The Case For Conservation

Hardly any person in America, or the world for that matter, would argue that they lack concern for the environment. Decisions that we make regarding environmental policy can have adverse effects on our planet at many levels. Much like political parties, environmental thinkers and scientists associate with particular belief systems and methods of analyzation. According to Peter Huber, author of Hard Green, there are two primary groups of environmentalists, conservationists and micro-environmentalists. Conservationists recognize that not every environmental problem can be solved through human intervention. They believe that one of the keys to protecting the environment is to restrict human use of selected lands. A primary example of this would be our national parks and forests. In short, "the whole point of conservation, one might say, is to be economically inefficient and unproductive, to retard conventional economic progress, not promote it, and to do so in well designated places set aside for that specific objective" (Huber XXIV). Micro-environmentalism, on the other hand, is concerned with an infinite number of factors that could lead to environmental destruction or chaos. These issues are typically discovered (or invented) by using computer generated models or studies that overlook many factors. Results from these findings has led to implementing policy which has cost not only money, but lives; this is the same kind of destruction and death micro-environmentalism is supposedly trying to prevent. Although the philosophy of conservation ignited the environmentalist movement, micro-environmentalism has become the prevailing school of thought; it must be stopped at all costs.

Surprisingly enough, the environmentalist movement originally began under the direction of conservative president Theodore Roosevelt in the early 1900s (Huber XI). Roosevelt was an avid outdoorsman who, "view[ed] the misuse of natural resources as ‘the fundamental problem which underlies almost every other problem of our national life’" (Huber XIII). During his time in office, Roosevelt was able to conserve millions of acres of pristine wilderness. He did so simply because it was beautiful and in the interest of human enjoyment to protect it. There was no environmental crises at the molecular level, no particular species at risk of extinction, his motivation was simply the aesthetic value of the land. Yet these are the reasons that are now supposed to motivate us to take action to save the environment from imminent destruction.

Micro-environmentalists focus on one particular occurrence, species, or pollutant at a time. Never do they consider the overall affects of the solutions they offer, nor are the negative consequences of their solutions weighed against the policies already in place. For example, fossil fuels such as coal are regarded as toxic pollutants, so micro-environmentalists demand that cleaner sources of energy be used. Nuclear power is much more efficient than coal, yet it is denounced by nucleo-phobes because it releases radioactive emissions. However, upon closer inspection it has been found that coal releases more radioactive materials into the atmosphere than nuclear power (Huber 20). Other faulty conclusions that have been made by micro-environmentalists have cost millions of lives.

As aforementioned, one area that micro-environmentalism studies is carcinogenic material on a molecular level. DDT, a supposedly carcinogenic insecticide, was banned worldwide in the 1970s for its ability to increase the chances of developing cancer. Janet Raloff, a writer for Science News, explains that what was not taken into account by the activists calling for the ban of DDT was that it would affect the lives of more than 400 million people. "Every day this disease [malaria] claims the lives of 3,000 children under 5" (Raloff 5). DDT was created in the late 1800s, though it was not used until the 1930s as an insect repellant" (Raloff 1). "In many parts of the world this long-lived toxicant remains the best hope for reining in malaria." In Belize, malaria had been effectively eradicated until DDT use was halted. After that, cases of malaria increased again (Raloff 4). Insect resistance to other insecticides has renewed interest in DDT’s use (Raloff 2). Problems with DDT arose from its agricultural implementation. Farmers used it to kill insects that would have otherwise destroyed their crops. A side effect of these actions was drastically increased concentrations of DDT in groundwater and a variety of species. However, Roger Bates explains in his essay, "WHO’s To Blame?" that, "although it was obvious the massive use of DDT in farming, not the small amounts used in public health applications, that caused the environmental problems, the issue of scale was ignored by policy-makers" (Bate 2). Thus, if DDT is implemented in small amounts as a repellant rather than an insecticide it can drastically reduce the number of malaria related deaths while minimizing the possibility of carcinogenic side-effects.

Micro-environmental theories have developed into what is now dogma, rather than science. This dogmatism has led to the inability to expose the truths buried among misstated figures and outright lies told by micro-environmentalist thinkers. Micro-environmentalism tells us that global warming is a result of human actions, that the rainforests are being clear-cut into extinction by the logging industry, and that overpopulation will result in world famine. All of these statements, however, have been proven to be extremely inaccurate. Sadly, they have been falsely presented as scientific fact over the past two decades. The only facts backing up any of these statements have come from computer generated scenarios, scenarios that rely heavily on Malthusian theory.

Thomas Malthus was an 18th century scholar whose most famous work was his "Essay on the Principle of Population." Miguel Santos, micro-environmentalist author of "The Environmental Crisis," uses this essay as primary support for his own theories regarding the supposed emergence of possible famine due to overpopulation. In essence, this essay stated that the global population increased exponentially whereas total food-growth increased geometrically; therefore, man would eventually grow out of his ability to produce enough food (Santos 91). This accusation is heavily flawed for one primary reason, the theory does not take into consideration any human dynamic. For example, Paul Ehrlich based his book The Population Bomb, published in 1968, on Malthusian theory. Ehrlich predicted that, "the battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s and 1980s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now." Fortunately, Ehrlich was dead wrong; "famine has in fact declined sharply around the globe." Why is this so? Because humans have always adapted to adverse situations. Rather than being forced into using an ever increasing amount of land to produce more food, we created fertilizers, pesticides, and genetic engineering to yield a higher rate of food production using less land (Huber 5). The human dynamic is impossible to predict, thus rendering computer generated doomsday models vastly inaccurate and utterly useless in the real world.

