Today we watched an important documentary on global warming. After investigating ideas on sustainable development, we have begun again to consider how human needs and wants impact the environment, society and economy.
Fossil Fuels are essential to our society. We use oil and gas to produce energy. Energy that allows us to heat our homes, heat our schools, fuel cars and buses; energy that powers the machinery that is used to build electronic devices and that cultivates food crops for eating. The burning of fossil fuels in cars and factories also increases the presence of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. There is a lot to consider.
Sustainable Development has been commonly defined as "development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs". There are two ideas you must comment on.
First: Mark Twain was quoted in an Inconvenient Truth. The quote is as follows:
"What gets us into trouble is not what we don't know.
It's what we know for sure that just ain't so"
How does this comment relate to Global Warming? What does this quote mean? What is Mark Twain really saying? Can you think of an example that demonstrates Mark Twain's idea? Now I do not expect you to answer all of these questions. You are required to comment on the quote. Reflect on his words, the documentary, sustainable development, and offer your thoughts for others to consider and respond to. One comment and one response.
Second: For a better understanding of sustainable development, we need to do two things: (1) criticize and (2) analyze. Before we analyze, let us criticize. You are all required to make at least one comment on the question that follows:
If sustain means to maintain, to keep the same, to preserve, and develop means to grow, to expand, to advance, then why is the term sustainable development problematic?
In other words, why is sustainable development a tricky, tricky, tricky idea?
You all did an exceptional job today in class. For the most part, you maintained your focus, listened well to your peers and myself, and took risks by offering your ideas on a range of challenging topics.
Do your homework.
Long live the Recycling Club!
Be respectful of each other's ideas.
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ReplyDeleteYou look at that river gently flowing by. You notice the leaves rustling with the wind. You hear the birds; you hear the frogs. In the distance you hear a cow. You feel the grass. The mud gives a little bit on the river bank. It's quiet; it's peaceful. And all of a sudden, storms and terror rip through the peaceful land because of what global warming this happens. I believe we can change the bad things by prohibiting Global Warming with all the storms it bring
ReplyDeleteYes I agree with you because it's like having a nightmare when peace is destroyed by our actions in the environment.
DeleteMark Twain's quote relates to the issue of global warming because in his quote he means to says " what gets us in trouble isn't what we don't know, it's actually what we know but it ain't so". Now this relates to global warming because the trouble we are getting in, due to global warming is what we already know but more than half the world doesn't care, which is the same thing as saying "it ain't so". Wake up world how long are we going to wait before we solve this problem and get us out of trouble.
ReplyDeleteI like how you trained your thoughts and worked step-by-step Maahil
DeleteI like how you connect your phrase to different examples and say at the end. Wake up world how long are we going to wait before w solve this problem and get us out of trouble
DeleteI believe that sustainable development is a tricky idea because in order to have a perfect sustainable development you need to have the balance between environment, society and economy. When balance between these 3 things is even, then automatically you will create a sustainable development in which you will be able to meet your needs and future generations will be able to meet their need without any compromises.
ReplyDeletei do agree with this
DeleteThis is a great point!
DeleteI think you make a very rational argument Maahil.When we do find the balance between environment,society and economy, do you think eventually future generations will find having a sustainable development more of an issue,again,if they were to lose that balance and have to start compromising ?
DeleteThat's is a valid point
DeleteI agree with the statement that Maahil had typed because its very tricky if you think about it. What will happen to the future generations that will come, what will they think of what had happen.
DeleteThe point that you make is clear because of how tricky it is to do that. Well, do you think sustainable development will be a issue for future generations.
Deletei think what mark twain's quote "What gets us into trouble is not what we don't know. It's what we know for sure that just ain't so" means that if you think you know something but your dont do anything about it and act like nothing is wrong. it also relates to global warming because the world knows about global warming and they refuse to do anything about it and act like "it just ain't so".
ReplyDeletethat is true, the world does refuse to do anything about it and act like it just ain't so
DeleteSellorne:
DeleteMy friend that is very true, we as humans just pretend that global warming isn't a big concern and do nothing about it.
We know what we know. What we do about that is different. Mark Twain's quote is powerful - it relates to any situation - consequences that we know can happen but we do nothing to prevent it from happening.
ReplyDeleteSustain - to maintain or keep the same and development - to move forward - these two words together contradict each other. We can develop and plateau or maintain but to develop further is contradictory.
