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To me, sustainability defines the human race’s ability to maintain and preserve the world’s natural resources. People shouldn’t overly take advantage of the resources, such as animals, fruit, vegetables, other natural crops, and landscape that was naturally formed on Earth. I believe humans need temperance and rational thinking when using a natural resource because we don’t actually own everything surrounding us.
When comparing my own definition of sustainability to Robert M. Solow’s, I can mostly agree with the points he addresses. As Solow would say, “…sustainability is about distributional equity” (Solow 182). I agree with this statement because we should spread out what we take from the environment, in order to remove any chance of extinction due to man-made developments. One of Solow’s points that really stuck with me was the line, “We free-ride on each other and we free-ride on the future. One of the ways we free-ride on the future is by burdening the environment” (Solow 183). Many of our callous decisions today are made solely for the immediate future and what people want now, but realistically, decisions should be equally weighed against the public’s prosperity, the future generation (being young children of today’s age), and of course, the environment (that existed before humans). I 100% believe it is important to consider the future generation, despite some of Solow’s opinions, because the world has always emphasized bettering the children and ensuring their future is better than their predecessors or parents. But surely this should only go to a certain extent because people living now also need to live by certain standards. Additionally, I can confidently say that it is important to sustain the environment because it is a natural resource that shouldn’t be used up and taken for granted. Solow’s line: “…when we use up something that is irreplaceable, whether it is minerals or a fish species, or an environmental amenity, then we should be thinking about providing a substitute of equal value” doesn’t necessarily sit well with me because people shouldn’t just kill something off then try and replace it (Solow 184). This ties into the whole aquaculture debate, to determine if farmed salmon are sustaining wild salmon. Yes, it does seem as though farmed salmon will help population numbers of wild salmon, but then again, farmed salmon could potentially take over and replace wild salmon. It isn’t okay to replace something from nature because WE over-exploited it.
I really like your response, it is very well thought out and well articulated. I agree with many of your points, and I appreciate how better you articulated them than I. Preserving wild salmon stocks I agree is important, but I believe that it is important because I want to see salmon in the wild. I think that it is intrinsically valuable to have wild salmon. So that the future generations can see them spawning, can catch one out the river, and appreciate it. And I think that what Solow is getting at is that value is a separate one, and is a good one, but should be argued for separately. That, at least, is how I interpreted it.
I love how your response was so articulated!! I 100% agree with your definition of sustainability and I appreciate your view that replacement isn’t the same as sustainability. Replacement isn’t okay. Basically, I agree with your argument involving wild vs. domestic fisheries.
I agree with this description of how Solow described sustainability and how in depth that this went with quotes as well. I also agree with this argument of the wild fisheries against the aquaculture facing the question that we were asked.
I agree with your definition of sustainability and I like how you related it to Solow’s. It is our moral obligation to preserve species for future generations and that is where Solow’s argument goes astray. However, whether we like it or not I think that farmed salmon is sustaining wild salmon to a point. Not necessarily in the vein of replacement as Solow would suggest, but in the fact that the demand for salmon cannot be met with wild stocks alone and farmed salmon makes up the difference so that we can protect wild stocks for the future. In other words, let them eat their farmed fish so that we can stil have wild salmon. Let’s just hope that we can find away to lessen or eliminate the burden it places on the environment.
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