How did this become a political issue? Can’t both parties agree that we need clean air, clean water, and stable temperatures? And it’s not a matter of Democrat vs. Republican. There have been Democrats that voted against a carbon tax and there was a Republican president (Ronald Reagan) who fixed the ozone layer.

Ultimately, this is not a matter of politics, it’s a matter of science. And it’s a pretty darn important one. Because of that, we will have a guest speaker visiting tomorrow from Brown University, one of the top schools in the country. He has a Ph.D. in climatology, and is an expert in global warming. We will get to hear his presentations and then ask him our questions. I ask you to come to class tomorrow with a sharp and open mind. The truth about global warming could change the course of history.

Adapted from Garrett Hardin’s 1968 article published in “Nature.”

Planet Earth gives us everything we need. Food. Water. Space to live. Comfortable temperatures. But on a limited planet, as human population goes up, the amount of resources available to each person goes down. Our world can only support a certain number of people; therefore, the human population will eventually need to stop growing. And when this occurs, what will the situation be for mankind? Specifically, can Bentham’s goal of “the greatest good for the greatest number” be realized?

The answer is “no.” The reason comes directly from scientific fact. To live, any organism must have a source of food. This food serves two purposes. The first is keeping you alive. To simply keep the heart pumping, humans require about 1600 Calories per day. For anything past that, they need extra food. Some people use these extra calories to go to work; others go to school. But these “extra calories” are also required for all forms of enjoyment, from swimming and automobile racing to playing music and writing poetry. So if our goal is to maximize the human population it is obvious what we must do: We must limit these “extra calories” so that there is more food available for others. No gourmet meals, no vacations, no sports, no music, no literature, no art… I think that everyone will grant that maximizing population does not achieve Bentham’s goal.

The ideal population is, then, less than the maximum. The human population must be kept under certain limits. And yet, there are 7,000,000,000 humans on Earth. By 2050, there are expected to be over 9,600,000,000 of us. So how is it that we can all agree on what needs to be done, and do almost nothing about it? How can we fail so miserably at protecting our planet, our one source of food, our one and only home?

The Tragedy of the Commons:
An answer can be found in a little-known pamphlet written in 1833 by a mathematician named William Forster Lloyd. We now call it “The Tragedy of the Commons.” And we use the word “tragedy” as philosophers use it: “A somber theme carried to a tragic or disastrous conclusion.”

The Tragedy of the Commons develops in this way. Picture a pasture that is shared by an entire village. Each day, the village farmers bring their cattle to the common area, so that the cows can eat. Some farmers are only able to afford one cow; others might bring five. Either way, in a large pasture, there is plenty of grass to go around. Such an arrangement could work well for hundreds of years if the number of cows was kept relatively low.

But, as a rational human being, each farmer will seek to maximize his gain and to feed as many cows as possible. He will ask himself “What are the consequences of me of adding one more cow to my herd?” And of course, there is one positive result and one negative result.

1. The positive result is that the farmer gets to support one more animal, which he
   can either sell, or eat, or use for milk.
2. The negative result is the overgrazing created by one more animal. Another animal means a bit less grass for all the others. But this negative effect doesn’t go directly to the farmer; it is shared by the entire village. If the grassland is destroyed, the whole village will be affected.

When he considers both sides, the rational farmer concludes that the only sensible course for him to pursue is to add another cow to his herd. For him, the benefits outweigh the costs. So he adds another, and another, and another…

Unfortunately this is the same conclusion reached by every farmer sharing the commons. And therein lies tragedy. Each man is locked into a system that encourages him to increase his herd without limit — in a world that is limited.

The logic of the commons has been understood for a long time, perhaps since the invention of private property. But it is understood only in special cases. Even today, cattle farmers in the western ranges demonstrate only a limited understanding; they constantly pressure the government to increase the head count (the amount of cattle they are allowed to own) to the point where overgrazing has ruined many fields and pastures. In a similar way, the oceans of the world continue to suffer from the Tragedy of the Commons. Maritime nations still argue for “the freedom of the seas.” Professing to believe in the “unlimited resources of the oceans,” they bring species after species of fish and whales closer to extinction.

