M7 (Hawks)

After Reading Chapter 7 here are the questions that stood out to me in the number 6 ‘Learning Objective’ on page 248:

What obligations do we have to future generations?

If I had not read the chapter and answered the question with just the knowledge I had before that I would have stated that we have much obligations to the future generation. We come from different generations and what they left us and taught us had an impact to us. So why shouldn’t we look back and ponder what we can do to at least stabilize a decent grounding for the future? However, as I had stated, once I had read the chapter I realized the difficulty of that process of change and the thoughts of the future generation in general. Not everyone is going to agree to do something to possibly help future generations if it hinders something they can utilize for their own gains in the present. That’s not to say that I don’t think that said present gain could be used for what they think is their possible future but I am saying there are multiple choices people have for either present use or future use. What a person decides to do with those choices is completely up to them. Let’s say even if everyone agrees to try and preserve resources for the future generations, who is to say that that is what the future generation wants? An example I’ll make is this one; Person X does not care for things like parks and mountain hiking trail or things like that but is more focused on the now for themselves in big cities and invests in corporations where as Person Y is opposite of Person X. Person Y does everything they can to protect the said parks and resources for they future child, Person Z. When Person Z Is born and Person Y passes away, who is to say that Person Z will become like Person Y? What if Person Z decides to live  like Person X does? Point is, we as people can try to do what we think is best for the future but do we really know what is best? With these thoughts in mind, I still have the same ideals that I had but I feel like I am more open to the fact that there is more than just a ‘black and white’ point of view. There is a ‘gray’ area. So, for me, I’m going to try to do what I think is best for ‘my’ future generation and I understand everyone else in the world has their own vision of that. I now say whether or not we have an obligation to our Future Generation is complex and Completely up to moral opinions.

Does nature have Value in itself?

Following up with the last question, I kind of view this question in the same way. One person may see that nature has value in multiple different ways and would want to put a lot of stock into protecting said value where as another person can only see 1 or 2 ways that nature has value and not put any other thought into it. This question, unlike the question before, however has more concrete evidence to prove one side is more logical than the other. If a person is looking at nature for its beauty and wonderment then it is based off of opinion. If a person is looking at nature for its resources and livelihood then it is based off of facts. This is all dependent though on how nature itself is viewed. This brings it back to how the main basis is moral opinion.

So it is fair to say that both the questions really can only be answered with one persons opinion or that the question cannot really be answered.

 

To finish this module, the question was asked to us for our opinion on if pollution costs should be put more on the companies that cause the polluting or the costs should be put on the people that stand to benefit from protection and restoration. My belief on this is that I think it could benefit from a little bit of both. Both parties should pay. However, I believe that the companies that caused the pollution should do a bit more of the pay. As of right now, in my mind, this is slightly fair (I say slightly because I know that the companies, corporations, and people that benefit from the protection of resources will have their own say as to why this is unfair) way of pollution compensation. The way I’m thinking right now is we all benefit in someway to both the protection of the environment as well as the polluting of it. If both parties agree to that statement then it should work out for both parties. Then there’s the fact I said more payment to the companies/corporations on this. This is because I think if that polluting in the way that they do is the only way they can think of doing their business with no other alternatives then they should at least pay for the potential damages that follow up with their choices other than the main choice they are working with (thought process being a paper mill can do more damage to the environment then just the deforestation of trees and how much the environment is impacted by that one thing). So maybe something like 60/40 or something like that. I don’t know. That’s just my thought process as of now.

Thank you very much for the read.