5 Theses Regarding the Environment

The drastic changes to the environment are the single greatest threat to humanity today. It is a multi-faceted issue that cannot be solved overnight and it most definitely will not be solved one person at a time. There need to be major sweeping changes on the level of government in order for any change to happen. There have been little snippets of hope for change coming into the government, but instead of being a unifying issue due to its reach into all of our lives, it has found its way into the aisles, becoming a Republican and Democrat hot topic. Major change needs to happen, and it needs to happen soon. This issue transcends political ideologies and at its core is a human issue.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez co-author of Green New Deal

1. [Policy Claim]
The state of the environment should be of greater concern to our government as demonstrated in legislation to protect the environment.
2. [Definition Claim]
The catastrophic climate change of our environment is the paramount issue facing our generation.
3. [Comparison Claim]
Although the changes in our environment have taken place slowly over many years, the changes in our environment should be treated as a flu-like epidemic. We should take all necessary measures to contain the spreading as quickly as possible.
4. [Evaluation Claim]
Governments across the world have taken inadequate measures to stop the growing epidemic of climate change.
5. [Casual Claims]
The drastic changes in the environment are caused by man-made industries, and humans are also the only ones capable of implementing measures to reverse such changes.

This exercise in formatting different thesis statements has helped to think about what kind of argument I want to make regarding the environment and our duty to be stewards over the earth we live on. Right now I am leaning towards a comparison claim, or a policy claim, because I feel like those are the strongest arguments I can make.

Image Credit: "Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Official Portrait" (public domain images via Wikipedia Commons)

Revisiting Hot Spots in Statistics

Red skies at sunset

In my previous blog post I looked at three drastically different topics that relate to statistics. One topic was the environment which is a very polarizing topic in the world today. Even the above picture, which depicts a beautiful sky, is a cause for grief because that color would not be as stark if it were not for carbon emissions.

1. Statistics in Sports (A lot of professional athletes are fed up with dialogue about what constitutes a play among people who have never played the game)

• Historical Connections

Sports have a great deal to do with popular culture. Basketball and soccer are globally recognized sports, whereas baseball, rugby, football all have millions of followers in several countries. Also, athletes have more of a public voice to share their opinions through mediums such as twitter and other forums of social media. Given that the happenings in athletic worlds are discussed among a large contingency of followers, it is well known that there are many athletes who objects to a solely statisitically driven approach to sports. 

• Communication Connections

As previously stated, our view into the minds of these athletes is made possible through mediums of communication such as twitter. When athletes want to share more comprehensive and complete view points they often take to The Player's Tribune to do so. Without the current access to social media, we would not be nearly as privy to understanding where athletes stand on certain issues, both related and unrelated to the sport they currently play. 

2. Statistics and the Anti-Vax Movement

• Historical Connections

The Anti-Vax movement is connected to the rational world of the Enlightenment and the feeling and imagination of Romanticism. There is a rational approach that those who stand in opposition to the Anti-Vax movement implement to try to show that because history repeats itself, if you are vaccinated you have a high likelihood of staying safe from certain diseases. The Anti-Vax movement uses feeling and imagination to share individual horror stories and portray them as if they are the rule and not the exception

• Communication Connections

I have seen a lot of interesting debates on social media regarding this topic. In a lot of the conversations that I have seen, those in support of vaccinations talk about herd immunity and try to take emotion out of the conversation, whereas those against vaccinations talk about instances where they had a child get sick, or the friend of a friend had a child who was autistic. Those who support vaccinations try to establish their credibility through ethos using government websites in a lot of instances, whereas those who are against vaccinations use a lot of pathos in their arguments. 

3. Statistic and the Environment

• Historical Connections

Caring for nature has long been something that people have professed a need for in this world. Even back in the days of the Renaissance people like Leonardo DaVinci would talk about the need for us to live in harmony with our surroundings as opposed to ruining our surroundings for more convenient living situations. During Romanticism there was a push to get back to nature and appreciate the world that you see around you. 

• Communication Connections

This topic has been the center of much heated debate in the world today. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez presented the New Green Deal which promptly got shut down. Scientists throughout the world are proclaiming the destruction that will come through climate change if we do not take drastic actions. President Trump tweeted during the polar vortex that obviously global warming is not real to which many people took objection, even with people such as Chris Evans chiming in about what climate change means. There is not a major media outlet that has not had at least one story on climate change in the world today. 