Pollution:
In a reverse way, The Tragedy of the Commons reappears in problems of pollution. Here it is not a question of taking something out of the commons, but of putting something in – sewage or chemicals into water, and poisonous fumes into the air. But the calculations are much the same as before. The rational man finds that it is cheaper to release his pollution into the ocean than it is to clean it up. So the oceans continue to get dirtier and dirtier each year. And since this is true for everyone, we are locked into this system of “fouling our own nest,” so long as we behave only as independent, short-term thinkers.

In the case of cattle overgrazing, The Tragedy of the Commons can be avoided through private property. You use fences to divide the grasslands into sections so that each farmer is affected by his own actions only. But how does one fence off the oceans? And how can we divide up the air?  In such cases, the Tragedy of the Commons must be prevented by different means.

But remember, the pollution problem is a direct consequence of population. It didn’t really matter how a lonely cave man disposed of his waste. “Flowing water purifies itself every 10 miles,” my grandfather used to say, and the myth was essentially true when he was a boy, because there were not so many people. But as cities became more crowded, the natural purification systems of the rivers became overloaded. Today, not one of the major rivers of New York City is safe for fishing or swimming.

The Tragedy of the Commons is involved in our overpopulation problem as well. In a more primitive world, how many children a family had would not be a matter of public concern. Parents who had too many children would leave fewer descendants, not more, because they would be unable to take care of all their children. David Lack and others have observed such effects with the reproduction of birds. But men are not birds. When men overbreed, we look to our neighbors, or to the government for help. Our good nature keeps our population growing.

Mutual Coercion Mutually Agreed Upon:
In order for people to solve such global problems, there must be coercion, or pressure, of some sort. Consider bank-robbing. The man who takes money from a bank acts as if the bank were a commons. But how do we prevent such action? Certainly not by trying to appeal to the robber’s sense of responsibility. Instead, we make laws.

The morality of bank-robbing is easy to understand because we can all see the negative effects of such an action. We are willing to say “Thou shalt not rob banks,” without exception. But such restraint can also be created by other means, through something like taxes. To keep downtown shoppers restrained in their use of parking spaces we introduced parking meters for short periods, and traffic fines for longer ones.

To say that we mutually agree to coercion is not to say that we are required to enjoy it, or even to pretend we enjoy it. Who enjoys taxes? We all grumble about them. But we accept taxes because we recognize all the good that they do too. Taxes pay for our roads, for our schools, for our police, and our firemen. In a way, we pay these taxes to escape the Tragedy of the Commons.

Recognition of Necessity:
Perhaps the simplest summary of man’s problems is this: our commons (whether they be grasslands, rivers, the air, or the ocean) can be shared only under conditions of low-population. And as the human population has increased, these commons have had to be abandoned in one case after another.

First we abandoned the commons in food gathering, enclosing farm land and restricting hunting and fishing areas. Later we saw that the commons as a place for waste disposal would also have to be abandoned. Limits on the disposal of sewage are widely accepted in the Western world; we are still struggling today to close the commons to pollution by automobiles, factories, pesticide sprayers, and nuclear power plants.

Every new restriction of the commons involves the sacrifice of someone’s personal liberty. Sacrifices made in the distant past are accepted because we are used to them; no one complains about not being able to rob a bank. It is the newly-proposed laws that we vigorously oppose. Cries of “violated rights” and “freedom” fill the air. But what does “freedom” mean? When men mutually agreed to pass laws against bank robbing, we became more free, not less so.

And yet we hesitate to limit the amount of cattle that farmers are allowed to own. We hesitate to prevent the clearing of Earth’s forests. We hesitate to police the fishing of the oceans. And the lesson we must now recognize, is the necessity of abandoning the commons in breeding. No technical solution can rescue us from the misery of overpopulation. Freedom to breed will bring ruin to all. It is painful to admit. Saying this, one feels as uncomfortable as a resident of Salem, Massachusetts, who denied the existence of witches in the 17th century. But in both cases, we speak the truth.

