Computers, Society, and Nature

On November 10^th, I attempted Rabbi Michael Cohen’s lecture on the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies. It was the first time this semester that we assist to a seminar that was not presented by a doctor or a researcher, which really made quite a change. The tone used during this conference was quite different from we had seen before. Rabbi Cohen didn’t use graphics or data to present us a certain situation, on the contrary, I felt like he was telling us a story.

But one of the more unusual aspect of this lecture was the fact that he it was given by a rabbi. All the lecturers that I have seen so far did show up wearing a scientist hat; I was not able to tell what their religious or political beliefs were. At the beginning of the presentation, Rabbi Cohen affirmed that he had just published a novel about bridging religion and environment, which I thought was a very interesting issue.

I found this great article about the controversial relation between science and religion on Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. The article begins by defining science and religion. The author reports the definition given by Jacques Monod (a French biologist that worked at the Pasteur Institute): ” The cornerstone of the scientific method is the postulate that nature is objective…. In other words, the systematic denial that ‘true’ knowledge can be got by interpreting nature in terms of final causes …”. Further explanation given in the article includes that science is “the absence of moral judgement, or value judgement”. Thus, science seems to be diametrically opposite with the nature of religion, which is basically all about beliefs. In what we can call pure science, beliefs are not accepted; to be considered credible, a new theory has to be based on data and supported by the scientific community. Is it possible, than, to consort religious beliefs and pure science?

The evening of 10 November 2008 a group of us attended Dialouge Group Montreal’s with guest speaker Rabi Michael Cohen. Rabi Cohen is co-founder and recruitment director of The Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, Kibbutz Ketura, Israel. Rather than discuss The Arava Institute I would like to focus on war, racism and peace as being interconnected with environment. Deterioration of environmental processes and services influence conflict between vying nations, just as states of war and/or peace influence environmental preservation or drive environmental destruction.

Environmental resources and deterioration have historically and will continue to be a source of conflict. After WWI, maps of Europe were re-drawn to compensate and punish ally or axis countries. Ocean ports for trade, agricultural land, culturally significant land and coal mines each had tremendous influence over establishing the new boundaries. In turn, the value and relative shortage of these environmental resources and services became a source conflict (driving economic depression, fear and/or revenge in various countries), and contributed to the beginning of WWII. Currently, wars and ‘peace keeping missions’ are fought over oil, a finite natural resource, but also over a plethora of other natural resource, ecosystem services and culturally/religiously significant land. The current water crisis is projected to worsen and quickly rise to the leading instigator of war around the world. As Rabi Cohen mentioned and I strongly agree; environment, (for example think of salt and fresh water systems and water cycling) knows no boundaries, does not discriminate and does not change course according to human ethics, law, politics or arbitrary borders.

War has devastating impacts on the war field; the natural environment. These impacts are not contained to the conflict zone but alter ecosystem functions on a wider scale and often trigger a cascading assault on environment in various locations. During WWI, for example, vast old growth forest were logged to construct mask and hulls of ships, and the shortage of food in France and England led to the conversion of North American prairie to wheat fields, eventually tipping the prairie ecosystem to collapse, otherwise known as the Dust Bowl. Looking back, we have been able to calculate the approximate damage of the WWI and WWII on the natural environment, but what will be the cost of current and future conflicts as warfare and weapons continue to evolve?

A prevalent and interrelated issue that was raised throughout The Arava Institute seminar was that of racism. Israel, Palestine, and Jordan all share a common land, contribute to the same environmental problems (significantly pollution of the Jordan River) and must work collectively to reverse these problems and preserve their shared remaining natural environment. However, racial and religious prejudice and stereotypes are conceptually rooted in religion-based worldviews that extend into far history, not in a modern environmental worldview.

Considering the detrimental environmental impacts of war and racism above and beyond human impacts, peace becomes crucial for a sustainable world. The influence of peace on the restoring and preserving and environment in the Middle East has huge potential. One example jumps to mind; Canada and the United States, living ad working in peace, have been able to jointly manage The Great Lakes ecosystem; working to reduce pollution, restore and preserve the lakes and their watersheds. Although The Great Lakes bi-national project has not been completely successful (The Great Lakes are still heavily polluted, support less diversity and perform fewer ecosystem services compared to their natural state) it has certainly benefited the lakes. It seems logical that a multinational approach to managing, restoring and protecting the Jordan River would increase the quality of water and than decrease tensions over water resources….but how can this begin without peace in the area? Peace is crucial for environmental restoration and preservation, but how and at what stage is it best incorporated into environmental management? Is peace required as a precursor to effective collaborative environmental preservation? Will peace arise while working across borders to preserve environment? Or is preserving the environment, thus reducing natural resource (especially water) scarcity, required first in order to achieve peace?

