I searched for the definition of sustainability, and I found that "the property of being sustainable". Since that didn't really help me, I continued searching. I found that there are many ways to define sustainability, but sustainability in an environmental sense means "Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." In other words, continuing whatever you are doing now, and doing so in a way that wouldn't harm the environment if you continued doing it for a million years.
Define this in your blog post and give examples of ways that you can lessen your human footprint. What is a human footprint? What do you think the video was trying to get across to you?
Human footprint is much easier to define. It means "The ecological footprint is a measure of human demand on the Earth's ecosystems." In other words, how much of Earth's resources you are using in your existence on earth. I think that the whole movie was trying to show you that you are not small at all, and that you do have a very large impact on Earth's resources, in other words a large Eco Footprint. I think that it was pretty effective in that respect.What does Earth have to do with our footprint? Find out what makes an Ecological Footprint by clicking on each icon in the circle under: What Makes an EcoFootprint? Describe some global impacts that occur because of consumerism. Now, follow the link on my original post and play the game.
The earth has to do with our footprint because it provides us with all of our resources that allow us to live and have an ecological footprint. Without the Earth, we obviously would have nowhere to live. Even if Earth and life did exist, but the Earth stopped producing resources, we would die because all of our food, electricity, and water and other vital things come from the Earth
Using the website below, calculate your Eco Footprint and reflect on what you learned about your family behaviors and actions and what type of Footprint you are leaving on the planet. Write down some ways that you believe you could lessen your footprint.
I couldn't really understand the game footprint calculator, but I used the calculator on the Eco Voyagers site to find out that if everyone on Earth lived like I did, we would need 2.66 Earths. That was surprising to me. I believe that my family is not doing to badly environmentally, because we almost never use our car (which is a hybrid) we always reuse plastic bags and we do other things to lessen our Eco Footprint. I guess that is not enough though. I could lessen my footprint further by buying less heavily packaged food, possibly living in a smaller house because ours is larger than we absolutely need and also conserving energy use further.
Now, go back to the Ecovoyageurs website and click on Earthly Impacts at the top of the page. Visit both the Global and Personal impacts pages. Were there any facts that surprised you from the website? What about from the video we watched in class? What were some facts that stuck in your head and really made you think about human behavior on our planet?
There were a few facts that really struck me, like:
The wealthiest 5% of the world's population consumes 58% of energy.
That surprised me because although I knew that the wealthier part of the worlds population used a lot of energy, I didn't think that it was this disproportionately high.
The least wealthy 20% of the world's population consumes 1% of paper, while the most wealthy 5% of the worlds population consumes 84% of the world's paper.
Again, this was surprising because I knew there would be a large difference, but I didn't know it would be this big.
Finally, click on You Can Help to get some ideas about what you can do to help lessen the footprint you leave.
I clicked through here, and the section that I focused on was energy consumption, which is the area that I think that I can improve the most in. There didn't seem to be any easy solution here, though. Global warming is a very complicated problem. They suggested switching off TV/Computer, and doing something that doesn't require electricity. That would be very hard for me.
Like I said before, (this is the same text) I could lessen my footprint further by buying less heavily packaged food, possibly living in a smaller house because ours is larger than we absolutely need and also conserving energy use further.
*Old Reflection*
Don't read this or grade this visitor. This is the my high-speed reflecting that I did during recess. Obviously I redid the whole reflection once I read the instructions.
I took the quiz that Mrs. M linked to on her site. I got these results:
Your total ecological footprint is 4.84 hectares
If everyone lived the same as you we'd need 2.66 earths!
I found it pretty surprising. In the quiz, it asks for many, many things, like how big my house is (I probably got that wrong), but telling me that I need 2.66 Earths to sustain my lifestyle is shocking. I'm glad not everyone in the world lives like that! The movie that we are watching in class also shows some shocking numbers, while backing them up with a real picture. However, they don't tell you the alternatives, or what you can do to avoid using so many resources. I find the fact that Earth is still able the (mostly) cope with so many people living like that surprising. In the movie, they do waste a lot of resources showing you what they want to show you. Especially in the scene when the dump thousands of eggs onto the floor, that seems quite wasteful. I guess that it is OK in the name of science, to waste all those eggs. Maybe people will eat fewer eggs, now that they know how many they are eating. If everyone reduced their egg consumption, then they could make up for all the eggs wasted.
Overall, I think that my quiz results plus the movie both show me that I do have a large impact on the earth, and that I can really negatively impact the environment if I don't conserve.
No comments:
Post a Comment