Reading to Be Done Before This Discussion:

:Esterbrook, Gregg. 2007. Global warming: who loses--and who wins? The Atlantic 299:52-64.

&Knox and Marston. Chapter 12: Future Geographies, pp 467-493.

Things to Bring to Class: Your own notes on the articles and/or a printout, your textbook.

Due in Discussion This Week: Answers to questions below.

Due in Discussion Next Week: Essay 1 as described below. 

Concepts/Ideas/Places: scale, place, nature , "natural" disaster, site, situation/environmental justice, social justice, spatiality, environmental determinism, scenarios, the future, global warming, climate change, greenhouse effect, greenhouse emissions / Russia, Greenland, Denmark, Antarctica, Newfoundland, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Singapore, Shanghai, Florida

Essay 1 Assignment: For your first essay you need to read the article and think about the scenarios about global warming presented in relation to what you have learned in this course. Then you will need to write a 2-3 page 5 paragraph essay that answers the following question:

Based upon what you have learned about human geography so far in this class, how reasonable are the author's predictions?

Esterbrook offers a variety of scenarios for the potential impact of global warming, some of which may be more convincing than others. You should base your answer to the essay question on your own overall assessment of his arguments in light of what you have learned in this class so far. Your thesis statement should state your argument and then identify three supporting reasons (see below for more details on how to write a successful thesis statement). However, a successful essay will offer more than an opinion on whether you believe the author is correct. You will need to draw upon the course materials (your textbook and previous readings) and apply ideas and concepts discussed in class in support of your argument. For example, if you think that the author is a bit too deterministic in his arguments you might draw upon our discussion of environmental determinism. On the other hand, if you think that his arguments sound reasonable you might quote and cite a passage that shows how he avoids falling into the trap of environmental determinism. There are many other concepts and ideas that you can use to analyze the arguments in the article.

Note that this question is different than the one posed last semester. In other words, do not be tempted to turn in a friend's essay from last semester. Your essay must be typed (or word-processed), double spaced, in 12 pt font, stapled, and with 1 inch margins all around.  You must cite any direct quotes AND paraphrased ideas from the article or other sources as directed in Citing Sources in GEO 101.  Note that I have provided you an example below by citing the article in the text and by providing a works cited section. Do the same in your papers! Papers that do not properly cite sources will lose points.

How to write this essay

Concentrate on doing the following three things when writing this essay: write a strong thesis statement, make sure that you support your argument with evidence in the supporting paragraphs, and write more than one draft of your paper.

The primary aim in your essay should be to assess the argument in the article based upon what you have learned in this class. That is you need to decide whether or not the author's arguments about the future are reasonable and use ideas from class to explain why. The question provides plenty of room for you to use your own creativity to come up with an answer. You might start by searching the article for specific scenarios, examples, or statements that help to support your argument. You might then look through your textbook, notes, and previous readings for ideas and concepts that you think might relate to the examples that you have identified. Some of you who are meteorology majors may want to dispute some of the basic climate science that the author relies upon. Doing so is fine as long as your critique does not constitute a significant portion of your paper (no more than a few sentences in the introduction or conclusion) and you can back it up with a cited source.

Whatever you plan to argue, your essay must have a thesis statement, usually placed at the end of the introductory paragraph. This thesis statement not only states your argument but outlines your entire paper by explaining why you believe the argument to be true. A thesis statement in a five paragraph essay is usually structured like this: [Argument] is true because of [reason 1], [reason 2], and [reason 3]. For example you might you might write "The predictions presented by the author are reasonable because they recognize the importance of spatiality, they avoid environmental determinism, and they fit Mathus' arguments about positive checks on population." You could also argue the opposite position. "The predictions presented by the author are unreasonable because they do not fully recognize the importance of spatiality, they fall into the trap of environmental determinism, and they incorrectly parallel Mathus' arguments about positive checks on population." Feel free to use one or more of the arguments from these examples if you want, but be sure that your thesis statement is original. You can probably come up with something much better. There are more subtle and sophisticated ways to do this, but sometimes being too subtle leads to bad writing.

The next thing to pay attention to is that your thesis statement connects with the rest of your essay by addressing each of the three supporting reasons from your thesis statement in the following three supporting paragraphs. Be sure that you use topic sentences to remind your reader of your argument in each supporting paragraph. For example if you think that the predictions are reasonable , the first sentence of one of your supporting paragraphs might be "The [first, second, final] reason why Esterbrook's predictions are reasonable is because they take spatiality into account." Then your paragraph would focus on explaining what spatiality is and how some of the scenarios provide good examples of it. You will likely cite specific passages that illustrate sensitivity to spatiality. This leads to the next important thing to remember. Be sure that you use evidence from the article (use direct quotes and cite them or paraphrased ideas and cite them). You do not need to and should probably not do extra research to write this paper. If you do, be sure that you are still responding to the article(s) assigned for this discussion. In many cases students who do additional research end up writing papers that drift off focus or that lack credibility. If you do additional research, be sure that you use credible sources (peer-reviewed articles or the report from the IPCC for example). Citing advocacy web sites will detract from your essay's credibility. You do not have to cite concepts and ideas presented in lecture. Most of what we have discussed will be found in your textbook in some form or another. For more information on the 5 paragraph essay format and what makes a good essay see the Syllabus and “Writing an ‘A’ Essay”

Finally you should write more than one draft of your paper. Do not hand in your first draft. Read your paper over and evaluate it using the Grading Guide for Short Essays. Make sure that you've fixed any typos and grammar problems. Then make sure that your paper makes sense and that you have supported your argument well. Fix the paper where needed and hand in your second or third draft. If you have trouble with any aspect of the paper do not hesitate to get help from your professor or from the Writing Center.