I do agree with you Zayden. this quote is powerful due to the many meanings people interpret about it.
DeleteI agree that this quote can connect to many different situations as it is a powerful quote indeed. I also think that this quote can mean many different things as well.
DeleteI agree this quote does apply to many other situations because of the many interpretations that people get from it,making it a very st rong quote because it is very relateable
DeleteI believe that Mark Twain's quote " What gets us into trouble is not what we don't know. its what we know for sure that just ain't so" means whenever we get to trouble we know for sure but just think we don't know. we forget about the consequences and what will happen in the future. we don't take into consideration of what we have done and if it affects anything important. its just saying to actually care about the actions that you commit because if you get into trouble you will be faced with consequences. This quote also relates to global warming because the world knows about this issue going on but just don't care. like people say don't litter but in the end people do litter and don't care but then our world will be destroyed. Due to what actions people commit to the environment, economy, and society. this is how the sustainable development model plays with this because of the connections. Global Warming should be as important to us as our needs. we need a clean world in order to live, so people should start caring about this issue.
ReplyDeletei agree with you qadriy because people do things and they dont notice it affects the environment.
DeleteThis quote can mean many different things, but I think it means that someone who doesn't know something is cautious and afraid, but the people who think they know something that is actually wrong could make a big mistake while being confident their thought is still correct.
ReplyDeleteI think that sustainable development is problematic in our world today since its hard to even out the sustainability of the environment, society, and economy. this is because of the many issues and problems going on in our world. like the use of too much fossil fuels or greenhouse gases. but at the same time we need to use them in our daily lives. the environment depends on the economy and society, so if one thing messes up the whole thing has a problem. this is why I think sustainable development is problematic.
ReplyDeleteI think that Mark Twain’s quote means that people do things that they know are wrong but they decide not to do anything to fix it. For example, everyone litters. EVERYONE. It has happened before and you know it. Educators talk about how it’s bad and yet we still do it anyway. We know it is bad for the environment and animals, yet we still don’t do anything about it. I think this is an example of what Mark means by “What gets us into trouble is not what we don’t know. It’s what we know for sure that just ain’t so.” We also use cars too much. Many depend their way of transportation on them. Even short distances. We know it is affecting the environment because it causes air pollution. But we don’t do anything. I think this quote relates to global warming because like littering, us students are taught in school that global warming is bad. We know this but we still do things that make global warming a bigger issue. Everyone panics because it is getting worse, yet we are not doing anything to solve it.I think sustainable development is a tricky idea because in order to have it, we must have a good balance between society, environment and economy. This is tricky because we humans depend on the environment to gain wealth and shelter or other needs. This will be hard to maintain because for example, Canada trades a lot of paper to other countries already, which is not good for the environment but is good for the economy, making an uneven balance between the two. This is why sustainable development is very tricky.
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ReplyDeleteQuestion 2: I think that sustainable development is tricky because we need to get recources for our society while we need to maintain these recources for our future generations to use, which they would need even more of these recources. To sustain them we need to think of complex ways to renew our energy and other recources so we can use them while the future generations can too.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Adrian because we need to maintain resources for the future while still yet using some of the resources for right now.
DeleteI agree with Adrian because in order to create a sustainable development in the future we need to keep the resources from now and use it in the future which will also be good for the environment.
DeleteI think Mark Twain's quote is a metaphorical way of trying to convey the fact that many of us don't know the harmful aftermath of global warming.We (society) think we are trying to "help" the environment because "yes,we litter,but it's going to turn into compost right?", but truly we what think is accommodating is much more damaging to the environment rather than helping it.Global Warming is such a broad complex issue that it's hard to decipher how it truly affects you until it does.I think because of our human activities that we act upon daily,like driving cars,running lights and things that are apart of our daily routines, have an effect,we forget about the big picture and limiting the amount of these activities could really be helpful.Until people actually realize that we are the main cause of global warming,and our actions do take make a difference to the environment it will harder to maintain a sustainable environment when there is nothing left on earth for future generations to build upon.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you Serena because it is hard to know how global warming is affecting people until it affects you and that we forget about this issue because of what we do in everyday life.
DeleteI agree with Serena because we don't really want to know or forget about it or don't care about global warming, until it's starts to affect our daily lives.
DeleteSellorne:
DeleteYou are right Serena, we forget the big picture. Everything we do effects the environment. We think something small as dropping a plastic bag won't have an impact, but we everyone does the same thing then it would only build up. What would we do then?
