Having Faith

I really enjoyed this piece and all the interesting facts it had. I was totally unaware of all the problems that are caused by something so small, so hidden, and to think we know what we are doing. We think we know the effects of our actions, the chemical processes we take advantage of, the problems caused from the use of Plastics and petrochemicals. There is always some new problem, new side effect of plastics coming out in the news every couple years. After reading all the awful things people have done to the environment, it makes me wish I had lived some 200 years ago.

My First Summer in the Sierras

I was frozen in anticipation reading just as John was frozen starring down the bear. I was suspended by the thought of what could come next; obviously he wasn’t killed, being able to tell of the experience. Nonetheless, I was very intrigued by what would happen next. What an exciting experience, even though he is frozen still, I am sure his heart was beating a thousand times a second. I could picture the scene with every descriptive word he wrote. He left the meadow with a story to tell and a very suspenseful one.

A Thousand-Mile Walk to the Gulf

Muir makes a remarkable claim about whether man was created greater than all other creatures. Man is ignorant to consider himself higher than other creatures and will justify its own endeavors over the needs of other mortals. Another suburb expands over the homes of all creatures, plants and animals alike, another forest exploited for financial gain. Man goes about life blindly ignoring the life around him and takes more than he gives back. A thief, plundering the wealth and life of the planet, someday karma will catch up to him, no jail for his crimes….

Silent Spring

“Who guarded the poisoned area to keep out any who might wander in, in misguided search for unspoiled nature?” The phrase misguided search for unspoiled nature sounds very loud to me. Many people are right in expecting unspoiled nature and enjoying it to its fullest. However they are misguided from the reality that faces them. Nature has been destroyed and you should not expect to find it unspoiled. “Who has decided – who has the right to decide…that the supreme value is a world without insects?” Another example of man exerting his believed dominance over the environment, the master of all other creatures, yet he runs wildly himself.

Industrial Tourism

“Then I went home to the trailer, taking a shortcut over the bluffs.” Great line to end this piece of writing. I enjoyed hearing his ideas; they helped me formulate my thoughts on the matter. The agree with him about how the national parks are getting diluted and destroyed by those unwilling to leave their cars. One of the best things about the Boundary Waters is the peace and quiet one gets back in the woods where only a canoe and feet can take someone. “Mechanized Wheelchairs,” is a wonderful way to describe the cars; really evokes an emotion in me about how lazy and helpless some people are.

A First American Views His Land

This piece was very interesting. I always viewed early man as having a great appreciation for the land like Native Americans. Also, that a changed happened as time progressed. However it’s easy to understand the point that the earliest man thought like the modern man and the Native Americans had developed their respect for the land. Mainly the way they think of the land is different. The author says ownership implies consumption while relating that love implies conservation. Modern man owns land. Native Americans love the land. Which is why they have such fundamental differences in view of the earth.

Walden Pond

Thoreau has very intriguing views and I can see how his writing influenced McCandless the way it did. He emphasizes exploring one’s life from the most simplistic stance. He states quite clearly that learning is best done by experience instead of unnecessary learning done at universities. A person learns only what is necessary and is thus “unburdened” by the things not important in this life. I like how he describes this by the boys that obtain a knife. The one that learns to do it and gets a knife from it, or the one who knows the process but hasn’t done it. “Which would be most likely to cut his fingers?”