You Ought to Have a Look is a feature from the Center for the Study of Science posted by Patrick J. Michaels and Paul C. (“Chip”) Knappenberger. While this section will feature all of the areas of interest that we are emphasizing, the prominence of the climate issue is driving a tremendous amount of web traffic. Here we post a few of the best in recent days, along with our color commentary.
A scattering of stories this week addressed the well‐known, but perhaps not widely‐recognized, fact that with human progress comes a more protected environment.
First up is a piece called “The Return of Nature: How Technology Liberates the Environment” posted at the Breakthrough Journal by Jesse Ausubel. This article makes a strong companion to the Ecomodernist Manifesto, that we commented on a few weeks ago.
The main premise is that human technology, as it develops and matures, actually decreases our negative impact on the environment. This is something that we have been fond of saying—the richer and more developed a country becomes, the more it protects its environment. Instead of measures to restrict human progress (such as artificially limiting energy choice) we should be supporting efforts to further it.
Ausubel’s essay is packed with interesting nuggets of information—a comparison of amount of corn fed to people vs. that fed to cars, mpg of farm animals, peak demand of materials, etc.—some of which may be new to even ardent followers of human progress. Here is the article’s teaser:
Despite predictions of runaway ecological destruction, beginning in the 1970s, Americans began to consume less and tread more lightly on the planet. Over the past several decades, through technological innovation, Americans now grow more food on less acres, eat more sources of meat that are less land‐intrusive, and used water more efficiently so that water use is lower than in 1970. The result: lands that were once used for farms and logging operations are now returning as forests and grasslands, along with wildlife, such as the return of humpback whales off the shores of New York City. As Jesse Ausubel elucidates in a new essay for Breakthrough Journal, as humans depend less on nature for the well‐being, the more nature they have returned.
Ausubel’s full article is really well‐worth a detailed look.