Article Review Example: Exploring Human-Nature Dynamics and Global Challenges

According to the article “Sustainability or Collapse” Costanza et al, the author expounds on historical ways in which humans have interacted with nature which currently and in the future will continue to define the increasing interconnection of global systems. Based on the article chapter “What Can We Learn from Integrating the History of Humans and the Rest of Nature” the author explains the relationship between the currently experienced scenarios in the globe to what has been taking place several centuries ago. Thus the discussion will involve the summarizing of the integration of human history and the rest of nature.

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In the article, the author tries to find answers relating to various questions regarding the currently experienced problems by humans mainly in the 21st century. These questions encompass; the currently experienced pandemics, global warming, water shortage, and collapse of worldwide finance, continued experienced international terrorism, and the meeting of global energy demand. Moreover, the author tries to answer these questions by classifying the nature in which humans have interacted with the environment in the past, which stands as the cause of the currently experienced phenomenon. Additionally, the author emphasizes that as humans we should note that, having our past interaction with the environment is the result of what we are facing today. Further, we should also note that it is how we interact with the environment in the current 21st century that would determine the result of the future to come. Thus according to the author, it is through what we are experiencing today in terms of life-threatening phenomena that we as humans should learn and change to ensure a suitable and desirable future for our species would be created.

Based on the article, the history of humanity has been cast in terms of the rising and falling of various historic events such as the great civilization, the world wars, certain human achievements, and historic natural phenomena such as earthquakes, plagues, and floods. However, these events could not completely describe a real integration of human history since they tend not to include some important ecological and climatic context and other emerging issues such as technology. This demand for fully understanding the integrated human history led to coming up with a more integrated paradigm that could help in surveying the past and test alternative explanations thoroughly. Due to this, a project known as the global change research community titled "Integrated History and Future of People on Earth (IHOPE)” was formed.

Through the operation of IHOPE, various past tests were surveyed to determine the integration of human history. For instance, IHOPE surveyed the evolution of the human-environment relationship. According to the survey, IHOPE established that human societies respond to environmental signals in several ways such as immigration, collapse, and failure as well as creative interventions founded through discovery. The author explains the evolution of the human-environment relationship to have been contributed by various cultural elements involving social and political structure practices which resulted in constrained responses. Further, more recent changes such as “accelerated globalization and global environmental change” in the human-environment relationship have linked the human relationship with nature over the past centuries.

According to the IHOPE, associating global change with green gas warming as evidenced in the past decades, the global change research community found the condition to have started more than 1000 years ago when various European landscapes resembled the way they appear today. This was also evidenced by some of the phenomena present today such as the rise in the human population, the start of industrialization, the escalation of global communication, and modification of land use. IHOPE further establishes the evolution of the human-environment relationship mainly with the current global change in climate to have started in the last 1000 years. For instance, in the period 1315 - 1317, the Western Europe region experienced a combination of weather seasons which involved the rainy autumn, cold spring, and wet summer a condition that led to the failure of crops and a slowdown of urban expansion. Other experience phenomena included the locust invasion in 1338 and the millennium floods of 1342. Further, due to the extreme event that impacted the social order in the 14th century, the period paved the way for the modern age. This period was characterized by dramatic changes such as the development of technology, improved economic practices, and the introduction of more organized political strategies that helped to reduce the past vulnerability. Thus from the IHOPE survey on the evolution of the human-environment relationship, it can be established that the present sociological system of experienced nature and complexity is dependent on past occurrences. For instance, the recent 20th-century phenomenon the “Great Acceleration” was characterized by an increase in the human population, an increase in economic activity, increased resource use, transport, communication, and an increase of knowledge in science and technology. The phenomenon was triggered in various parts of the world after the end of World War II and still continues in the current century.

Conclusion

Thus, as expressed in the article, the integration of human history and the rest of nature dates back centuries. For instance, based on the survey by "Integrated History and Future of People on Earth (IHOPE)”, the evolution of the human-environment relationship dates back more than 1000 years ago. The survey also affirms that the nature in which humans have interacted with the environment in the past stands as the cause of the current experienced phenomenon. Thus, as per the author, it is how we interact with the environment in the current 21st century that would determine the result of the future for our species.

Works Cited

Costanza, Robert, et al. "Sustainability or collapse: what can we learn from integrating the history of humans and the rest of nature?." AMBIO: A Journal of the Human Environment 36.7 (2007): 522-527.