Lec 2: Overall Scope and Activities

Question 1

What are the 2 approaches to strategies? Give examples for each

Answer 1

local approaches
- urban planning
- bylaws at the municipal level
- community action
- personal choices

International or global approaches
- national regulation
- trade laws
- environmental protocols
- climate accords

Question 2

How does environmental decision making relate to teleology?

Answer 2

We adapt with a specific end point in mind. We THINK before action.
- more informed decisions
- more strategic decisions
- achieve better outcomes due to adaptive management

Question 3

Name 9 environmental disasters that affect all of us.

Answer 3

1) Climate Change
2) Biodiversity Loss: support system, base of food chain
3) Desertification: loss of productive land
4) Water Shortages
5) Changed Biogeochemical cycles: carbon, mercury, and lead cycles. microplastics
6) Human Population Growth
7) Increasing Per Capita Demand: = increased demand on the environment
8) Human Well-being
9) Better Communication?

Question 4

Give 3 examples that demonstrate how political dimensions are important in environmental disasters.

Answer 4

• the war in Yemen
• Bolsanero in Brazil and burning forests
• Trump rolling back environmental regulations

Question 5

Why does covid require environmental management?

Answer 5

• a zoonotic is an environmental process
• it is mediated by environmental conditions
• its impact is linked to social/cultural parameters, which are part of human ecology!
  - infrastructure
  - equity
• it requires adaptive management

Question 6

What happens when natural and anthropogenic factors interact?

Answer 6

When natural and anthropogenic factors interact, they increase human vulnerability

Question 7

What is the Paradox of Progress?

Answer 7

Progress is a race between innovation and vulnerability.
Although progress makes us better off, it also increases our vulnerability by making us dependent on complex systems that we have created.