I think it is really interesting that history truly does repeat itself and that values that were relevant in the world hundreds of years ago find themselves in our day and age. Arguments are still won or lost by appealing to pathos, logos, or ethos. People 500 years ago were talking about the need to care for the world, and the first vaccination was performed in 1796 for smallpox. Statistics is such an interesting realm of study, because it can truly be applied to whatever you are most interested in. 

Hot Spots in Statistics

Hot Spots in Statistics:

• Statistics in Sporting

In the last few years, statistics has played a more prominent role in the decisions of front offices in terms of who they sign and what shots they want players to take. There has been some backlash from players, most notably after CJ McCollum made shot after shot from midrange in Game 7 against the Denver Nuggets and all of those shots that were made were considered "bad shots". Players shot their opinions back and said that if he was not taking those shots, they do not win the game and that a good player will take those shots that might not be statistically good shots, but it was the best shot to take at that time. (More Info)

• Statistics and the Anti-vax movement

There is an overflowing cornucopia of information from veritable sources disproving that vaccines cause autism. Yet that belief remains. For some reason, people put more stock in stories that have been passed down rather than statistics which show that 1 in 500 who contract measles who have not been vaccinated will die from measles-related complications whereas 1 in 1,000,000 who are vaccinated will contract measles. (More Info)

• Lack of Appreciation for Statistics and the Environment

The issue with statistics and the environment stands in stark contrast to that of the anti-vax movement. The biggest issue with statistics and the environment is that there seems to be an impenetrable bubble of apathy surrounding the majority of the human inhabitants of the world. Statistics such as 100,000 marine animals a year die from plastic entanglement and approximately 1,000,000 sea birds die as well, are not enough to motivate people to action. What is sad is that this is the case because it does not increase businesses bottom line to be environmentally aware. (More Info)

Of these three, I am most passionate about statistics and the environment right now. It reminds me of Stephen Covey's theory about quadrant 2 living about focusing on things that are important but are not urgent. We are so trained to think about what is urgent and important or what is urgent and not important, and oftentimes what is neither important nor urgent before we seek to do productive things before they are urgent. The environment has been in the not urgent, but important category for a long time, and if we had started caring a long time ago we could have gotten ahead of the issue. Now it is becoming increasingly more important and urgent, but the need to get to work by taking a car is more urgent and so we still find ourselves taking our car. The need to efficiently carry my groceries is more urgent, so plastic bags are used. The task now is to disarm people of their apathy and replace their apathetic armor and shields with resolute swords and axes to wield drastic changes in how we treat the world we live in. 

Lessons of Leonardo

Picture of Slave Castle in Cape Coast

This last Christmas I had an opportunity to visit my family currently living in Accra, Ghana. While there we had the sobering opportunity to visit a slave castle located in the city of Cape Coast. This year, 2019, marks 400 years since the first slaves were forcibly removed from Western Africa and transported to the United States of America. Coincidentally, this year also marks 500 years since the death of Leonardo Da Vinci. Now, I know that the events surrounding those two dates are not correlated in any way, but I started thinking about what messages did Da Vinci try to share in his lifetime that were not understood not only 100 years after his death but also 500 years after his death - today? 

Da Vinci was widely known for his intrepid experiments in engineering, but he also preached the need to create structures that complement the environment around us, as opposed to ones that impede the world. Also, as a true humanist, he desired the betterment of his fellow men and detested unnecessary suffering. In his painting, "The Last Supper" you see the emotion on the faces of each apostle, and their value as humans is communicated through the unique emotions.

East Coast of Atlantic Ocean 

There are still many in the world who do not understand what Da Vinci understood. Needless suffering, abuse, human trafficking, and slavery are still running rampant in the world. The need to protect the environment and work with the environment is lost on seemingly all governments. As I sat at the foot of the slave castle looking out into the Atlantic Ocean I saw mounds of garbage and plastic floating near the shore.

It struck me that one lesson was lost in this very spot several hundred years ago - the value of the human soul and that another important lesson is being lost - the value of the world we live in. If we each took the time to be just a little more learned about a few more things, could we leave a better world than we found?

Leonardo Da Vinci is the ultimate example of the "Renaissance Man". As more people seek a greater breadth of understanding of the world around us, as he did, we can all better embrace ideas that were realized by him more than 500 years ago. By doing so we can avoid mistakes both 400 years old, and those unique to our time.