Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Great Ape Personhood. Really?


            We can all agree that great apes like chimpanzees and orangutans are like humans in a number of ways, but there has recently been a push to grant great apes personhood.  What?  Not only is the idea preposterous, but also think: what exactly would these great apes do with a legal “personhood?” An attainable goal of the great ape personhood movement is to stop testing on great apes (chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas and orangutans).   This has already been accomplished in many places Germany, Spain and New Zealand have all stopped testing on primates.  Switzerland even recognized these great apes as “beings” not “things.” 
            One main point of contention surrounding great ape personhood is what makes something a “person”?  Some criteria for personhood are the ability to act (agency), self-awareness and the idea of past & future.  Do great apes possess all of these?  And if so, what other animals do?  Surely there are other animals that are self-aware.  Research has shown that dolphins are self-aware.  Can dolphins be persons too? 
            Critics of the great ape personhood movement ask another question.  What are babies?  Human babies are not self-aware and they do not understand past and future; so are they not people?  Do they not have the same rights as adults?  Are apes more persons than babies?
            I can agree with someone if they want to stop animal testing or provide saved apes with a safe habitat, but I feel that using the term “personhood” brings the argument further from that point.  Why would an ape even want personhood?  What could they do with it?  People native to the United States are citizens who can vote and drive.  Would chimpanzees be eligible for this?
            The next thought in my mind is that we would be creating a second-class citizen, much like slaves or non-white Americans prior to civil rights movements.  This is immoral; any person should be valued just the same as the rest.  Great apes would soon be voting and driving, or there would be an uprising against this injustice!  And they don’t even care about “personhood.”

See what people think of monkeys driving!

·      Great Ape Standing and Personhood, http://www.personhood.org/
·      Great Ape Personhood, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_ape_personhood

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Great Ape Personhood. Really?


            We can all agree that great apes like chimpanzees and orangutans are like humans in a number of ways, but there has recently been a push to grant great apes personhood.  What?  Not only is the idea preposterous, but also think: what exactly would these great apes do with a legal “personhood?” An attainable goal of the great ape personhood movement is to stop testing on great apes (chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas and orangutans).   This has already been accomplished in many places Germany, Spain and New Zealand have all stopped testing on primates.  Switzerland even recognized these great apes as “beings” not “things.” 
            One main point of contention surrounding great ape personhood is what makes something a “person”?  Some criteria for personhood are the ability to act (agency), self-awareness and the idea of past & future.  Do great apes possess all of these?  And if so, what other animals do?  Surely there are other animals that are self-aware.  Research has shown that dolphins are self-aware.  Can dolphins be persons too? 
            Critics of the great ape personhood movement ask another question.  What are babies?  Human babies are not self-aware and they do not understand past and future; so are they not people?  Do they not have the same rights as adults?  Are apes more persons than babies?
            I can agree with someone if they want to stop animal testing or provide saved apes with a safe habitat, but I feel that using the term “personhood” brings the argument further from that point.  Why would an ape even want personhood?  What could they do with it?  People native to the United States are citizens who can vote and drive.  Would chimpanzees be eligible for this?

            The next thought in my mind is that we would be creating a second-class citizen, much like slaves or non-white Americans prior to civil rights movements.  This is immoral; any person should be valued just the same as the rest.  Great apes would soon be voting and driving, or there would be an uprising against this injustice!  And they don’t even care about “personhood.”

See what people think of monkeys driving!


Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Add Insult to Injustice

            Imagine if a coal-burning power plant suddenly moved into the lot behind your home.  You would like to have a say in whether a power plant could open in your backyard, right?  If environmental justice were served, your word would be heard and appreciated, and the plant would probably not be constructed there.  However, for hundreds of years until the present, environmental justice has not been available for all people especially the poor.
            Environmental Justice is  "the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, sex, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies."  In layman’s terms this means that all people should be considered when any changes to the environment are made.  For a long time, factories, power plants or any structures that would be an eyesore were built in or near poor communities.  This way, the rich profiting from these health hazards could reap the benefits of these services but not be affected by their consequences. Robert Bullard, director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University, notes this problem quite well; “there are some people who are in elected offices who see nothing wrong with placing every single facility in one community and saying, ‘Well, there’s nothing wrong with it because it has to go somewhere.’”
            This is referred to as the NIMBY movement (Not In My Backyard).  This movement of earlier 20th century moved unwanted land uses such as landfills and hazardous productions from middle-class communities to poor communities with large minority populations.  NIMBY mentality was so prevalent that it spawned another similar policy’s acronym.   PIBBY: Place In Blacks’ Backyard.  Yes, this is a documented name for this inconsiderate planning.   
Today, the need for environmental justice has become more apparent, and people in positions of power are often acting more responsibly. This means they realize that it is not right for the majority of a nation’s population to benefit from a service that degrades the living conditions of another group of citizens.  Unfortunately, this problem of environmental injustice is far from gone.    

