Final Paper

The Advances of Science and the Natural World

Agenda

• Lecture

• Primary sources in final paper

• Thursday’s activity

• HW: discussion post (tardy but you’ll get points)

• HW: McNeill, “More People, Bigger Cities” [Blackboard: Week 14]

• HW: Reading Comp Quiz #11 due tomorrow

• HW: prep research for Thursday’s class

Scientific Advances

• How did nuclear energy affect the

earth?

• How did genetically modified crops affect

people?

Where was nuclear power applied?

• Nuclear power plants opened in mid-1950s (UK/US/USSR)

• 1965: nuclear energy 1% of world energy, 1980: 10%

• countries without fossil fuels or other sources of energy

• France/Belgium 50% of energy supply, Japan/S.Korea 25%

• Later also in China, India

What were economic and environmental

benefits of nuclear power?

• People thought nuclear power was safe and environmentally friendly

• Some considered it ‘green’ energy

• no greenhouse gases or sulfur dioxide

• more powerful than other energy

• One handful of uranium held more energy than a truck full of coal

“It appears that the long promised day of economical nuclear

power is close at hand. In the past several months we have

achieved an economic breakthrough in the use of larger-scale

reactors for commercial power. And as a result of this rapid

progress, we are years ahead of our planned progress. This

new technology, now being applied in the United States, will

be available to the world”

- Lyndon B. Johnson, Commencement Speech Holy Cross, 1964

What were environmental concerns?

• 1979 & 1986: nuclear accidents in US and USSR

• U.S. public lost interest

• Affected food chain, led to health complications (elevated rates of cancers, birth defects)

• Nuclear waste – today’s debates

• radioactive for tens of thousands of years

• storage? Safety? Sustainable?

Innovation unlocked food supply

- 20th century: 4x human pop., 2x cultivated land

- 1900: 70-90% of world population in low tech agriculture

- 1990: 2-3% of U.S. population worked in agriculture

How did so few people produce so

much food?

• Better machinery

• Hybrid seeds

• Artificial fertilizers

• Pesticides/chemicals

How did technology affect agriculture?

• 1890s: Gas-powered tractors led to larger farms, fewer workers

• Benefited: large countries with un-worked soil (US, Australia, USSR, Canada, Argentina)

• Less useful: Japan & China had neither the geography nor the mechanical infrastructure (repair shops, gas stations) to support

• Effects: Farms focused on single crops (specialized machinery expensive)

• Drove freed farm laborers to cities (urbanization)

What led to the Green Revolution?

• 19th century: Austrian monk Gregor Mendel – cross breeding plants

• 1900 Meiji Japan adopted his research

• 1918: Americans breed better maize (‘double cross’)

What led to the Green Revolution?

• 19th century: Austrian monk Gregor Mendel – cross breeding plants

• 1900 Meiji Japan adopted his research

• 1918: Americans breed better maize (‘double cross’)

• 1930: 1% hybrid maize in US, 1970: 99% of maize cross-bred

• 1953: dwarf wheat (needed artificial fertilizer but less water)

• 1959: rice hybrids = best of tropical & temperate rice

How did Cold War affect Green

Revolution?

• US wanted to spread hybrid crops

• Fed people don’t become Socialists

• Communists governments (USSR/China) embraced

• “Third World” free from US food aid dependency

• Helped: South Korea, China, India and Mexico (more generally Latin America/Asia), whereas sub-Saharan Africa lacked the capital and soil-water conditions to prosper

• Drove “Asian tigers” (industrialization of Taiwan, S. Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia and other countries)

What was environmental effect of

Green Revolution?

• Genetically modified crops grew in more marginal conditions

• Needed hybrid seeds - relied on more fertilizer & specific pesticides

• Encouraged mono-cropping (buy everything in bulk)

• Mono-cropping causes ecological & economic vulnerabilities (disease, total failure, pest resistance)

• Helped those with access to credit – made others poor

Primary source

• Analyze source:

• When was it created? By whom? Why?

• What is it depicting or discussing?

• How does this source support your paragraph’s argument?

“According to His Majesty's warrant, the mine owners on this massive range [at Potosi] have a right to the

conscripted labor of 13,300 Indians in the working and exploitation of the mines, both those [mines] which have

been discovered, those now discovered, and those which shall be discovered. It is the duty of the Corregidor

[municipal governor] of Potosi to have them rounded up and to see that they come in from all the provinces

between Cuzco. . . and as far as the frontiers of Tarija and Tomina. . . .

