AndersonGoFixItPost

Clockwise from top left: [|modern representation of human evolution], [|how human evolution has often been portrayed], [|group of indigenous people], [|Walmart shelves (symbol of American economy to at least my mind)], [|modern city (Los Angeles)], [|economic growth (Morocco)]


 * The Notion of Progress**

Many people believe that the world will just get better. Traditional economists believe that the economy will continue growing, and that such growth is the sign of a healthy economy. [//Mind Over Money//] Humans are a pinnacle species that evolved to be better than the rest. The traditional image of human evolution, the top right image in the collage above, shows the gradual progression from an ape-like creature (which is considered more primitive and behind) into a straight, tall human being. More recent history, too, is a story of everlasting and constant growth and development.

This [|World Bank] image shows that America’s GDP (gross domestic product) has continued growing since 1960, with a small dip around 2008. Can America’s economy keep growing indefinitely? [|Some people] in the business and finance world are realizing that this is not the case, especially since the world is likely to have hit peak oil soon or has already. Other limits to the resources available exist. We have to get out of this mindset that our economy will keep growing if we continue destroying the environment. One example of a resource that is being destroyed at a rapid pace is tropical rainforest in the Amazon—“During the past 40 years, close to 20 percent of the Amazon rain forest has been cut down—more than in all the previous 450 years since European colonization began.” [Wallace] Deforestation may be done for wood or for land to grow crops, two resources much needed by the growing human population. When statistics like the rate of deforestation are looked visualized in more stark terms, the problems with never-ending growth are easy to see: even if that rate of deforestation stayed constant, the rest of the Amazon rainforest would be gone before 2170.


 * Go Fix It!**

Usually, children are taught history starting with the Egyptians and other such “ancient” civilizations. Anything before that is brushed over and not considered important. However, to understand history itself, it is important to realize that not everything happens with an end goal in mind. The goal of evolution was not to produce humans; there were no goals at all, just individuals and species competing to survive and pass their genes on to the next generation. [Tudge] Like the image on the top left, human evolution was complex and nonlinear.

My intervention would require history to be taught realizing that “prehistory” was not a slow but steady progress towards agriculture and civilization. Instead, real people lived and made their lives from what was around them and the tools at hand. While it is true that a lot of advancements have been made throughout the last century and millennium, they have not been made with a specific goal in mind, just people trying to come up with something to help themselves live a better life or just survive in harsh conditions. Those of us who live in the “civilized” world are no necessarily better than those who currently don’t or who lived before what we call “civilization” started. This could follow into a corollary idea that the economy and our standard of living cannot realistically continue growing. Throughout much of history, people have not had the advantages that many Americans do today. It is important for everyone to understand this.

Some people would likely be shocked by these ideas, which would change how they viewed the world. Others would feel insulted at the idea that the evolution of humans, and what we are and how we live today is the result of chance events, instead of a show of human ingenuity and superiority. Stakeholders in this problem and its solution include economists and others in the business world, people who have difficulty believing in evolution and the very idea that humans are not some special beings meant to rule the world, and many others.

I’m not saying that we have to go back to a Stone Age lifestyle (and note that of course there were many different groups of peoples and lifestyles at that time). All I’m trying to get across is that we need to realize that ever-constant progress is a myth. If more people can realize that, and make changes to their lifestyles and mindsets, then hopefully many environmental problems can be solved, including deforestation.


 * References**

The Gold Report. //Chris Martenson: Peak Oil Could Limit Economic Growth//. Internet. (Oct. 31, 2011). Available: []. Accessed: December 2011.

//Mind Over Money.// Dir. Malcolm Clark. PBS, 2010. []

Romer, Paul M. //Economic Growth//. Internet. Available: []. Accessed: December 2011.

Tudge, Colin. //The Time Before History: 5 Million Years of Human Impact//. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1996.

Wallace, Scott. "Farming the Amazon"//.// //National Geographic:// []. Accessed: December 2011.

World Bank. //Gross Domestic Product.// Internet. (Nov. 1, 2011). Available: []. Accessed: December 2011.


