Environmental Ethics: Quiz Oct 22

Saturday, October 20, 2018

Quiz Oct 22

LEN 10-12 (after we catch up on 7-9). Post your questions, comments, & links. Presentations: Nicole Rondeau, Gold Fame Citrus by Claire Vaye Watkins; Rosemarie Kuenn, State of Fear by Michael Crichton

1. Three of our most common fears are what?

2. What does Cheryl hope never to have to find out?

3. What is it about kombucha that so enamors Cheryl?

4. What are the health benefits of fermented foods?

5. What's SCOBY?

6. How does Earth's ecosystem rely on bacteria?

7. What's wrong with antibacterial soaps?

8. What happened to "Scott"?

9. What does Cheryl find vulgar and titillating about her magnolia seeds?

10. What options for her seeds does Cheryl consider?

11. How does the seed make "Oneness" more vivid and concrete for Cheryl?

12. What should you tell your inner cynic, if it sneers at your efforts to develop a more intimate relationship with nature?

Discussion Questions:

Add yours
Are our "common fears" unfounded? What are your greatest phobias? Do any of them relate to environmental issues and concerns?
Which specter frightens you more, a future of humans no longer able to inhabit Earth, living permanently in the artificial environment of a spaceship, and out of touch with the natural rhythms of life (Wall-E), or being alone, untethered, and adrift in boundless space (Gravity)?
Do you take gravity for granted? Would life with much more or less of it be intolerable?
Is our continuing addiction to fossil fuel "inane," given what we now know about its contribution to global warming?
Have you brewed beer, made your own kombucha or yogurt or anything? Will you, in light of the nutritional and ecological benefits of bacteria and yeast? Or take a course at MTSU in fermentation science?
Do you clean with baking soda and vinegar? Do they work?
Does thinking about bacteria and other species that both ensure and threaten our survival give you a better appreciation of the place of humans in the ecosystem?
Is there truly a "botany of desire" on the part of plants as well as people? (See Michael Pollan's excellent book Botany of Desire...)
Do you have any compunctions about pulling weeds? Should you? 154
Do you agree that "everything we say, think and feel reverberates across creation... whether we realize it or not"? 155

..."how four familiar species (the apple, the tulip, marijuana and the potato) evolved to satisfy our yearnings for sweetness, beauty, intoxication and control..."

3 comments:

AnonymousOctober 21, 2018 at 12:20 PM
Max McConnell
1. What is the reassuring force that allows Cheryl to rest in bed at night with the purring cat on top of just one foot? Pg 134 Mother Earth’s embrace
2. What somehow made Cheryl mourn for her mother all over again? Pg 138 Her local organic food store stopped carrying the fresh kombucha in kegs that was on tap in their store for a time.
3. What did Cheryl used to do after her mother’s passing to try to revive her spirit? Take trips to fast food drive-through for a diet coke.
4. Who does Cheryl say protests to her drinking IPAs? Pg 138 Her waistline and the DMV.
5. What did Cheryl think about Kombucha when she first heard about it and its benefits, before she had tried it? Pg 139 Nothing that healthy could possibly taste good.
6. With what amount of devotion does Cheryl say she began going to the organic market for kombucha? The devotion of a postal courier, “through the rain and heat and gloom of night.”
7. Whose contributions did humans evolve dependent upon? Pg 142 Bacteria
8. What does Cheryl compare bacteria to in regard to respecting their contributions? Pg 143 Bees
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~*~Kari~*~October 22, 2018 at 10:18 AM
1 The fears that circle around the movie Gravity frightens me more, because life would be a survival issue. I don’t think I could live long untethered/ Life may not be thriving, but I could feel more comfortable being inside a spaceship with my needs for food and water being met. I haven’t seen the movie Gravity but now I am interested.
2 I didn’t recognize all the health benefits of kombucha, but unlike the author, I haven’t found a particular flavor I enjoy. My friend introduced me to it and I’ll drink it sometimes but honestly, it's only because I know of the healthy probiotics are good for me. I’d prefer to make wine or beer, but I’m interested in creating a flavor of kombucha I would enjoy. I don’t think I could make yogurt, it might kill someone accidentally
3 I agree with the thought process Cheryl outlines, I was happy that she sees this mindset as her reality. We are vibrational beings, our thoughts become our actions and our actions become our destiny. It’s a good way to think because it helps us to own up to our responsibilities and take control of our own lives without relying on others to meet our needs for us. All we really need is a clear definition of what our happiness is and then to define it by our own standards. I think having that kind of self awareness is really healthy, so I admire her saying so.
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UnknownOctober 22, 2018 at 3:47 PM
What somehow made Cheryl mourn for her mother all over again, and why do you think that such small things can have such a big impact on peoples emotions?
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First things first--a proper education

