Stefanie Penn Spear
In my line of work it’s easy to harp on what’s wrong. Problems with our water, air, food and land are vast. It seems two steps forward is always followed by ten steps back. We’re constantly fighting for protection of natural resources and trying to show that we can live in harmony with nature instead of destroying it.
Yesterday, as I was reading Janine M. Benyus‘s book Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature, I was reminded of the work of scientist Dr. David Suzuki and the film I’ve been wanting to see, Force of Nature. So I downloaded the movie, and, as I anticipated, I was awe-inspired by Suzuki’s life’s work and his ability to inform others on the importance of respecting the natural world and preserving what’s vital to our survival.
Force of Nature weaves together scenes from the places and events that shaped Suzuki’s life with a filming of his Last Lecture, which he describes as “a distillation of my life and thoughts, my legacy, what I want to say before I die.”
Early in the film Suzuki says, “The human relationship with the planet has transmogrified. We have become a force like no other species in the 3.8 billion years that life has existed on Earth and the accession to this position of power has happened with explosive speed.”
He describes exponential growth which has resulted in the human population exceeding seven billion and “as the most numerous mammal on the planet, we now have a very heavy ecological footprint. It takes a lot of land, air and water to support us and keep us alive.”
He discusses how a global economy exploits the planet’s natural resources to keep up with ever-expanding consumer demand. Humans are “single-handedly altering the biological, physical and chemical features of the planet in a mere instant of cosmic time.”
In reference to the urgent challenge of climate change, he says, “Human activity has become so great that our profligate use of fossil fuels is altering the chemistry of the atmosphere with potentially catastrophic effects for all of humankind.”
I could continue detailing the important facts Suzuki outlines in his Last Lecture, including how forests are vital to stabilizing our weather and how in less than a century 80 percent of the forests have been fragmented and lost. But, I’ll leave the rest of Suzuki’s insights for you to hear when you get the chance to watch the film.
Ultimately, one of our biggest mistakes is the rush to exploit resources without regard for the consequences or the long-term costs. What takes nature billions of years to create can be destroyed in just minutes with heavy machinery.
As I continue to read Benyus’s Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature, and Michael E. Porter and Mark R. Kramer’s Harvard Business Review article, Creating Shared Value,—prerequisite reading material to be part of the Great Lakes Biomimicry Collaborative, a new economic development strategy for Northeast Ohio—I have hope for the future.
Hope that we can restructure our economy by embracing a biocentric viewpoint that values our natural resources and considers the lasting impacts of our actions.
Suzuki says it best: “I believe that we are capable of even greater things—to rediscover our home, to find ways to live in balance with the sacred elements, and to create a future rich in joy, happiness and meaning that are our real wealth … All it takes is the imagination to dream it and the will to make the dream reality.”
I’ve been saying this stuff and much more for over forty years. Nice to see that scientists are finally catching on to the obvious.
I believe the message would work better if expressed in mathematical terms. That way the bean counters of the world could also get clued in.
Deaths due to air pollution have been escalating at a fierce pace. So I charted it for Ontario starting with figures from 1999 and sent the chart to the Ministry of the Environment. After that (2009) the Federal Government took the collection duties away from the Ontario Health Association and gave it to the Canadian Health Association then terminated the funding to the Canadian Health Association that was to pay for the collection of the data. So now there is no way to track atmospheric pollution impact in our population centres.
Data collect is done in other centres but nowhere with anything like the huge pollution issues unique to Ontario.
IT’S ALL ABOUT MONEY. ITS ALWAYS ABOUT MONEY. MONEY IS ALL ITS EVER BEEN ABOUT. THE ENVIRONMENT??? FUUUGHEDDABOUDDIT. UNLESS THERE IS MONEY TO BE MADE. PEOPLE ARE HERE FOR ABOUT 80 YEARS AND WANT TO GET AS MUCH AS THEY CAN GET OUT OF THOSE YEARS. WHAT DO THEY CARE ABOUT 1,000 YEARS HENCE?????
Imagine being asked by a child many years from now- “Didn’t you know?”
“Yes, we were told.”
“So, why didn’t you do anything?”
“Well, some people claimed not to believe it.”
“Really?”
“Yes, and those of us who did believe it, felt helpless to do anything about it.”
“You should have at least tried. You should have at least tried.”
It seems like you would favor a resource based economy as outlined by The Zeitgeist Movement.
Those of us who have known for years and those of us who care so much now must learn to enroll our fellow humans in making this change away from fossil fuels. We humans are like water running over the stones in the river, each one with our own voice and experience, but we are all the same stream. We all bear personal responsibility for the behavior of our species.
Fuel is a convenience, water and air is a necessity.
Check out a film called “The Age of Stupid”.