Why Write a Five Paragraph Essay?

Finally, you may ask, "Why am I being asked to write a very structured five paragraph essay? After all people don't really write this way do they?" The answer is that engaging in this kind of writing exercise helps you to practice supporting arguments with evidence and that people do actually write using the basic format of the five paragraph essay. Anyone can argue a point, but the only way to convince a fair minded reader that an argument is correct is to support it with evidence. Writing a structured five paragraph essay helps you to focus on this skill. Furthermore it helps you to polish your writing by forcing you to think about how you structure your paragraphs and your overall paper using a thesis statement and topic sentences. As you get better at writing this will become second nature to you, but students who are still developing writing skills need explicit practice. If this already is second nature, the practice will not hurt and may even make you conscious of ways that you can improve.

As to the question of whether or not people actually write this way, the answer is that they do! On any given day a newspaper editorial will take the general form of a five paragraph essay (though it may have more or fewer paragraphs). Notice that the population article we read has the general form of this essay assignment (with more paragraphs). Finally, you may find in your future studies or profession that you will be required to write within a highly structured framework. Written work in law school and the legal profession, lab reports or articles in science, and grant proposals are all forms of writing that may be highly structured and follow a specific and standardized formula. If you don't follow the formula you are not likely to succeed in your writing task. Did you notice that the "How to Write This Essay" section above is a three paragraph version of a five paragraph essay (without the intro or conclusion) and that this section is a two paragraph version of the five paragraph essay? As you read on below, note how I cite my sources when I supply evidence or quote something. Be sure you do that in your essay.

How This Discussion Connects with Lecture:  Geography is the study of the relationship between humans and their natural environment. In lecture we discuss various ways of thinking about nature and how these ways of thinking influence the way that people treat nature.  We will explore the consequences of labeling both people and places as being natural or as being somehow remote. One of the most important insights you should gain from lecture is that the consequences of environmental destruction are uneven. While some people are unaffected by a particular environmental problem, or may even benefit, others pay the costs. Often those people who are most affected by environmental problems are the poor or minority populations. As your textbook explains, this is the central problem that the environmental justice movement addresses. Today in discussion we will ask questions about environmental justice in the context of global climate change. You have also been asked to read the last chapter in your text on future geographies. While we will not discuss this chapter extensively in lecture, this chapter provides excellent background for helping to assess the credibility of the future oriented article that is the focus of today's discussion. .

To Prepare for Discussion: While global warming is a indeed a global phenomenon, it would be a mistake to think of it as affecting everyone and everywhere equally. This is the central theme of the article by Greg Esterbrook (2007) that you will read for discussion this week. There was never really much debate about whether the global climate is warming. Instead the most contentious debate concerned whether human activities were the cause of this warming. While a very few politicians and scientists continue to be skeptics, the latest report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2007) made up of climate scientists from around the world, concludes with a very high degree of certainty that humans are responsible for global warming. What is highly uncertain are the potential effects of global warming on regional climates and weather as well as the social, political, and economic impacts. The article does not claim to provide accurate predictions, but rather uses what we think we know about climate change to offer logical scenarios for the future. Scenarios for the future may be considered reasonable to the extent that the knowledge and assumptions upon which they are a based are sound. "[W]e must first glance back at the past. Then, looking at present trends and using what we know about processes of geographic change and principles of spatial organization, we can begin to map out the kinds of geographies that the future most probably holds" (Knox and Marston 2007:468). Creating scenarios about the social, political, and economic effects of global warming requires knowledge of both the physical science behind global warming as well as knowledge from social science. In our discussion today we will assess the plausibility of the scenarios presented in the article in light of what we have learned from this course. As you read, ask yourself whether the predictions in the article are logical in light of what you have learned so far. If so, what makes them logical? If not, what mistake has the author made in his assumptions about human geography?

Works Cited

Esterbrook, Gregg. 2007. Global warming: who loses--and who wins? The Atlantic 299:52-64.

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 2007. The Physical Science Basis of Climate Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Available: http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/wg1-report.html. Accessed September 13, 1007.

Knox, Paul and Salie Marston. 2007. Human Geography: Places and Regions in Global Context. Upper Saddle River, NJ:Pearson Prentice Hall. 

Additional Questions to be addressed in discussion:

• What regions of the globe stand to benefit and what regions of the globe stand to lose due to global warming?
• Is it likely that Russia and Canada are "pro-Global Warming" as the author suggests?
• Should emphasis be placed upon preventing global warming by reducing greenhouse gasses, or should it be placed upon adapting to climate change?
• Should the government reduce spending on greenhouse-gas-reduciton research in favor of subsidies for solutions from private industry as the author suggests?

Questions To Be Answered And Turned In At The Beginning Of Discussion

Name:
Honor Code:

1. What is scenario from do you find the most plausible? Why?

 

 

 

2. What scenario from the article do you find least plausible? Why?

 

 

 

3. What are some of the effects that global warming might have on the world geopolitical situation according to the author?

 

 

 

4. Most of the greenhouse gas emissions to date have been produced by developed countries. If the author is correct that developing countries will be harmed the most by global warming, what does this suggest for efforts to limit greenhouse gasses? Should the same limits on greenhouse gas emissions be placed on developing countries as on developed countries? What would be the consequences of doing so?

 

 

5.  What is one question about the issues covered in the reading that you would like to see discussed during class?