An Unsustainable ParadigmPart 1

Michael R. Edelstein, Ph.D.

Blind Effects

“On our present course, by E.O. Wilson’s estimate, half of all plant and animal species could be extinct by 2100 — that is, within the lifetime of a child born today….

So it’s startling to discover that the very idea of extinction was unthinkable, even heresy, only a few lifetimes ago.”

Richard Conniff, “Lost and Gone Forever”NYT FEBRUARY 3, 2011

The Buffalo Hunt

Before European Invasion• The Prairie Biome

http://www.uen.org/utahlink/tours/tourFames.cgi?tour_id=14051

• 75 million buffalo ranged prairie BWM. Migrate over 100 sq. miles for water and food in herds of 1,000 under alpha bull

• Herds stampede ex, Coronado 1541 saw them fill an entire ravine

• Natural threats wolves, coyote, bear and lion, grass fire and freeze

Human Ecology---Plains Indian• Nomads in search of Buffalo

– Commanche see which way horned toad hop• Hunt by running down herd or infiltrating in hide• Women skinned and tanned with brains• Buffalo provided food, hide, teepee, tools, toys

and ornaments. Use everything. Pemican.• Animism. Tongue eaten in post-hunt feast;

smoke blown in 6 directions• Happy Hunting Ground---heaven + buffalo• Not imagine world without buffalo

Enter the Europeans

• Buffalo main food on plains. Thirst/warmth.– “A stake cooked on chips needs no pepper.”

• Whites join hunt in 1830s, reduce to 40 m.• Threaten Indians---Buffalo wars 1860s

– 1867 Treaty of Medicine Lodge trade reservation life for saving Buffalo.

• 1871 Buffalo became commercially valuable; by 1883 nearly all destroyed.

Factors• Trade in Buffalo Robes with hair • Trains---sports hunting excursions• Ham and tongue became delicacy in US• New arsenic tanning technique 1870s made

hides valuable.• End of Civil War---unemployment. Hunt drew

hundreds. • Sharps 50 cal rifle 1872---kill from stand at 600

yards. • U.S. wanted Indians confined to reservations• Ranchers wanted prairie cleared.

First Conservation Movement• Commander Richard Dodge, Fort Dodge:

– “I have counted 112 carcasses of buffalo inside a semicircle of 200 yards radius, all of which were killed by one man from one spot in less than ¾ hour.”

• By 1873, hunters left for Texas, then Dakotas. • Movement to stop slaughter, SPCA, soldiers

– Territorial legislation---too late except Nebraska -1875• 1879 hunt uneconomical• By 1883 less than 1,000 Buffalo remained• Bones then used for fertilizer and sugar, once

picked up, only wallows remained

Human Ecology

• Frederick Clements described the sustainable relationship between prairie, buffalo and Indian as a Human Ecology.

• The North American Grasslands biome was a climax stage of an arid region exposed to dry winds and shallow rainfall.

• Plains Indian and Buffalo were partners in a stable ecological association there

• White men destroyed the stabile climax ecosystem

DISTORTED VALUES• Frontier Society vs. Sustainable Society

– Colonization versus maturity• Engineering Fallacy: Use of technology to

extend control beyond natural limits• Economic fallacy: Utilitarian values of economic

system applied to all relationships, ignoring externalities

• Confusion of Capital and Nature– “Natural resource”– Commodification of nature

Distorted Values 2

• Homocentric vs biocentric shift– Replace Buffalo in ecosystem with controlled

and owned cattle as resource• Man Over Nature vs Part of It

– Ambient vs environment– Lynn White’s thesis

Proof of Lynn White’s Thesis

Dominant Social Paradigm

• Man is above and outside nature• Nature is a resource at man’s disposal• Growth and Progress are perpetual• Technology solves all problems• Individual Interests over Community• Rich and Poor get what they deserve• Na Na Na Na Na Na Live for today

Lester Ward, 1893, the Psychic Factors of Civilization

Experts must plan (no laissez faire)Organize nature where it is inefficient (ex. winding

rivers)Engineer a paradise on earthThis is our moral imperative (we are over the

primitive and ape).We can pacify nature by expanding the Garden of

Eden through a moral equivalent of war.Later Technocrats Movement in U.S.

THE Unsustainable Paradigm

CONTINUED ON PART 2