The only way we can preserve and nurture other, more precious freedoms is by giving up the freedom to overbreed, and that very soon. “Freedom is the recognition of necessity,” Hegel said — and it is the role of science and of education to reveal the necessity of abandoning these freedoms. And it will be the role of teamwork, people working together, to make it so. Only then can we put an end to The Tragedy of the Commons.

April 27 – The Tragedy of the Commons (pg702)

Tonight’s HW is to read a New York Times article that is related to the
topics of over-fishing and the Tragedy of the Commons. It is rather long,
but be sure to read the entire thing. Click here to access the article.

Today in class, students took part in The Candy Fishing Lab. The goal was simple: survive until the end of the game so you get to eat your candy. But accomplishing that goal was not so simple.

Each round students would walk up to their group’s “fish pond” and take a few “fish” (candy). What they didn’t know was that their pond worked just like one in nature; the more fish they took, the fewer were left behind to reproduce. On the first attempt, most groups fished their ponds to extinction. No fish for you!

However, after they were educated about how the fish reproduce, most groups got it right the second time around. Taking just one fish each day, students were able to survive while allowing the fish in their pond to repopulate. Needless to say, there were a lot more smiling faces afterward.

The lesson was clear, using resources sustainably requires education and teamwork. This lesson can also be applied to real-world problems like over-fishing, littering, the overuse of antibiotics, and deforestation.

April 26 – Candy Fishing Lab (pg701)

“When are we ever gonna use this stuff?” That’s a common question teachers hear from students. We make you learn Algebra; if you become an engineer you might use it, but you probably won’t. We make you learn chemistry; if you become a doctor you might use it, but you probably won’t. It’s too bad there isn’t some subject we could teach you that you’d all use, one that’s really important for everyone to know about…

There is! It’s called Environmental Science. Over the next seven weeks we’ll be learning the science of the planet we live on, the most important science of all. In particular, we will be focusing on the following five issues:

1. Global Warming
2. Waste & Litter
3. Deforestation
4. Dirty Energy
5. Overpopulation

Today, students examined a group of twenty-five photographs, five photos related to each of the topics above. By sorting them into groups, we were able to come up with a name for each topic and also discuss how each category might be interconnected. Over the course of the next seven weeks, we’ll be studying each of the topics in depth. But first, we’ll be taking a page out of Garrett Hardin’s book (almost literally) and learning about why all of these problems occur. Buckle up. Tomorrow’s lesson is the most important lesson of the year.

Today marked the beginning of April break as well as the end of Unit 6: Evolution. Today in class, students took the Unit 6 Test. From the scores I have seen so far, it looks like everyone did a great job. I wish you all a sunny, happy, relaxing April vacation!

April 15 – Unit 6 Test (pg617)

My apologies for not being in class today, everyone. I had a science department meeting I could not get out of. During class, students worked on their Unit 6 Study Guides. The entire cluster will take the Unit 6 Test tomorrow, during D-period. If you would like to check the answers to your study guide, please click the PDF below.

April 14 – Unit 6 Study Guide (pg616)

Today was the final day of the Of Spice & Men lab, and we finally got to the question we’ve been pondering all along: “Why do we humans like what we like?”

Imagine that there are three families of cave men living together on an island. The first family has a genetic trait that causes them to like the smell of pine bark, so they begin to experiment with grinding it up and sprinkling it on their food. The second family has a trait that causes them to prefer cinnamon bark, so they begin sprinkle it on their food. And the third family prefers their food plain.

Which family would die off first? According to our results, the “pine bark family” would be in rough shape. Pine bark might even promote germ growth, so the family would probably be exposed to several diseases. Cinnamon, on the other hand, kills germs. The “cinnamon family” would have an advantage over the “plain family.” By sprinkling cinnamon on their food, they would actually kill germs, which would make their children healthier, stronger, and less likely to get sick. Over time, the “cinnamon family” would take over the island, perhaps even passing off their cinnamon-loving genes to members of the “plain family.”

That’s evolution, my friend. And that’s the reason we enjoy the tastes of things like cinnamon, mint, and even garlic. They all kill germs! And over the course of thousands of years we have evolved to like their flavor. Just don’t combine all three. That would be one strange muffin.

April 13 – Of Spice and Men (pg614)