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Ecotax

            Pigovian taxes may not sound familiar just yet, but you certainly will not forget them.  The principle idea behind Pigovian taxation is that these taxes attempt to counteract a negative externality, which is a cost not translated through prices, through the institution of a new tax law.  A healthy environment would be a positive externality and a damaged or stressed environment would be a negative externality.  This would result in an Ecotax. 
The institution of an ecotax would be positive punishment.  Until natural conditions improve, carbon taxes (related to burning fossil fuels), taxes on deforestation and coal-burning, and waste disposal would all increase.  This would not need to start as a large change either; ecotaxes could be created in connection with the lowering of income or property tax.  If ecotaxes replaced existing taxes, citizens and businesses would have a way of lowering their taxes but only if they made a change to help better the environment.  Individuals using less gasoline or creating less trash would pay less taxes; and corporations who harvest less minerals from the earth, cut less trees and produce less waste (leading them to recycle) would also be taxed less. 
You can already get a tax break by being environmentally conscious.  People who drive fuel-efficient vehicles or otherwise improve their lives in a measurably “green” way (having solar panels) can get government money to help finance this.  The difference with earning these tax breaks and ecotaxing is that ecotaxing is not optional.  It is a deductable built into everyone’s taxes.  Business-standard.com summarizes this well; with an ecotax “there is always an incentive to reduce pollution, whereas with direct regulation a polluting company has no incentive to pollute any less than what is allowable.”
A Pigovian tax would be an effective way to strike up environmental change because it would increase the money available for conservation and restoration of nature, but would also alarm people to the importance of environmental protection, when they feel the pain of degradation to their wallets. 
·         Pigovian Tax by Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pigovian_tax
·         Ecotax by Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecotax
·         Eco-tax should not spoil simplicity of GST by Sukumar Mukhopadhyay, http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/eco-tax-should-not-spoil-simplicitygst/392982/

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Some Political Ecology


Rowan University has done a lot of talk about “going green,” Rowan even has posters made, like for their garbage receptacles, to flaunt how “green” they are.   But what makes Rowan green?  I have seen no more green on campus in my 2 years being here, in fact, due to recent construction there is noticeably less greenery.  And what greenery there is now is decorative shrubbery or typical sod.  What Rowan needs to do to go green and promote a healthy ecosystem is to revisit old sites on campus and reevaluate their uses, not just create new spaces.  Unfortunately, this movement will not flow on as smoothly as it should.
One outstanding point of interest is the traffic circle at Robinson and Education Halls.  It is empty space!  Through this lot run a number of concrete paths to a central cement pad, and all of this is surrounded by grass.  This would be a perfect place for real habitat like native trees and bushes; instead it is a useless lot.  Students don’t even do anything in this space, except walk through it on occasion.  What’s worse is that the sidewalks in place do not follow the path students want to take, and on multiple occasions students can be observed walking near but not on the sidewalk.  This is a perfect space to start renovating and it would be naturally and aesthetically bettered by reverting it to a more natural landscape.
The Edgewood garden in Rowan’s sustainable living community is one step in the right direction.  Vacant lot space was converted into planters, which the Edgewood apartment residents maintain.  They plant, care for and then get food or flowers from the garden.  This is among the few redesignations of land around Rowan University that is actually good the environment, not detrimental.
However, there are a number of things that stand in the way of changing land at Rowan: people, rules and money.  First, people have to care about what you’re doing, how do you get them invested in green space?  Even after people are interested in work around Rowan, discussion with RU legislation would have to be opened and all of the pre-existing rules would have to be catered to.  That is, if Rowan’s leaders even want to hear about this.  The big deterrent of change is money; this is what people are concerned with.  Where is there money to do this?  Naturally, money is not a long-term thing and the idea that you could save money by not having to constantly baby a lawn and plant short-living shrubs is too long term to matter.  Any progress toward environmental improvement at Rowan is not going to be without resistance.  

