Humanity and the Environment

Humanity and the Environment

• The presentation discusses the relationship between humanity and the environment.

Defining Environment

• Some people associate the word "environment" with unspoiled nature, far from civilization.
• The environment presupposes the existence of a subject within it, which is the one being surrounded.
• Environment refers to the totality of things, both living and non-living, and the conditions in the surroundings.
• The subject in the environment is man or, to avoid sounding sexist, the human being.
• The most practical reason to study about the environment is its importance to life, especially human life.

Why Study the Environment?

• Such surroundings affect human life, as much as human actions affect them.
• We study about the environment for the same reason George Mallory wanted to summit Mt. Everest: because it's there.
• We study environment to reflect on how our attachment to artificial objects has affected our attitudes and influenced our behavior, to see if our culture aligns with nature.

Humanity's Role in the Environment

• Homo sapiens is a deeply purpose-oriented species.
• Humans act to satisfy needs and wants and use understanding of causation to plan for the future, acting in ways to maximize chances of success.
• The Homo sapiens species has managed to survive challenges and threats.
• Humans are still free to choose and properly using freedom can lead to satisfaction.
• Calculated thinking, motivated by the desire for dominion, transforms nature into a warehouse of resources. Resources continually are cataloged, refined and appropriated to supply humanity's ever-growing demand for convenience and control.
• Meditative thinking contemplates the mystery behind the powerful momentum of the age of modern technology to understand why we live the way we do, seeking to allow nature to unveil itself as our dwelling place.
• Survival of the fittest means fitting into the environment by taking a role, performing some task, contributing to the sustainability of the system.
• Survival of the fittest does not mean competition for domination
• Survival of the fittest means filling an ecological niche.

Evolutionary Context

• Evolution as survival of the fittest means that every living thing has to fit in its environment.
• Humans are products of the same evolutionary process that produced all other species and our bodies are carbon-based like most others.
• All living things, including humans, have DNA consisting of the same chemicals and human DNA is almost 99% identical to that of a chimpanzee, making us relatives with everything else in the biosphere.
• Ancestors survived long enough to reproduce due to their ability to fit in their environment despite heat, cold, diseases, accidents, predators, and scarce resources.

Interconnectedness

• As living things, we are part of the struggle for survival and part of the biotic community.
• To survive, we consume and use resources from the environment.
• The environment is an ever-present reality.
• Everything is connected to everything else.
• The artificial world we live in is part of the greater reality of nature.
• Different things fit together and we are in this together where each one of us can contribute something, for our sake and for the sake of those who will come.
• Throughout our whole lives we are part of nature, not a conqueror but a plain member of the life community. The rest of nature owes us nothing; we owe everything to it.

Relationships in the Environment

• An ecosystem is a complex set of relationships among the living elements of an area.
• Mutualism is when two different organisms interact and both benefit.
• A mutualistic relation exists between people and dogs, where the dog gets free meals and shelter, and the owner gets peace of mind or unconditional loyalty.
• Human beings can have mutualistic relations with other species, like the Boran people of Africa and the honey guide bird.
• Commensalism is a type of relationship between two living organisms in which one organism benefits from the other without harming it.
• Tree frogs use plants as protection, cattle egrets eat the insect stirred up by cattle when they are grazing, and golden jackals trail a tiger to feed on the remains of its kills are examples of commensalism.
• In predation, parasitism & herbivory one benefits at the expense of the other. Benefit flows only in one way.
• The difference between predation and parasitism is that a parasite does not usually kill its host, at least not immediately, in order to feed or reproduce.
• Nietzsche warned that there can be parasitism among people, within the species. The powerless can invent some ideology that enable them to parasitize on the powerful

Impact and Change

• We change our environment, sometimes to our benefit and at other times harm.
• We learn to change our behavior through experiences in the environment.
• We continue to live by taking resources from the environment and find the world without a user's manual.
• We are still free, can choose, can find satisfaction if we properly use our freedom which allows us to realize what works and what not through our experiences and the labors of others, past and present.
• We may not have to change our role as predators, but we can be selective of the species that we prey on. Most wildlife species in the country are either already extinct or seriously endangered. Keystone species have to be preserved.

The Philippine Condition

• The Philippines is located in the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire and is geologically active with volcanoes all around the country.
• The Philippines is in the typhoon belt, experiencing an average of twenty typhoons entering the Philippine Area of Responsibility every year.

The Greenhouse Effect

• Some solar radiation is reflected by Earth and the atmosphere.
• Some radiation is absorbed by the Earth's surface and warms it,
• Infrared radiation is emitted by Earth's surface which then passes through the atmosphere.
• Some infrared radiation is absorbed by greenhouse gasses and re-emitted in all directions by the atmosphere. The effect of this is to warm Earth's surface and the lower atmosphere.

Points to Ponder

• This is a finite world we live in, the resources are limited so how are we going to manage the limited resources for ourselves and for future generations?
• How can we pay for our stay on this planet?
• Do we exist only for ourselves, for the here and now?
• Or are we here for something, someone else?

Call to Action (SDG)

• Make a plan of activities that will replace your screen time.
• Choose activities that will benefit the natural environment.
• Try to faithfully observe the plan you made, make a calendar checklist.
• Take a video of yourself 10 times and submit.
• Include the before and after.

Final Thoughts

• The presentation encourages viewers to consider their relationship with the environment and the impact of their actions.
• We will die, as others did, and our bodies will chemically disintegrate to become the stuff that consists the environment of future generations, together with everything else we throw away as waste.