I continue to work on a project to understand the variation in behavior in living organisms to the presence and absence of resources and how a changing environment influences interactions between and among organisms and groups of organisms.
I am trying to gather information from the natural world to explore evidence of the same instinctive process in man. I started with the research of Peter and Rosemary Grant on the Galapagos Islands that clearly showed how extremes in environmental conditions influenced behavior. It described how the size of the finch’s beak and the availability of certain sized seeds influenced the survivability of some finches over others in drought conditions. Their study showed that extreme conditions can influence the survivability of the organism, but those with an adaptive advantage, such as the size of their beak have a greater chance of surviving. Even sex was a variable in survivability in some conditions. But if drought was sustained over longer and longer periods, it would threaten the existence of the species….even those who are favored by genetics and other factors. If lush conditions were sustained over long periods, it would lead to unrestrained chaos of the natural social order. It appears there may be an ideal position when it comes to resources…..enough to maintain survival but not so much to compromise the orderliness of social relationships. That balance is impossible to maintain in nature.
There is an interesting book called Enough is Enough written by Rob Dietz and Dan O’Neill. They talk of building an economy that is sustainable in a world of limited resources. They explain that a growth economy is not sustainable given its cost in terms of energy, environmental resources, waste and destruction to the planet. They talk of a steady state economy based on need or growth balanced by the cost to the environment in terms of carbon imprint. They go on to talk of how this could be implemented. As fascinating as this is and for sure it is a possible option, it does not take into account the fact that man is an instinctive organism guided by an emotional system. Hence, any remedy to our many environmental problems must take into account who man is.
I plan to study the research of Sandra Veherencamp (? Sp) as suggested by Stephanie. I recall reading some of her work long ago and believe it could shed some light on this process. I also want to review the work of others and would welcome suggestions. The overuse of available resources seems to be instinctive in man and other organisms.
I just finished reading Oil and Honey by Bill McKibben, an environmental activist. Here are a few statistics that got my attention. In 2008, NASA scientist James Hansen and his team published a paper stating that, “ If the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere rose above 350 parts per million, we couldn’t have a planet similar to the one on which civilization developed and to which life on earth is adapted.” In 2013 “we were closing in on 400 parts per million,” thereby fueling Arctic melting. In 2011, Jim Hansen published another paper noting that we were in fact running out of easy-to-tap crude oil, but there was a new category emerging. This was “unconventional oil,” and in particular the tar sands of Canada, which contained huge amounts of carbon. Those Albertan tar sands, says Jim Hansen, “are so gigantic that if we burned them in addition to everything else we are burning, it would be “game over for the climate.”(p.15). The Keystone XL pipeline was designed to carry almost a million barrels a day of that tar sands oil from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico. Native leaders in Canada had been fighting tar sands mining for years because it had wrecked their land. Jim Hansen continues, “If we have any chance to get back to a stable climate, coal would have to be phased out by 2030 and unconventional fossil fuels, like tar sands, must be left in the ground.” P. 18
I remember Bowen stating that man’s conflicts with each other had more to do with the drying up of the earth’s resources and the way man was responding to this (not an exact quote) than it had to do with the issues they were fighting about.
So this might say that the disturbances in man’s relationship with each other is deeply embedded in his relationship with planet earth and all its bounty. A responsible relationship with the earth would then foster a more respectful and cooperative relationship amongst all the inhabitants of the planet.
I thank all of you for your contributions to this writing group…..all of which I have read carefully. It will require more time to reflect on the important material that has been presented.
Ann,
I think this is a topic of great interest and I believe it is very important.
This may be a tangent to what you are trying to sort out but the impact of scarcity and abundance on relationships is something I have observed in my own family. In my extended multigenerational family, which immigrated here from Ukraine and Poland between 1906 and 1918, it has seemed that the families stayed in close proximity while they were financially dependent on cooperation with one another when resources were scarce for them. With affluence came cutoff between the children of the immigrant generation- somewhat like divorce has to be affordable.
There has been an irony about my efforts to bridge the cutoffs in my family effort- it’s been costly and not necessarily the kind of investment or consumption my family respects as affluence and its symbols roughly equals status. Except, actually, it’s turning out that with viable connections made through my efforts, the family system has become a more complex network with some cooperative relationships forming in the next generation. I do feel increasing respect as this occurs and room for the unconventional has increased in the family. I think this has to do with something about the constructive potential of transcending the instinctive responses to abundance.
Ann, I am so appreciative of your ongoing efforts to think about mankind’s relationship to the natural environment. I learn a lot every time I encounter your thinking. As I was reading your piece, I was thinking about emotional blindness and the inability to see the consequences of our impact on the environment or alternatives ways of being. I work with the offshore wind sector see the barriers (well funded by fossil fuel interests) its advocates encounter in offering a different solution to the country’s energy needs. Offshore wind presents challenges to be sure, but as with any other hot issue, the conversation tends to polarize. The only notion that seems to soften resistance relates, ironically, to economic development and jobs.