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Creative Workspaces

            I initially could not find an interesting field of study within my Google search of “Environmental Psychology.”  What would make my paper stand out?  I sat in my apartment’s living room and looked at all the boring things I see every day.  This is when I stumbled upon an article I immediately hated: Space Meets Status: Designing Workplace Performance‬ by Jacqueline Vischer.  Her papers strikes at individualism in the workspace and caters those who are “liberated enough to overcome the primitive urges of Territorial Man.”  You cannot help but picture countless sterile cubicals.
            Why Not?, a book  I have read on innovation through creative thought, makes mention of IDEO.  IDEO is global design consultancy, famous not just for their first-class product designs but also for the treatment of their employees.  IDEO prides themselves with providing their employees with personalized offices and public meeting areas that are functional and stimulating.  The Art of Innovation discusses IDEO in much greater detail.  In one of IDEO’s locations, an airplane wing, think “freedom”, is suspended from the ceiling above a central conference table.  Rather than save the best office for executives, IDEO reserves the best rooms and views for public spaces for their employees.  This wild use of space is not what Jacqueline Vischer had in mind though, because one could understand an aversion to IDEO’s somewhat ridiculous prop.  Vischer identified having family photos or art, or bringing lamps from home, as problematic to teamwork in the workplace.
            There must be some credibility to this workspace freedom; IDEO is not the only modern company to have the same idea about their employees’ workspace, another company famous for this is Google.  When pictures of Google’s work areas first hit the Internet, they were considered a hoax.  But Google’s workspace is real, and is complete with fireman’s poles, pool tables and all the food you can eat.  They have employee spaces designed for different purposes such as scenic rooms with retired gondola cars for private conversation and also comfortable workrooms with massive expanses of whiteboards for thinking aloud. 
            I feel that this effort to make stimulating workplaces is part of these companies’ continued success.  I tested this theory with some research of my own.  I wrote this article while sitting in a mock living room set placed in a plot grass between Rowan’s Mullica and Whitney buildings from 12-midnight on.  Complete with a sizeable area rug, a beanbag chair and my laptop (as well as snacks) this workspace provided me with a stimulating but not distracting environment.  Once I moved from my uniform, white living room to a more diverse environment, I felt much more at ease, more engaged in work and I had ceased looking for distraction.
            Although I am a proponent of interesting, engaging work places, I do feel that it should be monitored; however, not monitored to the controlled state that Jacqueline Vischer would like.  My outdoors office had some flaws, and this sort of thing would need to be eliminated to keep workspaces efficient.  Distraction found me, in the form of friends who came to visit me while trying to accomplish my work.  From this I can see there are flaws to having freedom over your workplace, but overall allowing employees liberties when in the workspace makes work a more comfortable and enjoyable place, while still facilitating productivity. 

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

What Does Food Mean to You?


            No matter who you are or where you’re from, food sends you messages.  A raw steak, dinner at a friend’s house and good table manners all send messages, conscious or unconscious, to those observing.  These messages can be understood through semiotics, the study of symbols.  The food, act of preparing it and the manner in which you eat are all different symbols, and are constantly interpreted.
            In the most basic sense, food is understood by all living organisms.  A bear receives messages from berries it sees and forages, and from prey it catches and kills.  One example of this type of symbol is illustrated in the science fiction novel, Babel-17 by Samuel R. Delany.  In the novel, the main character, Rydra, is given a talking bird as a present.  The bird is trained to say certain phrases and one of these is “Hello, Rydra, it’s a fine day out and I’m happy.” Rydra becomes frightened by this because she knows the bird is thinking “There is another earthworm coming.”  To the bird, Rydra’s presence represents food and Rydra herself is a symbol for food. 
            What’s more useful to us is how we interpret prepared meals.  The act of preparing food for someone is symbolic.  Making a meal for someone has apparent symbols in itself; the amount of effort that goes into preparing a meal creates value, and then by giving someone a meal they receive the message that they are deserving of the food and all of effort that went into it. 
            Even manners are symbolic.  Table manners have social value and displaying them shows respect for the other person and also directly speaks highly of your person.  Knowing how to properly use silverware is not just a silly formality. Pierre Bourdieu, sociologist and philosopher, saw this and remarked “It is cheaper to impress with an expensive meal than expensive clothes, cars or houses.”
            Although food is easily understood to us as necessary sustenance, food unconsciously represents more than just that.  It is evidence of relationships and value and this is unconsciously weighed in our minds whenever we encounter food.