Global warming is another so-called environmental crisis that has been hotly debated. Most scientists have come to the consensus that global warming truly does exist, however scientists are still divided on whether or not humans have played a critical role in the rise of the earth’s average temperature. One of the main downfalls of theories regarding global warming based on human intervention is that most of the statements made by its supporters are contradictory. For example, some say the polar ice caps will melt because of the increase in temperature, others believe that they will harden, bringing another ice age. As Steven Hayward of the National Review explains in his January 2005 article, "Cooled Down," "These competing scenarios have some theoretical plausibility, but the inability of the scientific community to assign a probability estimate to either a temperature increase or the effects of such an increase-regionally as well as globally-shows how limited our climate knowledge remains" (Hayward 2).
There is little that scientists actually agree upon regarding anything near the realm of fact involving global warming. Much of what is known has come from geologic study. It is true that the earth’s increased 1 degree Celsius in the past hundred years, and this is a drastic change. Even a mere degree can effect sea levels and meteorological events. But before anyone starts to link this to human intervention in the normal cycle of our planet, one must first look at geologic history. Earth has gone through warming and cooling phases over the entirety of its existence. During the Jurassic period millions of years ago, the earth was in a warming phase. After dinosaurs were forced into extinction, the earth underwent a period of ice age. "Precisely because the computer climate models are plodding along, unable to deliver the goods, environmentalists latch on to any event as proof that global warming is well under way" (Hayward 2).

It is important to correct this general fallacy of a human pollution correlation to global warming because the actions that have been taken, such as the creation of the Kyoto Treaty, are having negative economic effects not only for our country, but for underdeveloped third-world countries. Many industrialized nations (predominately members of the European Union), have been calling for poor, pre-industrialized nations, to either switch to alternative energy sources and stop using chemical agents deemed as pollutants or face the possibility of being denied of billions in foreign aid. This threat will not solve anything; moreover, the thinking involved is completely backwards.

Economic sanctions are counterproductive to improving air and water quality in developing nations. If foreign aid is taken away from these countries, it will be nearly impossible for any of them to ever make steps toward cleaning up their act for two reasons. First, they will lose the capital needed to install pollution filters on smokestacks, build nuclear or hydroelectric power plants, build water treatment facilities, and buy better farm equipment to utilize their land more efficiently. Second, the inefficiency of stricter environmental regulations too fast will lead to economic collapse due to lower productivity rates in impoverished nations. For example, in his book, "Trashing The Economy," Ron Arnold explains that "this stupendous reallocation of resources [...] reduced our Gross Domestic Product by 5.8%" (Arnold 8). Although America is wealthy enough to withstand such a mighty blow to the economy, most underdeveloped countries cannot.

Perhaps one of the saddest examples of American micro-environmentalist influence has been its ability to destroy the exports and increase unemployment in developing countries. One group of micro-environmentalists, The Rain Forest Action Network, has "proudly destroyed $35 million dollars worth of desperately needed exports from Central American economies and bankrupted dozens of responsible, well managed ranches in Guatamala and Costa Rica." In 1987, RFAN launched a boycott against Burger King because the cheap beef it was importing from Central America was responsible for the clear-cutting of rain forests so cattle could graze. Burger King lost over 10% of its average sales that year, forcing it to cancel beef contracts with Central American countries. "Thirty-five million bucks had supported thousands of jobs in poor developing countries." Even worse, "the slash-and-burn economy culture of poverty-stricken villagers who do clear-cut rain forests to make room for their scrawny cattle was untouched by the boycott" (Arnold 587). Nothing had been accomplished.

In order to implement safe and effective environmental policy, all the dynamics of issues must be addressed. Micro-environmentalism, the prevailing environmental movement today, does not allow for this to happen. Though apparently trying to prevent it, environmentalist thought today is taking the human race on a dangerous race for disaster not only environmentally, but economically. The implementation of micro-environmentalist policy has led to a continuance of poverty in developing nations, the survival of malaria in Africa and South America, and inefficient methods of conservation such as recycling that use more resources than they save. Conservation is the key to successful environmental policy. Environmental protection should be looked at from an aesthetic standpoint rather than a moral or ethical one. There is no need to argue over specific details regarding the safety of one species or danger of one carcinogenic molecule within an environment. Such details only cloud over the overall goal of environmental protection and allow unneeded bureaucracies to take control, thus doing more harm than good. To put it simply, "Life is a fascinatingly complex good that requires no further justification. We conserve because it is there and because we find it magnificent– today" (Huber XXI). Conservation prevents degradation, micro-environmentalism does not.

~ Rich