Saturday, April 26, 2008

The Environment

I ponder the environment a fair amount these days because of all the global warming hype and high gas prices, high food prices, etc. We should, of course, be good stewards of the earth and avoid pollution as much as possible. However, I disagree with the notion of putting the earth before humans, or blaming humans for anything problematic about the environment. I ran across a couple of articles that I recommend that you read and give some thought to. They are as follows:

At Townhall, "A New Environmentalism" by Victor Davis Hanson

At American Thinker, "Earth First! (People Later)" by David Bueche

In "Earth First! (People Later)", Mr. Bueche discusses why global warming isn't really a problem and how much of a disservice it is to humans to focus on that instead of other, more urgent problems (food, sanitation, etc.).

In "A New Environmentalism", Mr. Hanson focuses on energy and points out that if the US continues to import oil, we are often filling the coffers of terrorists and others who do not have our best interests at heart. If we continue to divert grain to biofuels, we raise food prices around the world, which hurts the poor most of all. He points out that solar and wind simply do not provide enough energy at this time or in the foreseeable future. The wisest course is to build nuclear plants and to drill for oil in our own country (ANWR, off the coasts).

I think these two articles make a lot of good points and that we need to get away from extreme positions on the environment (Don't touch anything!). It is possible to seek traditional sources of energy without much in the way of pollution or other environmental damage. We need to do what is best for our country, which in turn will do a lot to benefit people around the world. We need to think instead of following along with the various hysterical claims of global warming or whatever the cause of the day is. We can still be good stewards of the earth while making sensible use of its resources.

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4 Comments:

At 5:29 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

That will happen only if people understand what is really going on in most cases. It's not about the enviroment, it's about power and control.

 
At 6:04 PM, Blogger Mary A said...

And money. Don't forget money! But, yes, a lot of these leaders (in anything, not just environmentalism) are seeking power, control, and money. Otherwise, they'd be a lot more interested in the real science and in sensible solutions.

 
At 1:48 PM, Blogger conor said...

I do think that humans should carry some of the blame and that there's a lot more we can be doing to help the environment that we're not doing out of laziness or lack of awareness.

I like your blog and would like to link to it from mine.

 
At 3:11 PM, Blogger Mary A said...

Conor, thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment. Feel free to link my blog from yours. I'll be happy to reciprocate.

I do think people need to exercise good stewardship over earth and its resources. I also believe that businesses should do all they can to not pollute the environment. I just don't think it is right to blame everything on human activity when there are many natural phenomena that we don't fully understand (climate change, for one example).

Be that as it may, I think we can all learn from one another. Thanks again for stopping by!

 

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