16.4.05

Nature Entertainment

Katherine Wroth points to the Today show's list of 50 things to do before you die. She points out that 15 of them are nature-related:

watch whales migrate; go whitewater rafting; see wild game on an African safari; dive the Great Barrier Reef; travel the Nile in Egypt; swim with the dolphins; helicopter over a Hawaiian volcano; feed sharks; ride a mule down the Grand Canyon; gaze upon a magnificent waterfall; walk the Inca trail at Machu Picchu; explore the Alaskan wilderness; dive in a submarine; scale a famous peak; explore a rainforest.

What struck me about this list is that they're all entertainment experiences. Nature appears on this list solely as the object of aesthetic appreciation. That's not necessarily unique to nature, as most of the list is entertainment-based -- a bias that is perhaps understandable, given that such experiences are easier to come by (many can be simply purchased) and much easier to put on TV. But where's the nature equivalent of an accomplishment like "write a song or poem for someone you love" or "volunteer overseas" or "say a special thank-you"? Something like "learn organic gardening" might not have the same romantic cachet as the things on Today's list, but it would make you feel good rather than just entertained.
Stentor Danielson, 13:54, ,

15.4.05

Australia's Other

During the heyday of Smokey the Bear, Australia adopted a strong policy in favor of controlled burning. This was not merely a difference of opinion about fire ecology. It was also an attempt by Australia to show that it was different and special, to maintain its identity in the face of the scientific and practical powerhouses of the US and British India. Though fire policies have changed, some of this attitude persists, as seen for example in a recent article in The Age:

The controlled burn that became a bushfire in Wilsons Promontory National Park at the weekend is a case in point. This is a popular, much-loved park. The area had not been affected by wildfire in decades. As in most of the Australian bush, fire is a naturally occurring part of the life cycle in the park - or at least it should be. Yet for decades, fire was largely excluded from the park, as it was deliberately excluded from other areas of public land across Victoria. This policy - slavishly adopted in Australia after the example of European and American land managers - owed more to northern hemisphere forestry practice than to any understanding of the Australian bush and how it is best cared for.

The last quoted sentence is technically true -- fire suppression has been a popular practice in the northern hemisphere, and that example has contributed to its popularity in Australia. Yet there's an implication that fire suppression is an appropriate practice for the northern hemisphere. The problem, according to this author, is not that fire suppression is an accross-the-board mistaken policy, but that it's being foisted on Australia by ethnocentric foreigners who don't understand Australia's unique circumstances.
Stentor Danielson, 00:26, ,

13.4.05

More On Biomass Vs. Fossil Burning

Stephen Pyne's theory of the gradual replacement of biomass burning by fossil fuel burning is historically limited. No matter how optimistic you are, it's undeniable that we're eventually going to run out of fossil fuels. So even granting Pyne's simple developmental model, the fossil fuel burning stage can only be transient. I see three possibilities for what would happen next:

1. A return to biomass burning. This scenario is advocated by eco-anarchist and other radical environmentalisms, who want us to return to the more sustainable practices of non-industrial society. This scenario is also the likely outcome of an eco-catastrophe, as the economic infrastructure neccesary to sustain a fossil-fuel-using economy would be fatally disrupted by extreme environmental collapse.

2. A sort of Hegelian/Marxist synthesis of the two types of burning. Technologies like thermal depolymerization offer the possibility of using biomass as a feedstock for fossil-fuel-burning technologies -- e.g. turning scraps from turkey processing plants into gasoline.

3. A transition to a non-burning economy. This would be perhaps the most radical change, as humanity's tenure on this planet has been defined by burning. Yet ironically it's the vision of the reformists, rather than the radicals, in the environmental movement. The "ecological modernization" school of thought argues that technological advances will be able to solve our environmental problems without requiring radical lifestyle changes. In this vision, a suite of renewable energy sources -- wind, solar, tidal, nuclear -- will replace fossil fuels. Notably, few of these proposals incorporate any sort of burning-based energy source (though sustainably-farmed biomass fuels have been discussed).
Stentor Danielson, 11:50, ,

AAGs, Day Three

This post is extremely late, as I got stuck in a hotel room with no internet, and then got stuck in Denver for an extra two nights due to the blizzard. But now I'm back in the Eastern time zone, so on with the show:

Friday's big event was a talk by Stephen Pyne, the guy writing about the social side of fire management. His talk was decently attended, though I'd expected more (perhaps because I'm too immersed in the fire literature to realize how un-famous he is outside of it). I also think Pyne is coasting a bit on his own famousness. It's been some time since he really bit off a substantial new chunk of conceptual territory. He seems to be circling around through the same ideas, reframing them a bit on each pass. So his AAG paper wasn't anything profoundly new, although he did have some nice graphics for it.

One of the major issues he raised was the relationship between biomass burning and fossil fuel burning. His basic thesis is that development leads the latter to replace the former. He showed a photo of the Earth at night in which you could see Europe lit up with (mostly fossil-fuel powered) electric lights, while Africa was covered in fires. By the end of the session, most people had left, so I was able to talk to him about this issue, specifically to suggest that the relationship between the two types of burning may be somewhat more complex than the simple developmental replacement model he advocated. Specifically, I raised the case of the urban-wildland interface.

The UWI is a site not only of increased vulnerability to biomass burning (wildfires), but also of increased incidence of biomass burning, as roads fragment (and hence dessicate) forests, lawn fertilizer runoff and exotic species increase biomass in "wild" areas, and human activities provide additional ignition sources. Yet the UWI as we know it today (as opposed to the more intensively managed farms and working forests of traditional rural areas) would not be possible without fossil fuel technologies -- in particular cars to drive into the city to work.

Pyne replied that the contemporary UWI was simply a transitional phase. He argued that in the short term, UWI residents would not put up with biomass fires and would turn to fossil-fuel-powered technologies to eliminate it (e.g. gas-powered mowers and wood chippers). In the longer term, the UWI is simply the leading edge of urban growth, so the "wildland" part would in due time be converted to skyscrapers. I wasn't particularly convinced by either claim, although it wasn't until later that I could articulate why.

Pyne's short-term claim seems to be contradicted by the preliminary results of Tam Ubbin's study of Montanans' attitudes toward fire. In commenting from the audience on another paper in this session, she said that her interviewees in the UWI were quite aware of the fire danger, but were willing to accept it as the price of a "natural" landscape. Pyne may be falling into the trap of many fire managers who assume they know what the public values. Or he may just be too optimistic about the likelihood of either developing a management technique that reduces fire danger without aesthetic impacts, or about altering our aesthetic principles.

Pyne's long-term claim seems to buy into a simple developmental model of urban territorial expansions (which was also a major subtext of a session earlier in the day on exurbia, which is what non-fire people call the UWI). Yet I question whether this is likely to occur. In the developed world (where the UWI problem is most salient), population growth is slow, so the "we need more space for houses" pressure is declining. What pressure there is may be in part relieved by gentrification of city centers. Also, the UWI often abuts reserved land (National Parks, National Forests, etc.), creating an irreducible wildland area next to settlement and making it harder for current UWI residents to sell their land to a developer and move further out.
Stentor Danielson, 11:22, ,