Monk's parakeets--an invasive species

Sustainability: we should live so the needs of the current generation are met without taking away the ability of future generations to meet their own needs

• when we make decisions we should ask will this hurt future generations
• if we use up all the oil we figure future generations will come up with an alternative
• on the other hand at some point it is unfair to run up debts that future generations are going to have to pay
  

Example of a test question from a past year (I won't use this one again):

• Why was the experience of European colonization so different in Africa (including temperate South Africa) than in North or South America, Australia, or New Zealand (please pick only one as your example).

key themes from this book:

• disease made it possible for Europeans to displace native people where they had no resistance to those diseases
• Europeans brought their whole ecosystem and transformed the ecosystems of the neoEuropes
• European plants and animals dominated--Why?
• Europeans cultivated plants and changed the environment in ways the native plants weren't used to (the European plants were not inherently better, they were better with European modification of the environment such as plowing and cutting down trees)
• new animals weren't part of the established predator-prey relationship--in many cases the European animals had few predators
• isolated areas have less diverse ecosystems--Europe was a big area where many kinds of plants and animals came together while less diverse ecosystems are more easily disrupted and native people were more vulnerable to disease
  
• the Europeans had to learn by experience how to take over an area--displace the native people, create a new ecosytem, how to make money
  
• and others below
  

Three waves of human transformation of the neo-Europes:

• 1. the arrival of the people we call indigenous--Amerindians, aborigines (Australia), and Maori (New Zealand)--who opened gaps in the original ecosystem. The megafauna went extinct
  
• 2. the arrival of European colonists, who took territory by force but succeeded because they transformed the ecosystem and bred rapidly
  
• 3. the arrival of huge numbers of immigrants in the 19th and very early 20th century, attracted particularly by the idea of having plenty of food (just before WWI about half the U.S. population was foreign born) combined with rapid urbanization and industrialization (eg. railroad, tractor)
  

What is the next wave of human transformation of the environment?

Review:

Crosby's central point: you can't explain the success of Europeans in the neoEuropes without using an ecological argument as an important part of the explanation
(Compare North America and Africa--why was it possible for people of European descent to become the huge majority in North and South America, Australia, New Zealand)

How do you prove this point?

• disease is an important part of the story--Crosby sees that as an aspect of ecology
  
• look to show a pattern--where European plants and animals are dominant the people are too
• can this theory explain where they failed as well as where they succeeded?
• New Zealand as as particularly clear case study
  
• weave the point about ecology together with other explanations, such as capitalism
  

how much is the success of a civilization determined by ecology?

• Europeans succeeded in colonization because their plants and animals did
• where they were less ecologically successful their colonies didn't succeed
• ecological change by itself doesn't explain everything but it is a necessary condition
  
• does this still apply to us today?
• Crosby would say this shows us how much we are a part of the ecosystem

History tends to be written separating nature and culture and focusing only on culture
to talk about environmental history we need to deal with the relationship between nature and culture
notice here that history changes

• we may find out new facts about the past
• science gives us new ways of explaining something (eg. ecology)
• as our worldview changes we come to different understandings of the past
  

when we talk about "nature" we are seeing ourselves as separate: we see nature as what is not human

• but are we so separate?
• our cultures are (to varying extents) based on nature
• human beings always modify the environment
• human beings are part of the ecosystem
• different human cultures work in different ecosystems
• there is no "nature" not affected by human beings
  

a step more specific:  how did Europeans and their plants and animals succeed?

• Crosby's explanation is that European plants and animals dominated not because they were better but because the environment was disturbed by Europeans (overgrazing, plowing, burning), creating the environment that those plants and animals needed
• It took a while for the Europeans to learn how to succeed: they tried some strategies that didn't work
  
• where they succeeded and where they didn't--they could only modify environments that were somewhat close to their own and where there weren't too many diseases that threatened them
• even with a favorable climate, they did not succeed in areas that were part of the large connected area of Africa and Asia (which were connected to Europe so diseases had already spread)--they only succeeded where ecosystems were isolated
  

What are some of Crosby's most important specific arguments:

• Europeans learned from experience where they could succeed and what worked
  
• European technology became increasingly important over time but wasn't the main story, particularly early on
  
• Europeans only succeeded when the climate was somewhat similar
• Europeans were lucky to find ecosystems with holes in them and were able to use those
• domestication of animals gave Europeans an advantage
• European plants and animals were better suited to the environment Europeans created
• Europeans couldn't have displaced the native people without the effect of diseases
• traveling across the seas--spurred technology, attitude that radical new things were possible
  

What does this theory explain, and what does it not explain?

history is not just a bunch of facts, it is instead an attempt to understand cause and effect
the natural world/ecology is one part of the story of cause and effect
historical explanations change over time--Crosby's argument wouldn't be possible without the science of ecology
the natural world is not a given, it changes too, and human beings can have major effects

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