We have been talking a lot about whether or not scientists should be activists (even though our definitions of activism seemed to differ), but we didn’t talk about the role politics have to play in science, and the role science has to play … in politics.

It seems to me that those two spheres can hardly be separated. After all, the major part of funding that scientists receive comes directly from the government. The government itself make statements all the time by deciding to fund some specific researches over others. Thus, if we agree on the idea that science cannot happen without the financial input of politics, are we willing to consider that scientists should implicate themselves in public politic debates to ensure the viability of their funding ?

In September 2008, the journal Nature published an editorial where the total absence of science in the electoral campaign was deplored. In the article, the journal reports that “many Canadian scientists are seeing, and complaining about, an undue emphasis on commercially focused research over long-term basic research” (Nature, 2008). Isn’t it a good example of an appropriate moment for scientists to become activists ? Don’t you think scientists have to react when the quality of their research is jeopardised by bias in the way funds are attributed ? Obviously, some scientists thought it was a real problem cause they signed the petition i vote for science (ivoteforscience.blogspot.com) where a public statement about their views on environment, health, science and technology was required from politicians.

I personally assume that if scientist depend on the government’s funding, they have an obligation, both as citizens and as professionals, to implicate themselves in political debates.

On the other hand, I am wondering if politics need science. In march 2008, the Office of National Science Advisor, that was previously created during the last liberal mandate, has been abolished by the Conservative government. The role of the office was basically to advise the Prime minister on different issues concerning science and technology, and to counsel the government on how it can “better support and benefit from science conducted inside government” (Industry Canada, 2008). In my personal opinion, the Conservative party sent a message that it does not need science when it got rid of this office. I am asking you this question, colleagues, as researchers, are we willing to accept that science is push aside from politics ? Do you think that scientists should be more implicated on public debates ? Or do you think that science and politics should be completely separated ?

Carpenter’s seminar Imagination for Transformation provided another outlook on the future environmental problems of the world.  There was the address that what we are seeing now has not occurred before.  The human population is growing faster than we can provide resources for ourselves.  And while our use of environmental services are increasing, the conditions of the environment we are using are deteriorating.  But if these rates of deterioration and natural disasters can no longer be predicted, how do we prevent a catastrophe.  I believe this is where the role of imagination comes into play.  We cannot blindly propose a solution without some knowledge of the situation.  Thus we can create models of what we’ve already seen and attempt to apply them to the future.  Based on our current knowledge we make educated guesses based on what will happen in the future, and whether these future visions pose a problem or not.  It is however, difficult to foretell future events with a large degree of uncertainty.  It may then be necessary to stretch our minds eye and envision several possibilities, not just one.

One of the messages that struck me in Carpenter’s lecture was that our goal was not necessarily to stop these possible disasters from occurring but from increasing the resilience of our environment to these disasters.  This is relevant because you might consider that we don’t have the power to stop all the disasters that might plague the earth.  We might not be able to prevent a fleet of meteors from entering our atmosphere, but perhaps we can find ways to decrease the damage these meteors may cause.  A more relevant example is that we cannot stop the effects of climate change because they are already occurring, but we can reduce the impacts of climate change by controlling our emissions now.

I would suggest it is more important to reduce damages done than to prevent events from occurring on earth.  An event may have negative consequences at the beginning but turn out to have subsequent positive consequences.  Forest fires can be a damaging force, but they can also change the environment for new beings to grow and survive.  Who knows if there may be any benefits to climate change.

Carpenter also attempts to stress that positive change is not as hard as it looks.  Using the example of population, he showed that a difference of one child per woman can create a huge difference in population demographics.  Thus the “Imagination for Transformation” seminar wasn’t your usual doom and gloom “the world’s careening off a cliff and we have to change our ways now so its not a complete disaster”.  With a positive outlook, people will be more likely to seek change then giving into despair.

