Reflective writing part B

Name: Leung Lok Wai

SID: 1155092495
Question 2b

In conclusion, the use of pesticides and herbicides do reflect negative and large issues
about human relationships with Nature itself. There are clear evidence shows that use
of pesticides will cause even more serious diseases like malaria in countries of Third
World (Roland, 1972). Moreover, pesticides and herbicides cannot kill those pests and
herbs by 100% which provide them a chance to grow up immunity against pesticides
then cause an increase of pest numbers as result (Roland, 1962a). In general,
pesticides and herbicides is not effective and cause more serious problems afterwards,
and also interrupted the original nature community (Roland, 1962b).

When we need to make public decisions, it is important to not just focus on scientific
researches and data, but also consider the moral perspective. Take the use of
pesticides as an example, we cannot destroy and dominant the nature community as it
can kill the pests and improve the growth of food. It is important to sustain the
original habitat when we wish to boost the food growth at the same time.

One way to make a decision which can balance both scientific and moral perspective
is to have a fair and neutral committee to judge, like International Whaling
Commission Scientific Committee in the case of tackling whale hunting problems
(WWF, 2015). The importance of having a neutral stance is to ensure the decision is
not affected by related stakeholders like business companies or Environmental
organizations. The neutral committee can base on arguments from each stakeholders
and different data to find a solution which can try to cover concerns of each
stakeholder and achieve a balance between them. Take the smog problem in mainland
China as an example. The smog problem in China have been more and more serious
which highly affects the quality of life and public health of citizens. From a

documentary taken by Chai Ching(柴靜), a Beijing reporter, has revealed that the

environmental department have not been really doing their jobs since the members of
the highest committee are mainly bosses of industrial companies. They denied to
enforce the law to companies that have exceed outputs of industrial gases which
causes the smog, mainly because to cut down the cost of industrial works and protect
the interests of their companies (Chai, 2015). This case shows the negative outcomes
which we do not have a neutral committee to make decisions on environment-related
issues.
There are clear justifications for proving the human community do care about the loss
of the Nature. For example, there are Non-Governmental Organizations care about the
animals like World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), Greenpeace etc. These
organizations do put lots of attention on issues like whale hunting, and they have been
spoke up in venues like the International Whaling Commission (IWC) Scientific
Committee Meeting, and launched campaigns to increase the awareness of whale and
fish hunting from general public, e.g. Oceans campaign by Greenpeace (Greenpeace,
2016). Those campaigns are not just criticizing the problem and the ones who caused
those issues, but they would collect data and try suggest some feasible solutions for
the human future. Take Oceans Campaign from Greenpeace as an example, the
campaign suggests to zone 40% of the ocean as protected area to ban any hunting
activities in those areas, so that marine life can have enough breeding and resting
places for them to recover and ensure the sustainable supply of food resources at the
same time (Greenpeace, 2016).

We can see that how important for us to having a neutral decision-making committee
which can balance different interests. Moreover, there are people who wish make our
world be a better and sustainable place to live along, to plan for a brighter future. It is
important to not just make decisions easily only based on own interests, but also to
care about the Nature community as well.

References

Chai, C. (2015, February 28). Under the Sky(柴靜霧霾調查：穹頂之下). Retrieved

March 18, 2017, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbK4KeD2ajI

Greenpeace. (2016), Oceans Campaign, Retrieved March 18, 2017, from
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/campaigns/oceans/
Roland C. Clement. (1962a), The Failure of Common Sense
Roland C. Clement. (1962b), How Far Can Man Go In “Controlling” Nature?
Roland C. Clement. (1972), The Pesticides Controversy, 2 B.C. Envtl. Aff. L. Rev.
445, http://lawdigitalcommons.bc.edu/ealr/vol2/iss3/1
World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). (2015, May 26). Japan must stop killing whale
science, Retrieved March 18, 2017, from
http://wwf.panda.org/wwf_news/?247351%2FJapan-must-stop-killing-whale-
science