“The complexity of our present trouble suggests as never before that we need to change our present concept of education. Education is not properly an industry, and its proper use is not to serve industries, either by job-training or by industry-subsidized research. It's proper use is to enable citizens to live lives that are economically, politically, socially, and culturally responsible. This cannot be done by gathering or "accessing" what we now call "information" - which is to say facts without context and therefore without priority. A proper education enables young people to put their lives in order, which means knowing what things are more important than other things; it means putting first things first.” ― Wendell Berry

The college project

“The American college may be considered a continuation, at the human level, of the self-education process of the earth itself: universe education, earth education, and human education are stages of development in a single unbroken process...The entire college project can be seen as that of enabling the student to understand the immense story of the universe and the role of the student in creating the next phase of the story.” --Thomas Berry, “The American College in the Ecological Age,” in The Dream of the Earth

“Odd as I am sure it will appear to some, I can think of no better form of personal involvement in the cure of the environment than that of gardening. A person who is growing a garden, if he is growing it organically, is improving a piece of the world. He is producing something to eat, which makes him somewhat independent of the grocery business, but he is also enlarging, for himself, the meaning of food and the pleasure of eating.”
― Wendell Berry, The Art of the Commonplace: The Agrarian Essays

“Nature shrinks as capital grows. The growth of the market cannot solve the very crisis it creates.”
― Vandana Shiva, Soil Not Oil: Environmental Justice in an Age of Climate Crisis

“Why should we tolerate a diet of weak poisons, a home in insipid surroundings, a circle of acquaintances who are not quite our enemies, the noise of motors with just enough relief to prevent insanity? Who would want to live in a world which is just not quite fatal?”
― Rachel Carson, Silent Spring

“How can we be so arrogant? The planet is, was, and always will be stronger than us. We can't destroy it; if we overstep the mark, the planet will simply erase us from its surface and carry on existing. Why don't they start talking about not letting the planet destroy us?”
― Paulo Coelho, The Winner Stands Alone

“When asked if I am pessimistic or optimistic about the future, my answer is always the same: if you look at the science about what is happening on earth and aren't pessimistic, you don't understand the data. But if you meet the people who are working to restore this earth and the lives of the poor, and you aren't optimistic, you haven't got a pulse.”
― Martin Keogh, Hope Beneath Our Feet: Restoring Our Place in the Natural World

“When the last tree is cut and the last fish killed, the last river poisoned, then you will see that you can't eat money.”
― John May, The Greenpeace Story

“We are being made aware that the organization of society on the principle of private profit, as well as public destruction, is leading both to the deformation of humanity by unregulated industrialism, and to the exhaustion of natural resources, and that a good deal of our material progress is a progress for which succeeding generations may have to pay dearly.”
― T.S. Eliot

“There is a tendency at every important but difficult crossroad to pretend that it's not really there.”
― Bill McKibben, The End of Nature

“We know, at least, that this decision (ending factory farming) will help prevent deforestation, curb global warming, reduce pollution, save oil reserves, lessen the burden on rural America, decrease human rights abuses, improve publish health, and help eliminate the most systematic animal abuse in history.”
― Jonathan Safran Foer, Eating Animals

“An attitude to life which seeks fulfilment in the
single-minded pursuit of wealth - in short, materialism - does not fit into this
world, because it contains within itself no limiting principle, while the
environment in which it is placed is strictly limited.”
― Ernst F. Schumacher, Small Is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered

“One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds.”
― Aldo Leopold

“Saving the world requires saving democracy. That requires well-informed citizens. Conservation, environment, poverty, community, education, family, health, economy- these combine to make one quest: liberty and justice for all. Whether one's special emphasis is global warming or child welfare, the cause is the same cause. And justice comes from the same place being human comes from: compassion.”
― Carl Safina, The View from Lazy Point: A Natural Year in an Unnatural World

“The re-establishment of an ecological balance depends on the ability of society to counteract the progressive materialization of values. The ecological balance cannot be re-established unless we recognize again that only persons have ends and only persons can work towards them.”
― Ivan Illich

	Michael Pollan (@michaelpollan) http://michaelpollan.com/
5/14/15, 10:57 AM All the lectures and talks from Edible Education 101 are now online. All told, a great introduction to food politics bit.ly/1Fausvx

Saturday, October 20, 2018

Quiz Oct 22

3 comments:

Peripatetics