I also agree that many of us don't know how harmful global warming's aftermath is,yet we do nothing
DeleteJust as everyone else say, I agree with the points you've provided. I especially when you said "Global Warming is such a broad complex issue that it's hard to decipher how it truly affects you until it does." Because that is a very strong argument expressing how society is truthfully and clearly. Kind of an inconvenient truth, huh?
DeleteP.S- I remember when we took that profile picture ;) :D
i think that mark twain is trying to say that A person who doesn't know something is cautious, a person who incorrectly believes they know something can make a big, confident mistake. global warming causes many problems. we help global warming to make the problems bigger because we don't do anything to help our world from those problems. we can change the world by stopping global warming and save our planet.
ReplyDeleteI think that is very true Omer, but what can we do because we contribute to global warming, but very little. The big industries like Coca-Cola are the ones that are contributing to this alot more than we do because they have hundreds of trucks driving all over the world to sell there product.
DeleteI think mark twain quote is clever wordplay
ReplyDeletei think that mark twain quote it used words that global warming causes many differ types of problem that made mark twains quote so intresting
ReplyDeleteI think mark twain's quote is clever wordplay because his vocabulary and grammar is so rich for a few words.
ReplyDeleteGlobal warming is an inconvenient truth because it's actually more of problem and closer than we think. It's evident when former USA vice president Al gore shows us how icebergs are melting rapidly and the water level is rising . Also, that mountains that be covered in snow now barely has any
ReplyDeleteI think the connection between global warming and sustainable development is that we can't have one without the other. I think this way because as we are trying to sustain the environment from being totally destroyed yet we keep destroying it. We keep destroying it by putting greenhouse gases to keep the earth's temperature warmer which is ultimately causing global warming. So if we take out greenhouse gases entirely we could see colder temperatures all over of the world but is saving the environment from global warming. But if we continue using greenhouse gases we will see global warming reaching closer and closer and destroying the environment entirely. So basically you can't have one without the other.
ReplyDeleteI think that Mark Twain is saying that when we do something bad some people might not know what the consequences will be but that person will know at the end of what he/she did for example if some one were to throw garbage on the floor he might not know what that one piece of garbage could do but that person will defiantly affect the environment.
ReplyDeleteMark Twain's quote relates to the issue of global warming because in his quote he means to says " what gets us in trouble isn't what we don't know, it's actually what we know but it ain't so". Mark Twain's quote is strong because it refers to any situation like littering. We know it is bad, but we just don't care. Sometimes it's not that we don't care it's because we do not the consequences or the aftermath. I used to litter and my friends would tell me not to litter, but I didn't care because I didn't see how it was affecting anyone. Although it is just regular daily activities we do in our life that effect the environment like drive our cars and run our lights unnecessarily. Until people realize that humans are the main cause of global warming, it will get worst rapidly and seeing how the economy is we will probably only act on this when it finally takes the resources we need.
ReplyDeleteSustain means to stay the same and develop means to grow or to upgrade. This very tricky because we have to get resources for our society while trying to maintain these resources for the next generation. We will have to think of a complex plan to sustain or to renew our energy. So, energy like fossil fuels will not last very long.
ReplyDeleteMark Twain's quote " what gets us in trouble isn't what we don't know, it's actually what we know but it ain't so" relates to a diverse amount of problems.One being about global warming.This quote relates to global warming because it talks about the knowledge that is given to people that neglect to use it as power to take action against things like global warming,and how people waste their knowledge,their potential to do good, and instead leave the world to rot from global warming.
ReplyDeleteI think sustainable development is a tricky idea.I think this because sustain means to keep the same while develop means to change,evolve etc.These 2 things make sustainable development a tricky idea because they are the complete opposite of each other,how do you change when you must stay the same?.
ReplyDeleteMark Twain's quote: What gets us into trouble is not what we don't know, its that what we know but just ain't so. I think Mark Twain's quote relates the issue of global warming and how people who study the pollution found out that global warming would be a world issue before it happened. But I understand how it can relate our actions destroying the environment.
ReplyDeleteI think that sustainable development is a tricky topic because sustain means to maintain, while development means to upgrade, evolve, etc. The two words are opposite and how do maintain when you need to upgrade. That is the tricky part. For example, we need resources for now, but maintain all our main resources in the future. How can we do that.
ReplyDelete