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Topic 1.1 : Environmental value systems

Value
- Value = The importance, worth, or usefulness of something
- Types of value:
- Economic: Provides money, strengthens the economy
- Ecological: Provides resources, and services for living things in nature
- Social: Provides services for human societies
- Cultural: Provides symbolic meaning for a society
- Aesthetic: Provides beauty
- Intrinsic value: Something has value “for its own sake” outside of what it can provide you
- Does nature have intrinsic value?

History of the environmental movement

- Post-industrial revolution: Negative impact of human behavior on nature begins to be
examined
- Significant influences on Environmental Movement:
- Literature:
- Walden by H.D Thoreau (1854) - Humans relation to nature
- Nature by R.W Emerson (1836) - Human's relation to nature
- Silent Spring by Rachel Carson (1962) - Dangers of pesticides
- Media:
- An inconvenient truth by Al Gore (2006) - Documentary educating about
global warming
- Twitter of activist like Greta Thunberg
- Major environmental disaster:
- Great London smog (1952)
- Love Canal (1970s) - Site of toxic dumping cause major health effects
- Chernobyl (1986) and Fukushima (2011) - nuclear accidents
- Bhopa (1984) - Chemical accident
- International agreements:
- Rio earth summit (1992) - Climate change
- Kyoto Protocol (1977) - Climate change
- Montreal Protocol (1987) - Ozone layer protection
- Paris Agreement (2015) - Climate change
- Technological advances:
- Green revolution - Increased crop yields and agricultural production
- Climate engineering - Carbon dioxide removal, solar radiation management
Environmental value systems

-
- EVS: Your perspective on how to interact with and use nature
- EVS spectrum:
- Ecocentric (nature-centered)
- Puts nature as central to humanity
- Minimal materialism
- Self-sufficing societies
- Prioritizes bio rights
- Importance of education
- Encouarages self restrain
- Holistic worldview
- Anthropocentric (human-centric)
- Focus on sustainable management of the environment
- Requires regulation by authorities
- Uses taxes, legislation, and incentives
- Debate is encouraged
- Techocentric (technology-centered)
- Tech can provide solutions to environmental problems
- Optimistic view
- Scientific research is encouraged
- Pro-growth agenda demand is necessary for societal improvement
- Extreme ecocentric = Deep ecologist:
- A spiritual revolution is necessary, with nature at the center, equal rights for
all species
- Extreme technocentric = Cornucopian:
- New resources + technologies will solve any environmental problems in the
future

Experimental design
- Variables:
- Independent: Manipulated variable ; cause
- Dependent variable: Measured as a result; effect
- Controlled: All variables kept the same between groups
- Research Question: To what extent does (IV) affect (DV)?
- 5 groups of IV x 5 trials of each group = 25 total trials