I’ve been long interested in environmental issues, but I wouldn’t realize how serious it is until I took this class.
We watched a lot of documentaries during this class and learned the global problem and the following solutions. My mood in this class was constantly shifting as I was dreadful about the future and, at the same time, hopeful of some of the new efforts human beings made.
I was constantly trying to find the root problem of the environmental issues, and it was hard. I used to think maybe burning fuel, or all kinds of resource waste are the fundamental problem of the devastation of the earth. But soon I realized that the problem is awareness or education. People are so ignorant. If we look at some major problems today, they are not only caused by modern human beings but our ancestors. They burned forests to grow crops, they overgrazed everything on land, and they never used the soil in a sustainable way. They are responsible for a bunch of desertification worldwide.
The problem never is a particular event, but the ignorance itself. Pathetically, those tragedies still happen today. For example, the tragedy of commons, which is responsible for a series of events like overfishing, overgrazing, and air pollution. People chase for money by any means necessary, the mono-agriculture ruined countless lands on earth and pushed California to the edge of drought. Sometimes it is hard to believe how much harm human beings can do to their surroundings.
Awareness is the key. With the agreement in Paris, the world first reached a consensus on environmental issues and started to treat them. New techniques like electric cars and green power like wind, solar, and water are saving the earth. There is still hope if we can raise and spread awareness to the world and gather all people to work together to save our planet.
Years taken: 2022