What is affluenza?

Answer 14

The relationship between resource consumption and environmental problems

Question 15

What is IPAT?

Answer 15

I = environmental impact
P = population size
A = affluence
T = technology

Environmental impact = P x A x T

Question 16

How can affluence increase environmental quality?

Answer 16

Provides money for developing technologies to reduce pollution, environmental degradation, and resource waste

Question 17

What is sustainable development?

Answer 17

Meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs

Question 18

What are examples of natural services?

Answer 18

Air, water, soil, plants, and wind

Question 19

Why is natural capital a critical component of sustainability?

Answer 19

It keeps us and other forms of life alive

Question 20

What are 3 components of sustainability?

Answer 20

1. Natural environment or natural resources
2. Social connectedness
3. Economic and financial prosperity

Question 21

What is a perpetual resource?

Answer 21

Lasts forever (solar, wind)

Question 22

Sustainability integrates with which 3 dimensions?

Answer 22

1. Environmental
2. Social
3. Economic

Question 23

What are environmental aspects of sustainability?

Answer 23

Recognize the diversity and interdependence within living systems

Question 24

What are economic aspects of sustainability?

Answer 24

Define the framework for making decisions and the flow of financial capital

Question 25

What is socio-political?

Answer 25

Interactions between institutions/firms and people

Question 26

Are we living in a sustainable world? Why/why not?

Answer 26

No, because:

1. Nonrenewable resources used as if renewable
2. Renewable resources used faster than replenishment
3. Pollution of the environment as if no limit to the environment capacity to absorb them
4. Human population continues to increase despite Earth’s finite ability to support us

Question 27

What are sustainable livelihoods?

Answer 27

Emphasize the conditions necessary to ensure that basic human needs are satisfied

Question 28

What is resilience?

Answer 28

The ability of a system to absorb disturbance and still retain its basic function and structure

Question 29

What is sustainable yield?

Answer 29

The highest rate at which a renewable resource can be used indefinitely without reducing its available supply

Question 30

What are indices?

Answer 30

Aggregates of similar indicators

Question 31

What is the tragedy of the commons?

Answer 31

Degradation of renewable free-access resources

Question 32

What are solutions to environmental degradation?

Answer 32

1. Use free-access resources at rates well below their estimated sustainable yields
2. Establish rules and traditions to regulate and share access to common-property resources (fisheries, forests)
3. Convert free-access resources to private ownership

Question 33

What are the environmental worldviews?

Answer 33

1. Planetary management
2. Stewardship
3. Environmental wisdom