Finally the proposition is given for three tools that could assist us in the future.  These are education, innovation and imagination.  We would need to educate our children, who carry on a large legacy, especially with the trend of fewer children to inherit the world.  As mentioned previously, with education we may be able to estimate the events of the future.  Education itself is the greatest tool we have to our survival.  With regard to innovation we have the opportunity to change our environment and build it right the second time.  We can come up with technology that reduces our footprint on this earth.  Innovation would tie in with education.  By learning from our mistakes we can create a better future.  Finally concerning imagination, we can assess the possible scenarios, foresee a positive future and take heed of the warnings that we are faced with along the way.  In this way we can talk about what we should do without the panic of a need to act immediately.

November 3, 2008, I attended the S.R. Carpenter seminar entitled, ‘Imagination for transformation.’ I have decided to focus on the article, ‘Uncertainty and the management of multistate ecosystems: an apparently ration route to collapse,’ written by S.R. Carpenter et al. Overall I enjoyed and learned from the article; I believe it is well written and gave a clear example of the detrimental cycle of collapse and renewal or recovery that human managed ecosystems are subject. The example of lakes switching between oligotrophic and eutrophic states as a result of Phosphorus loading, removing and recycling, and under the authority of the ‘lake manager’ gave an enclosed model of multistate ecosystem management failures. I especially liked the description of reactionary management (where policy and management approach changes is reaction to changes in lake state) opposed to informed management (policy and management developed according to scientific understanding of the multistate ecosystem). Carpenter et al. acknowledge that complete scientific understanding of environmental systems influenced by society is difficult to come by, but stresses how constant fluctuation in policy and management causes ecological instability as natural ecological functions are consistently undermined. Examples of socio-environmental systems that despite management have behaved stochastically are given and include the cod fishery collapse, AIDS in Africa and the ozone hole.

Carpenter et al. recommend that effective institutional designs (essentially a restructuring of modern social, economic and political frameworks) are needed for ecosystem management. This massive suggestion is reminiscent of that made by James Gustave Speth in his book, ‘The bridge at the end of the world,’ who claims that ‘working within the system will, in the end, not succeed when what is needed is transformative change in the system itself (86).’ Similarly, Speth’s book/traveling seminar and Carpenter’s article fail to suggest how we, citizens of the modern world, would go about effectively transforming the overarching system which we live under.

There is one significant aspect of Carpenter et al.’s article that, I believe, remains largely unexplained. The lake example given offers generalized lessons about ecosystem management on a relatively small spatial scale, and is circumstances where policy and management decisions are governed by not only a single country but by a single ‘lake manager.’ There exists too many assumptions (environmental, social, economic and political) in this model to apply it to a multinational scale ecosystem or environmental issue. Worldwide socio-environmental issue such as biological diversity loss, climate change, desertification, declining fish stokes, etc, are not governed by a single set of policies, decisions are not made by a single ‘lake or fish or climate manager’ and the cultural, social and economic costs and benefits of ecosystem management will be felt differentially across the countries. Therefore, while I think Carpenter et al. present an informative and well researched model that is important for understanding ecological collapse and recovery cycles on a small, single-country scale, this model does little to advance policy and management of the large, interacting environmental issues currently facing the entire world.

This year’s Beatty Memorial lecture brought up the key points in Professor Speth’s last published book: “The bridge at the end of the world; Capitalism, the Environment and Crossing from Crisis to Sustainability”. And we all know by now at least some of the main causes of the crisis we’re soon about to face: capitalism and it’s drive for profit, lack of concern for the environmental costs of our activities and failing to make the transition to sustainability. The solution to all this? Well, that’s not just as simple. In Speth’s view, the way to succeed is to raise public awareness on the crisis and to push an enlightened government to act on the matter before we pass the point of no return. But how is that possible when decades after we came to learn about the extreme environmental changes we are inducing we’re continuing on the same path of destruction with unsurpassed speed? For sure public awareness has raised, but the effects are slow to show, and certainly can’t balance the damages being done.