  • Babel-17, Samuel R. Delany

Monday, September 26, 2011

How Actor-Network Theory Does Not Apply to Human-Environmental Interaction

                Sociologists always try to make the most sense of interaction, but they have gone too far with Actor-Network Theory.  Actor-Network Theory is a unique sociological view that connects humans and non-humans (including objects) into a massive network of what influences what.  However, Actor-Network Theory (ANT) is much criticized and likened to an actual ant, because it fails to explain why relations are and simplifies complex relationships down to just the direct influences.
When analyzing the environment with Actor-Network Theory, trees and humans would have an unclear relationship.  Someone utilizing Actor-Network Theory could tell that trees and humans interact, but ANT does not account for the numerous ways in which they influence each other.  Without more context, one might believe that trees victimize humans, that trees and humans lead a balanced, peaceful existence or that trees are reliant on humans.  However none of these accurately portray their relationship and this is what Actor-Network Theory misses.  In the aptly-named article, On the Use of Actor-Network Theory for Developing Web Services Dedicated to Communities of Practice, an actor is described as “characterized first hand by its capability to act and interact, its influence.”  Trees do not do much direct influencing on their own; even when trees are influenced themselves, such as by humans, the cause for interaction is not important to ANT.
Actor-Network Theory would acknowledge that 17th century Portuguese sailors interacted with Dodo birds and used them for food, but not tell us that the sailors and their animals hunted Dodos to extinction. Knowing that a relationship exists is practically useless without knowing its nature.  Alone, the fact that Portuguese sailors ate Dodo birds is insignificant; what is more important is the long-term biological implications on Earth’s biodiversity. 
                What’s worse, ANT misses another facet of interaction: power.  An Actor-Network Theory analysis would not distinguish between the capabilities of trees and people.  ANT might tell us that we rely on trees for our existence but would miss how humans exhibit power over trees by destroying them.  That seems pretty important, that the relationship may extinguish or change its members, but ANT does not value that information. 
Actor-Network Theory is even less effective in the Environment-Human network because roles are constantly changing.  The position of humans relative to the environment, and vice versa, are always adapting.  The ideas people hold about nature (yet another “actor”) also change and that influences the relation humans and the environment have.


Monday, September 19, 2011

Satisfying Volunteers Expectations

What makes people volunteer to help the environment?  The obvious answer is “because they care about nature.”  Realistically, this is a no more than a romanticized notion and assumes that people’s concern for the natural world provide them with enough drive to leave their couch.  I explored practical ways in which I could actually get people to come to and continue to attend meetings for our group project. 
            First and foremost, once our group has organized and chose public meeting times, there must be refreshments.  Believe it or not, food is a huge incentive for college kids to attend meetings and a nice reward for everyone to enjoy.  Having food to eat at the end of a meeting also facilitates social interaction between members.  Part of this portrays expectancy theory, people often expect food as reward for their time and service; but this also fills Maslow’s third tier in the hierarchy of needs.  It is safe to assume that most people who are volunteering have free time, and don’t have to worry about having food or feeling safe and sheltered (the first two levels).  The third layer of Maslow’s needs is belonging, or friendship.  Besides food to share, there are other ways we could make our group’s new members feeling comfortable and accepted; feeling like a part of the group is key to keep people wanting to return.  One way to accomplish this is to play a “name game” at the beginning of meetings to help members learn each other’s names, and therefore increase comfort and interaction. 
            Another way to motivate people to volunteer is to make the project seem important.  A big factor in convincing people to volunteer is recognition, or social gratification.   This boils down to having something to show off once you have volunteered.   Our group could organize to plant trees or to build birdhouses.  For our first meeting, I am considering contacting the local press; having a reporter write and publish a short article about Glassboro’s up-and-coming environmental activism group would be great publicity, and incentive for the public to come join.  The same motivation (and group pride) could also come from a vendor fair highlighting eco-friendly businesses, services and products locally. Fun, personal enjoyment, would act as a major motivation if the right message were sent to potential members.
            We could also host friendly competition within our volunteerism.  Bird counting could be made into contest, seeing who could identify the most species in the time allotted.  The prize would be negligible, something like Spit Balls (which are fun to play with but also a useful for planting) or a simple group acknowledgement. This kind of contest highlights expectancy theory well, that people will do something with the expectation of an appropriate reward. 
            A simpler form of incentive, which would also excellent for team building, would be to give members matching T-shirts or caps.  It would build unity within but also entice outsiders with the promise of belonging (Maslow’s Third Level) or material gain.  We would certainly be a sharp-looking group in our Courier-Post cover shot.