 * Article Annotations**


 * Article Annotation 1**

Romer, Paul M. //Economic Growth//. Internet. Available:  []. Accessed: December 2011.
 * 1. Full citation. **

The author teaches at Stanford University. He has written other articles about economics. Besides teaching at other colleges before Stanford, Romer has won the Recktenwald Prize in Economics.
 * 2. Where does the author work, what else has s/he written about, and what are her/his credentials? **

The article explains economic growth, as viewed traditionally.
 * 3. What is the main topic or argument of the text? **

First, Romer explains exponential growth and why that is important. Then, he states how economic growth occurs. He also discusses developing and developed countries, and how their economic goals differ. He concludes with some history about the economy and economic growth.
 * 4. Describe at least three ways that the main topic or argument is fleshed out. **

“For a nation, the choices that determine whether income doubles with every generation, or instead with every other generation, dwarf all other economic policy concerns.” (page 1) “Economic growth occurs whenever people take resources and rearrange them in ways that are more valuable.” (page 2) “Leading countries like the United States, Canada, and the members of the European Union cannot stay ahead merely by adopting ideas developed elsewhere.” (page 4)
 * 5. What three quotes capture the critical import of the text? **

While this text had more of a “traditional” view of economic growth, I felt like I needed to understand how those who do not believe in limits see growth by directly reading their readings. While what is stated in this article works under the current economic system, I can see many fallacies when those theories are applied to a scenario that takes into account environmental limits.
 * 6. Explain how the argument and evidence in the text supports your research focus. **

I discussed the popular view of economics as constant growth. The article also explained exponential growth and how some countries’ economies are growing.
 * <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">7. List at least two details or references from the text that you have used in your presentation and wiki post. **


 * <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Article Annotation 2 **

Tudge, Colin. //The Time Before History: 5 Million Years of Human Impact//. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1996.
 * <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">1. Full citation. **

<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">The author works in Great Britain. He is predominantly a writer but has also broadcasted, lectured, and taught courses. He has written many other books as well as articles, including //Last Animals at the Zoo, The Link: Uncovering Our Earliest Ancestor,// and //The Tree//. He studied English and Zoology at Peterhouse, Cambridge.
 * <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">2. Where does the author work, what else has s/he written about, and what are her/his credentials? **

<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Humans are not some special being created through anything, including evolution, but the result of chance climatic and evolutionary events.
 * <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">3. What is the main topic or argument of the text? **

<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">The book starts by explaining how human history is usually told, and the story of Misia Landau, who in reading paleo-anthropological literature discovered that many of those books had a sort of “hero myth”. Sort of a disclaimer to what follows, Tudge goes on to explain the plate tectonics and climate and how those influenced human evolution. Then, he reminds his readers that humans have never been the only species on the planet; there were many others. Towards the end of the book, he goes through the different regions of the world and recounts how many species became extinct around the time humans moved to those regions. He also looks at the invention of agriculture and argues that it may have been a “second choice” for humans, rather than a brilliant discovery that was immediately used by anybody smart. Tudge concludes with a chapter called “The Next Million Years”, in which he discusses whether or not //Homo sapiens sapiens// will still exist a million years from now, and what that will take.
 * <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">4. Describe at least three ways that the main topic or argument is fleshed out. **

<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">“How odd it is to suggest, as historians conventionally do, that the Assyrians, the Egyptians, the Greeks, and the Romans were ‘ancient’.” (page 11) <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">“Third, if cultivation of a kind did indeed arise 30,000 years ago, then a significant mystery is removed: why it was that agriculture seemed to arise independently in many different locations at different times after 10,000 years ago.” (page 270) <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">“The question is not whether this growth must stop, but when, and how great the numbers will be by the time it does, and whether we can call a halt by means that are voluntary and benign, or whether the eventual restraint will be out of our hands.” (page 317)
 * <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">5. What three quotes capture the critical import of the text? **

<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">I drew on this book a lot for my presentation idea. It really stresses the importance of understanding our human history—not just Western history, and certainly not just a few thousand years of history. It also describes the fallacy of believing that human history has been one of never-ending progress.
 * <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">6. Explain how the argument and evidence in the text supports your research focus. **

<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">I used what was stated in the first chapter of the book—that human history did not start a couple thousand years after the invention of agriculture, as is often taught (and I remember that my world history books generally devoted only a short chapter to anything before agriculture). Tudge also discusses how much of an impact humans make on the planet. Since this book is about fifteen years old now, I used other sources to get exact statistics.
 * <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">7. List at least two details or references from the text that you have used in your presentation and wiki post. **