Geography

There are 3 main ideas of human-environment interaction:

•  Humans adapt to the environment

•  Humans modify the environment

•  Humans depend on the environment

Every single living thing on this planet is dependent on the environment it lives in. Whether it’s for air, water, food, or shelter, living beings simply cannot survive without some form of interaction.

But for humans, that dependence has grown to a level where someone living in Boston might also be dependent on the environment in Central America for certain foods, or for the minerals mined in China for electronics.

Basically, everything you see around you is entirely dependent on environmental resources that come from thousands of miles away.

There are 3 basic types of regions:

• Formal regions: These are designated by official boundaries, such as cities, states, counties, and countries. For the most part, they are clearly indicated and publicly known.

• Functional regions: These are defined by their connections. For example, the circulation area for a major city area is the functional region of that paper.

• Vernacular regions: These include perceived regions, such as "The South," "The Midwest," or the "Middle East"; they have no formal boundaries but are understood in mental maps of the world.