quiz #2

Question 1

how are environmental science policies today received compared to historically?

Answer 1

science/progress is almost always met with resistance. people will challenge ideas that threaten them or ones they don’t understand ex: copernicus believed that the sun was the center of the universe and he was met with lots of resistance. climate change is today’s version

Question 2

what is the environmental paradox?

Answer 2

human well-being has improved but natural ecosystems that provide us with goods and services have declined.

Question 3

what are the 4 hypotheses that try to explain the environmental paradox. how are they measured? are they true?

Answer 3

1) measurements of well-being are flawed and human well-being is actually declining. the united nations’ human development index (HDI) measures human well-being of nations and is accurate and shows an improvement. so, not supported
2) food production has been enhanced and outweighs the declines in other ecosystem services. ecosystem capital in a nation and its income-generating capacity represents a major form of a nation’s wealth. millennium ecosystem assessment (ME) determined humans have changed the world more rapidly/profoundly over the past 50 years than at any other time in history. looked at links between ecosystem services and human well-being (provisioning services: goods like food/fuel, regulating services: processes like flood protection, cultural services: nonmaterial benefits like recreation) . food production has increased and human well-being has improved which outweighs the costs of ecosystem decline.
3) technology can substitute for natural goods and services so humans are less dependent on ecosystem services. helps explain.
4) the lag between ecosystem decline and human well-being means the worst is yet to come. helps explain.

conclusion? declining ecosystem conditions will affect human well-being.

Question 4

define greenhouse effect

Answer 4

GHG absorb infrared energy radiated from earth’s surface which warms the lower atmosphere.

Question 5

what are greenhouse gases?

Answer 5

gas in an atmosphere that absorbs and emits radiation within the thermal infrared range.

Question 6

what’s a runaway GHG effect?

Answer 6

when a system doesn’t have the mechanisms to take out the CO2 in the same rate that its put in.

Question 7

define the umbrella terms of climate change

Answer 7

1. climate change
   a) global warming ii) average temperature warming
   b) paleoclimatology ii) study of past climate
   c) geological temperature record / natural climate variability ii) long term changes