Some argue that we’re going about it with the wrong approach. As Speth writes in his last chapter of his book, “Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus remind us, for example, that Martin Luther King Jr. did not proclaim, ‘I have a nightmare.’ My reply to them was that he did not need to say it – his people were living a nightmare. They needed a dream. But we, I fear, are living a dream. We need to be reminded of the nightmare ahead. Here is the truth as I see it: we will never do the things that are needed unless we know the full extent of our predicament.” I happen to agree. At the end of his lecture Speth called on the young generation and urged us to become activists. To disregard this wouldn’t be the same as continuing on the “business as usual” path?

Although he doesn’t pretend to have all the answers, Speth shares with us his ideas on what could be done. First, making the market work for the environment by “getting the prices right”. For now “The environmental costs are normally external to the company – externalities, not paid by company – and thus not incorporated in the price.” Putting a price tag on the damage to the environment and reflecting it in every product we purchase might induce a change in the behavior of the common consumer.

Second, moving to a post-growth society, from an economical point of view, advancing beyond today’s capitalism: “Eventually, a society reaches a point where more growth is not worth it.” Herman Daly sais that “we have already reached or passed this point and are now experiencing ‘uneconomic growth’.” The “real growth” must be “promoting the well-being of people and nature”. A change in mentality is called for, so that we could become satisfied with “living with enough, not always more.”

As Speth said in conclusion to both his book and his lecture, we are approaching the critical point where we have to choose our future. And as he foresees it, “where the path forks there will be the site of … a struggle that must be won even though we cannot see clearly what lies beyond the bridge.” Are we up to the task?

I attempted Christie Lovat’s presentation on ecologically managed golf courses.

As it was described in previous comments, Ms Lovat did demonstrate that golf courses owners can benefit from more ecological management.

The presentation reminds me a discussion we had in class about the role of humankind on the environment. Some of us agreed with the assumption that every action of a human will have an impact on the environment. We considered that every initiative taken to reduce this possible impact would be a good thing.

To confer ecological practices to golf courses is certainly an interesting project. However, those golf courses remain an important piece of land –where plants and trees are removed- devoted to a single sport. I think we should be careful about this “green labeling” tendency. Let’s look at those new carbon neutral events and conferences, where emissions of GHGs are compensate by funding a green project elsewhere in the world. The organization Planetair, for instance, proposes to fund projects for windmill development or electricity by biomass in India. I am afraid these initiatives will become a method to reduce our guilt without forcing us to make real efforts to change our lifestyles.

I am wondering where society will set the boundaries of greenwashing. Is every action taken to reduce our ecological footprint good? Can anything become green? If even golf courses can have a green label, then a lot of other things can!

October 7 2008 I attended Christie Lovat’s seminar, “Economic Benefits of Ecologically Managed Golf Courses.” This seminar contrasted the economic costs and environmental conditions of golf courses, providing relevant facts and figures to illustrate two varied business approaches. Traditional manicured golf courses with large greens require high cost maintenance (pesticides, irrigation, and mechanical upkeep) and seldom reflect a regions native environment. In contrast, ecologically managed golf courses preserve the native environment and habitat within the course, resulting in less disruptive and costly maintenance. The viability of both approaches was presented and discussed, showing that ecologically managed and environmentally marketed golf courses can be as or more successful than traditional course in the short and long terms. This seminar was interrelated with several environmental issues previously discussed in our seminar class; how environment factors into modern economics, value of nature, human impacts as positive or negative for environment, etc.

In addition, this seminar raised a new issue, that of environment and recreation. Outdoor recreation encourages humans to experience, enjoy, and connect with nature; a deeper appreciation and value for nature can be fostered in this way. Conversely, outdoor activities, such as golf or blazing trails through pristine rainforest, can be extremely damaging and disruptive to natural ecosystems. Furthermore, one person’s idea of ‘outdoor activity’ and ‘nature’ can greatly differ from the next person. Many urban dwellers consider golf an escape from city life where nature’s beauty and fresh air can be enjoyed. In reality, however, manicured golf courses seldom reflect a given region’s native environment, nor do they support a diversity of native wildlife. In this case, the costs and benefits of ‘enjoying nature’ must be contemplated; benefits of connecting with nature vs. damages imposed on nature by a given activity. These two factors are difficult to assign value. For example, benefits of connecting with nature may include increased awareness and environmental activism or policy-support. Costs of damaging outdoor activities may include loss of habitat and native biodiversity, decline or pollution of water tables, etc. In both cases, the costs and benefits are difficult to weigh; inherent value will be subjective while assigning monetary value is difficult and often obscure, neither are easily translatable into effective environmental policy. This limitation reflects those associated with applying cost-benefit analysis to environment and economy which we have spoken of in seminar.

