SUSTAINABILITY

• How would you define sustainability?

• Now that you have brainstormed what you think sustainability means. Create a list of the ways the area where you live tries to be sustainable.

• Put into simple terms, sustainability is:

• “the ability to sustain” or, put another way, “the capacity to endure.”

Sustainability:

• Everything that we need for our survival and well-being depends, either directly or indirectly, on our natural environment. 

• Sustainability creates and maintains the conditions under which humans and nature can exist in productive harmony, that permit fulfilling the social, economic and other requirements of present and future generations.

• Sustainability means more than recycling, planting trees, or driving less.

• Sustainability encompasses 3 pillars, or spheres: the ecological, the social, and the economic.

• It is a model that looks at all areas of life, the natural and the man made, and recognizes that you can’t look at any one of these without considering the others.

• Sustainability, and sustainable development, is about developing an ecologically aware, socially just, and economically responsible society.

• Should we continue to clear cut forest for the sake of human consumption?

• Why should we continue to propagate our species, and life itself?

• Should we continue to make gasoline powered vehicles?

• What environmental obligations do we need to keep for future generations?

• Is it right for humans to knowingly cause the extinction of a species for the convenience of humanity?

• How should we best use and conserve the space of our environment to secure and expand life?

• These are ethical decisions that human beings may make with respect to the environment.

4 Main Ethics:

• Economic

• Preservationist

• Balanced Multiple-Use

• Ecology

Economic Ethic:

• They think that the resources on Earth should be exploited in order to make money.

• They are profit driven. Thinking about making money now, and don’t think about how it may effect future generations down the road.

• Profit and employment are important factors.

• Technology will be developed to help replace non-renewable resources.

Preservationist Ethic:

• Believe that resources can be used but only to a limited amount.

• There should also be large areas of wilderness preserved and left untouched.

Balanced Multiple-Use Ethic:

• Ideas follow closest to sustainability principles.

• It dictates that land can be used for a variety of economic and recreational purposes, and the resources are to be used in a way that does not deplete them for future generations.

Ecological Ethic:

• Nature should be left to manage the biosphere.

• Human resource consumption should be so small in quantities that the ecosystem will be able to self-renew (Example: Selected logging using machine-equipped helicopters)