Discussion for argument paper--when the experts disagree how do you decide which side to believe?

• look at their supporting arguments and see which are more convincing
• look at funding--if the experts who say cigarette smoking is safe are funded by the tobacco companies can you believe them?
• look for different explanations of the same fact to understand both sides
• look and see if the large majority of experts are on one side--you can sometimes tell this by major scientific organizations issuing statements
• notice criticisms of research and even evaluate it for yourself (eg. how many people were studied or how large an area)
• don't take any source as completely trustworthy
• it doesn't work to say: "there are facts and there are theories--the facts stay the same and the theories change"
• if you can never be completely objective, then we need to look at opinion
• some sources are valuable for facts, other sources are useful to understand the different opinions
• look for the assumptions and the values that may be behind conflicting opinions
• we are looking for how effectively you explain why the arguments are better on the side you pick and what is wrong with the arguments on the other side
  

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In 1960, what kind of protection was there for the environment?

• Park Service and Forest Service (and other agencies) managing public land for public benefit
• organizations like the Sierra Club and Audubon Society could lobby against harmful projects and build public opinion
• local laws against pollution, particularly water pollution
  

Something dramatic happened in the 10 years or so around 1970

• In the 1960s, the environmental movement began to grow
• new federal laws that dramatically changed protection for the environment
• general shift in public opinion
• the government took new roles--new agencies as well as new laws
  

This new public opinion was very confusing for the government agencies that looked after natural land.  Some of this was land that was publically owned, but there was also a government role affecting private land.

Private ownership is not total control of land--for example, in the U.S. wildlife is publically owned

• state or local governments can restrict hunting and fishing even on private land
• licenses are required
• rules to preserve good hunting enforced by the license system
  
• government agencies restocked game animals and fish
• consider the conflict as environmental concerns grew--fishermen wanted fast-growing fish to be stocked, ecologists complained that fish stocking was disrupting the natural ecosystem
  
• should people be restricted from developing privately owned land that is home to an endangered species?

Water

• states established fish hatcheries to continually restock fish in streams
• rivers and streams are publicly owned
• in the west who can use the water from a river and how much is a huge issue

Public Lands

• in th e 19th century the federal government was trying to sell or give public land into private ownership
  
• in the mid-20th century sale of federal land stopped
• Federal land became not something the government was trying to distribute to the people by land sales and homesteading but rather land the federal government was retaining for its own purposes
• along comes the environmental movement and presses the federal government to change the purposes
  
• the goals of management of federal land have changed radically over time (eg. Forest Service change from timber production to recreation)
• how did that shift happen?
  

Park Service:

• Environmentalists--were angry that the Park Service had not supported the Wilderness Act
  
• what changed in the 1960s?  Park Service was force to change its approach
  
• wanted the parks to be more natural--don't feed the bears
• Yosemite had a tradition called Firefall where a bonfire was pushed over a high cliff each evening--this went on for 88 years until in 1968 the Park Service decided it was a manmade tradition damaging to the environment
• whatever they did it made some group angry
• many new parks were created for political reasons, diluting resources

We will look more at the Forest Service next time, but Rothman stresses:

• the Forest Service had traditionally criticized timber industry practices
• but in the 1950s it became more dependent on the timber industry for support
• Multiple Use Sustained Yield Act of 1960
• increasing timber cutting and recreational use came into conflict
• the Forest Service opposed the Wilderness Act, which took land out of multiple use
• foresters had been the heroes of conservation and it was a shock that environmentalists came to see them as the enemy

Bureau of Land Management

• got the leftover land--allowed public use of that land by permits for grazing, mining, and logging
• who is the constituency--who are the people this government agency is most directly serving
  
• local support came for allowing profitable use of the land
  
• range wars--political fights about changing grazing rules
• ranchers don't want wolves (remember this is federally owned land) and they don't want buffalo because they carry a disease cattle can catch
  

Notice the different messages of the old and new agency emblems--the old shows a surveyor, a logger, an oil worker, a cowboy, and a miner

Bureau of Reclamation:

• had seen its mission as large scale water development projects
• somewhat to provide water to cities
• provide irrigation water so desert could be turned into farms
  
• through the 1960s the agency tended to ignore its opponents
• the Sierra Club regretted not opposing Glen Canyon Dam and decided to fight the BLM more seriously 
  
• old goal--to tame the river, stop floods and provide water for irrigation
  
• the public had become much more suspicious of progress, of conquering nature
  
• people no longer saw conquering a wild river as a good thing
• concern about fish affected by dams
  

People were beginning to see quality of life (living in a pleasant environment) as important even when it conflicted with economic growth and progress

• the young people of the baby boom in many cases didn't want to grow up to be like their parents--they wanted more freedom
• life seemed too orderly
  
• Vietnam and Watergate led to distrust of government

Long-term planning by government agencies came to be seen not as professional wisdom but as serving commercial interests--agencies eventually responded by trying to respond to public opinion, much weakening scientific planning

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