The debate over environment and recreation, which is unavoidably linked with economy, raises the following question; with the amount and quality of natural, wild spaces worldwide dwindling, are outdoor activities such as golf a benevolent experience or abuse of the environment? I believe that outdoor recreation (including golf), wilderness excursions and eco-tourism are gaining popularity worldwide with largely unknown impacts on environments. I also believe, however, that when managed in a sustainable- ecosystem based manner, outdoor activities can help preserve the natural environment while promoting environmental awareness and education. In her seminar, Christie Lovat illustrated that golf can be managed ecologically, to preserve native habitat, flora and fauna (squirrels, birds, butterflies, etc.), reduce water waste and herbicide pollution, and offer a more authentic outdoor experience to ecologically minded and simply competitive minded golfers alike.

I attended this week’s “Freaky Friday” seminar on Global Swarming, presented by Anthony Ricciardi. It was a wake up call to the effects that human activity and the global environmental changes it induces have on other species, effects that in most cases are harmful to us in the most unexpected ways: they are costly -from an economical point of view, and they are hazardous to our health. For example the Leafy spurge, an invasive specie that is taking over the farms in Manitoba, has both economical effects, resulting from loss of farmland and toxicity to cattle, as well as human health effects: it causes contact dermatitis. Another costly example is that of the Zebra Muscle, who spread from the Black Sea and is now found on the Eastern coast of North America and in the Great Lakes. It reduces the turbidity of water, thus creating a proper environment for the growth and spread of weeds, their decay causing anoxic zones favorable for the development and persistance of human pathogenic germs like Clostridium Botulinicum. The same Zebra Muscle was responsible for three emergency shut-downs of a US nuclear plant by multiplying in the water intake systems. And these are just two examples. But there are many more plants, insects and animals that with the “help” of humans are spreading faster and invading parts of the world that otherwise would have been impossible for them to reach.

One of the most important points of the seminar for me was the labeling of cargo ships as “floating syringes”. The cargo ships that we now use and depend on for transport of food and freight, are the most common means of spreading invasive and deadly species around the world. The water released from their tanks in different ports (on coasts or up rivers) contains enormous quantities of viruses, bacteria, plants and animals. In Mr. Ricciardi’s view, these are the true terrorists crossing our borders each day and causing the loss of billions of dollars worldwide.

So is global swarming worse then global warming? They’re both very serious threats, closely related, caused and sustained by the same thing: human activity. We seem to be the worst kind of invasive specie, the one causing unsurpassing environmental changes wherever we go. And as Mr. Ricciardi pointed out, there aren’t many places on Earth right now where humans can’t go. It’s high time we face the consequences.

On Friday September 26, I attempted to the seminar “Global swarming” presented by Antonio Ricciardi. With various examples, Ricciardi demonstrated that species invasions are one of the most important global changes that we are experiencing at the moment. He also insisted on the fact that these modern invasions are happening at such a large scale and so rapidly that what happened in the past in nothing compared to the modern rates of biological invasions.

What really catches my attention is the choice of vocabulary that the speaker used during his presentation, starting with the title itself (global swarming). In his introduction, he used the terms “monsters” and “ecological terrorists” to designate the invaders he was going to talk about. Than, he mentioned that the example he was to give during the talk were not “insulated monster stories”, that alien species were present in almost all ecosystems worldwide. Some species like the pig were compared as “little engineer” transforming the habitat and at the end of the speech, he told us that those alien species were a “tax” on natural resources.

At the end of the presentation, in response to a question, Ricciardi made the strong assumption that the human kind is probably the worst invasive specie of the world. After all, we are all invaders outside of Africa! To support this idea, he brought up the fact that we are present in almost every ecosystem and that we are definitely the best when comes the time to transform our environment. This idea was, again, a very powerful way to insist on the role that human plays in spreading alien species all over the place.

All those superlatives were very catchy, and it surely was a great way to increase the auditor’s awareness of that special issue. I was wondering if this effort was necessary; do you need to sound alarmist to convince people? Perhaps! But it made a strong contrast with the more neutral tone used in the article “Are Modern Biological Invasions an Unprecedented Form of Global Change?“.