Sunday, September 11, 2011

Creating a Dynamic Project Group

We have all worked on a group project and found that your group could not accomplish an objective as efficiently as possible.  Sometimes the problem is that your group-mates cannot agree on a basic part of the project. Other times a problem stems from members who take too many creative liberties or those who are not willing to take any at all.  Some members fail to contribute because they do not see a reason to.  As they are, these individuals would make a weak team. However, if we balance each of these people’s mannerisms to highlight their strengths, we can create ideal teams for completing a project, such as our class’s final group project.
My first experience with teams built around their members’ personal traits came in the fall of my freshman year.  Composition I professor, the now-retired Dr. Donald Stoll, utilized these attributes, which he saw as learning patterns, to combine me and my peers into efficient teams.  He used an online service called Learning Connections Inventory to gauge each individual’s stronger patterns.  Students at Rowan all have access to this test for free through their Rowan Self-Service accounts.  The Learning Connections Inventory, LCI for short, examines four learning patterns: Precise, Sequential, Technical Reasoning, and Confluent.  Precise patterns value accuracy and want to know exactly what is going on, Sequential patterns seek order and consistency, Technical patterns desire practicality and independence, and Confluent patterns rely on intuition and do not like to follow rules. Though we all use each pattern, most people have one or two that they utilize most.
It is easy to visualize how a team of Sequential people could argue about each other’s methods and take too long planning and not enough time acting.  A Precise team would likely pay too much attention to details on step one and never produce a product in time.  A team of Technical individuals might not want to work together at all.  Confluent people would fail to follow rules and create something that does not fit the criteria. 
However, all of these patterns have comparable strengths in their own right.  Sequential people are good at planning and keeping Confluent members in line; Precise members will raise important questions and add details that Technical members might find unimportant; Technical individuals would find practical application for your project and would examine purpose where Sequential people would otherwise blindly accept parts of a process; finally, Confluent people bring a different perspective to work and could draw Precise members away from detail to keep a steady rate of progress.
In short, a strong team is composed of members who dominate in each of the four different learning patterns. But what about LCI makes it more valuable than a Meyers-Briggs test?  I found the answer to this question as a direct result of my own confluence.  While scrolling down the Let Me Learn webpage (letmelearn.org), the organization that created the LCI, my eye caught their headquarters address.  It is in Glassboro!  With only 45 minutes before my next class started, I quickly recruited my friend Alex and his car to take me to Let Me Learn’s headquarters.  We arrived in no-time at Let Me Learn Inc. where we met Executive Director Joel Johnston.  He described to us how a person’s personality is much more fickle than their learning pattern.  We also discussed how each pattern manifests itself in people and what they would bring to a group. 
After our discussion with one of Learning Connections Inventory’s creators, it was evident that this would be an easy way to maximize our class’s potential for creating an outstanding project.  Every Rowan student already has LCI results available online in their Rowan Self-Service account!  I propose we use LCIs to chose groups in class, and judge how effectively our groups function to accomplish our objective. This practice would be effective outside of the classroom as well, employers would be able to better allot jobs and create teams for jobs if they know the learning patterns of their employees.