The conscripted Indians go up every Monday morning to the. . . foot of the range; the Corregidor arrives with all

the provincial captains or chiefs who have charge of the Indians assigned him for his miner or smelter; that keeps

him busy till 1 p. m., by which time the Indians are already turned over to these mine and smelter owners.

After each has eaten his ration, they climb up the hill, each to his mine, and go in, staying there from that hour

until Saturday evening without coming out of the mine; their wives bring them food, but they stay constantly

underground, excavating and carrying out the ore from which they get the silver. They all have tallow candles,

lighted day and night; that is the light they work with, for as they are underground, they have need for it all the

time. . . .

These Indians have different functions in the handling of the silver ore; some break it up with bar or pick, and dig

down in, following the vein in the mine; others bring it up; others up above keep separating the good and the

poor in piles; others are occupied in taking it down from the range to the mills on herds of llamas; every day they

bring up more than 8,000 of these native beasts of burden for this task. These teamsters who carry the metal are

not conscripted, but are hired.”

• Compendium and Description of the West Indies written

by Antonio Vazquez De Espinosa

• dated around 1620

• Documented working conditions in Spanish colonies

• Represents European exploitation of New World

• Required native laborers to mine silver ore from mines near

Potosi – later smelted (for which needed lumber)

• silver mined in New World not only damaged local landscape

• Marks discusses how it also:

• fueled European warfare

• allowed Europeans to trade with China for desired goods

• Indirectly caused China’s environmental exploitation

• Global trade links and colonization not only caused local

damage in places like Potosi or the Dutch East Indies

(Indonesia) but had global consequences for the environment

• Image from autumn1673

• Painted by Fan Qi who

lived during 17th century

• Colder, unpredictable

weather: crises =

overthrow of Ming,

invasion of Qing

• Influences of

unpredictable weather

had social and political

consequences in China

• Mirrored by continued

impact of weather in 19th

century when El Niño

famines caused millions

to die and helped

Europeans consolidate

power in “Third World”

Preparing for Thursday: From the reading

• Focus on urbanization and urban metabolism in reading

• How does urbanization affect the environment? How do wealthier and poorer countries differ in how they deal with urban effects?

• What were the dangers of urban life in the 20th century and how did they differ from earlier dangers?

• How would you explain urban metabolism? Despite a city’s “metabolism” with one concrete example from the reading.

Preparing for Thurs: group work (10 pts 

for writing or discussion grade, your choice)

• Groups will be responsible for researching the following cities and writing answers to questions (groups of 5 can ignore one question of their choice from next page):

• Manila: Brianna A., Nirvanie, Christina, Quinten, Christopher, Jonathan

• Lagos: Anthony, Talha, Thomas, Marieliz, Mckaila

• Calcutta: Olga, Tatiana, Joseph, Yunpeng, Brianna M

• Mexico City: Brandon, Opeyemi, Briana P., William, Patrick,

• Shanghai: Maleik, Jasmin, Kunal, Jennifer, Nicolas, Michael

1. What is the city’s recent history? How has the size and population of the city changed from 1900 to 2000? What are some reasons the city has changed?

2. What is the population? How many apartments/houses exist? What are construction materials for them? How do people get their energy? Coal? Oil? Wood? What is the infrastructure in place for that? Import oil? Mine coal?

3. Does the city have any industry located in the city? What types of raw materials does it need to produce these goods? Where does it import these materials from? Hint: Check to see if the country itself has reserves of these materials or if it trades for them

4. How many people live in the city? What are traditional dishes for the country? Where does this food come from? What effect does this food have on the land? i.e. is it land intensive (meat-heavy diets need lots of land). Do import food from abroad or does the country devote land for internal food production? What are the environmental effects on growing/producing this much food?

5. What type of infrastructure does the city have? Trains? Rails? Buses? Roads? Airports? Where does trade enter most? What regions of the country or what international trade partners does the city have? What type of emissions do these transportation methods create? How many cars exist in the city?

6. What type of waste products does the city produce? Talk to partners with other questions: how much food waste does an average person in the country produce? Multiply by city’s population. What are main industries? What ways do these pollute/create waste? Discuss two examples. How many cars/trucks/other modes of transportation exist in the city?

Urban Metabolism Activity Resources

CIA World Factbook

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/resources/the-world-factbook/

World’s Air Pollution

https://waqi.info/

Trade/Industry

https://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/country/cri/

Homework

• HW: discussion post (tardy but you’ll get points)

• HW: McNeill, “Urbanization” [Blackboard: Week 14]

• HW: Reading Comp Quiz #11 due tomorrow

• HW: prep research for Thursday’s class