We will be reading two texts by a British biologist, Dave Goulson, who specialises in bee ecology. In many ways his writing echoes Rachel Carson’s ‘Silent Spring’ – his book is entitled ‘Silent Earth’, and one of the chapter we will be reading ‘The Toxic Cocktail’ – and you might want to think about what has happened/changed in the six decades that divide these two texts, perhaps also in the light of the other readings we were discussing recently. In the light of the final chapter of his books, we would also like you to consider what we can do – as individuals, communities, groups/organisations, states, and as an international community – to remedy the ecological harms caused.
The other reading we will explore is a text by environmental historian William Cronon, ‘The Trouble with Wilderness. Or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature’, which has been very influential in thinking about nature conservation and the ways in which we project our ideas (and ideologies) about nature on these processes. This reading also invites us to consider human place in nature, and the ethics of relating to, and forming – and re-forming – the living world.
readings
Dave Goulson. The Garden Jungle: or Gardening to Save the Planet
Chapter 4 – The Toxic Cocktail (63-91)
Chapter 12 – Gardening to Save the Planet (221-258)
Dave Goulson. Silent Earth. Averting the Insect Apocalypse
Chapter 21 – Actions for Everyone (287-301)
William Cronon. The Trouble with Wilderness. Or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature.
In: Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature (69-90)
questions for discussion
If you compare Rachel Carson’s and Dave Goulson’s texts, what does stand out for you? It has been over 60 years that Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring was published – what do you think would be written about these things another 60 years from now?
How do you feel about the ubiquity of pesticides and about how we don’t really know how much we consume, and what they do? Should we research more to find out the effects and carry on using them, or should we just stop their usage? (Just a note, even a compost made from groceries left overs has pesticides/insecticide in it most likely…)
Why do you think that we – as humans – consider ourselves exempted from the flow of toxins through the ecosystems?
Do you think it is plausible to mitigate the usage of herbicides and such through promotion of people growing their own vegetables, pulling slowly agriculture, or at least some of it among the common people? Making it less large scale and hopefully more sustainable with regulation?
Given all we had talked about through this course – how consumerism and mass production is seeping the life out of planet, and large corporations that have became desensitized because of their scale promote the harmful substances, and as a result in a lot of places there is a poor sense of community and people live in ways that leave large carbon footprints – do you feel compelled to start changing your own ways, even in small steps, to battle this problem?
How would you motivate people to grow their own vegetables?
In the last half of the chapter, Goulson explores three argument in favor of pesticide use. The first argument is quite simple and anthropocentric: at the concentrations currently in use, the pesticides are harmless to human health. The second defense is the nature fallacy – natural toxins are just as harmful as synthetic ones, therefore we should not worry about our exposure to synthetic chemicals. Finally, since people are living longer, pesticides cannot be that bad. Would you agree with this line of arguments? Why or why not? What assumptions are these based on? Do you consider them deeply problematic and flawed?
Goulson ends the chapter with a rather bleak outlook on how it is impossible to live our life free of pesticides and insecticides as they are everywhere. No matter how strongly we try to avoid it, some aspects are out of our control. How does this make you feel? Are you angry with the powerful companies that allow their product to penetrate our soil, water, and air, and enter our bodies? Is there anything we can do about it?
Since the spraying that is supposed to eliminate Zika virus is not effective and according to the author it is just a gesture that the authorities are taking care of their citizens, do you have any other example on such a situation on your mind?
Tying it back to the experience at the farm, glyphosate was mentioned. We talked about how toxic the chemical is, but we were also made aware of the difficulties of banning it due to the alternative reality of using more varieties of chemicals to combat the same issue. Linking it back to other readings that we have done in class, perhaps, we should not limit our farming practices to the dualistic, black and white thinking that we trap ourselves in. Perhaps it is okay to have a garden with aphids and Japanese beetles, perhaps it is okay for the fields to look a bit unkempt. Perhaps it is time to understand that we share this Earth with several other species that feel and live the same way we do. What are your thoughts on this?
A lot of the assumptions in the regulation of potentially toxic chemical rests on the premise that humans are not affected by these in the same way as those organisms that are directly targeted. We now nevertheless know that we are hosts to trillions of other organisms that are essential for our health, i.e. the microbes that reside in our intestines and on our skin (holobiont), some of which share the biochemical pathways targeted by the pesticides/heribicides/insectides. Do you think a different understanding of who we are as humans might lead us to a stricter regulation?
How has the landscape of the place you come from changed in the past century? How would you like to change it in the future?
Do you consider humans to be part of ‘nature’? Why or why not? (Eg. the Oxford English Dictionary defines nature as ‘The phenomena of the physical world collectively; esp. plants, animals, and other features and products of the earth itself, as opposed to humans or human creations.’ See the campaign ‘We are Nature‘ that is advocating to change this definition to include humans).
We have discussed previously the romanticism and the ‘worshiping’ of nature as a response to industrialization and urbanization. What are the dangers of opposing the ‘nature’ and ‘culture’?
What is William Cronon’s argument about the wilderness as a human construct? What are the social implications of trying to keep the ‘wilderness’ and ‘civilization’ separate?
Can you provide examples of the current versions of the romanticization of nature?
William Cronon writes about the ethical implications of the distinction between humans and nature: “one of my own most important environmental ethics is that people should always be conscious that they are part of the natural world, inextricably tied to the ecological systems that sustain their lives. Any way of looking at nature that encourages us to believe we are separate from nature—as wilderness tends to do—is likely to reinforce environmentally irresponsible behavior. On the other hand, I also think it no less crucial for us to recognize and honor nonhuman nature as a world we did not create, a world with its own independent, nonhuman reasons for being as it is. The autonomy of nonhuman nature seems to me an indispensable corrective to human arrogance. Any way of looking at nature that helps us remember—as wilderness also tends to do—that the interests of people are not necessarily identical to those of every other creature or of the earth itself is likely to foster responsible behavior.” What are your thoughts on this? What would it mean in practice, in everyday life?
William Cronon writes about the necessity to relate to the place we inhabit as a ‘home’, as a place for which we take responsibility, which we care for. What are the ways which you can make this true in relationship to the place where you live?
additional resources
Interview with Laura J. Martin. Reversing biodiversity loss requires ecological restoration. Mongabay podcast (audio)
Laura J. Martin. Wild by Design. The Rise of Ecological Restoration (book)
Christof Mauch. Slow Hope. Rethinking Ecologies of Crisis and Fear (text)
Ben Rawlence. Treeline. The Last Forest and the Future of Life on Earth (book)
Fred Pearce. A Trillion Trees: How We Can Reforest Our World (book)
Daniel Christian Wahl. Designing Regenerative Cultures (book)
Arturo Escobar. Designs for the Pluriverse. Radical Interdependence, Autonomy, and the Making of Worlds (book)
David R Montgomery, Anne Biklé. What Your Food Ate. How to Restore Our Land and Reclaim Our Health (book)