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Student Name Professor Name Subject 27 September 2012 "Why I Am Not An Environmentalist" The article Why I Am Not An Environmentalist serves as a criticism of environmentalist approach to everyday life and upbringing. The main idea of the article is to show that there are points of view, opposite to those imposed by the environmentalist doctrine. The author calls environmentalism a sort of religious movement with corresponding nonscientific, purely emotional guidelines and argumentation. Also, he compares this approach to the so-called scientific or economic one that proves to be based on logic and economic laws. Being radical in his views, the author claims that most of the ideas, imposed by the environmentalists, should be analyzed from all possible sides and all aspects should be taken into consideration before accepting their position as a moral law for human beings. Also, the author argues that a number of environmental issues should be ignored in order to make our life more comfortable and contemporary. The author operates a number of purely economic terms when stating his position. The case of Jacks woodland and Jills parking space represents an example of a tradeoff and the opportunity costs. A tradeoff is a situation of losing one aspect or quality in return for another; an opportunity cost is the cost of anything measured in terms of the value of the next best alternative that was not used. Wilderness has to be sacrificed to gain a new parking space. The decisions are mutually exclusive; both upsides and downsides of each particular choice must be taken into consideration. The same is with the usage of pesticides comparing to the growing price for fruit and vegetables. When trying to prove that recycling can be counterproductive to the goals of environmentalists, the author describes the term incentives. Incentive is a motivated influence, a stimulus. Environmental concerns and taking care of companys own publicity force the

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company to be environmentally responsible. The author says that recycling paper can eliminate an incentive for paper producing companies to plant trees and thus cause forests to shrink. The long-term effects of recycling paper can therefore lead to the results, opposite to those environmentalists fight for. The case of luxuriant shower reminds us about the concept of market. As long as the demand for this kind of product remains, suppliers will try to satisfy this demand, driving up the price of water and at the same time helping sellers. As we can see, the author tried to prove that environmentalism with its shortcomings cannot be considered a commonly accepted point of view. With the growing social hysteria associated with the global warming, such point of view becomes popular and widespread. At the same time, authors argumentation is not strong enough. He did not address the environmental issues themselves but rather he tried to prove that people have their right to sacrifice some of those issues for the sake of making their life more comfortable. Personally, I do not think that environmental issues are not important at all. Rather, I believe that being important, they are not solved in a right way. Those, who try to solve environmental problems, usually confuse cause and effect. Many of the decisions, offered by such people, do not really solve the ecologic problems themselves but make it hard for our economic life to prosper. However, I agree with the author, that just like all other problems that human beings encounter, environmental issues must be handled using the scientific approach and scientific methods, and we shouldnt let our emotions and short-term fears dictate our behavior.

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