Close Reading: Discuss Explain Each Case Nature and Environment

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Literature and Language
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Nature and Environment
* "I now suspect that just as a deer herd lives in mortal fear of its wolves, so does a mountain live in mortal fear of its deer. And perhaps with better cause, for while a buck pulled down by wolves can be replaced in two or three years, a range pulled down by too many deer may fail of replacement in as many decades. So also with cows. The cowman who cleans his range of wolves does not realize that he is taking over the wolf's job of trimming the herd to fit the range. He has not learned to think like a mountain. Hence we have dustbowls, and rivers washing the future into the sea."
This excerpt is from the seventh paragraph of Thinking like a Mountain By Aldo Leopold. It addresses the issue of how the carrying capacity and natural balance of the ecosystem is done through the presence of the food chain. The hunting down of wolves was initially taken as a good thing since it enabled the deer to multiply and hence provide the hunters with more game meat. This was from the thinking of a human being. However, if thought from the perspective of the mountain, then the need for awareness of the natural balance would come out. The killing of wolves results to the exponential increase in the number of deer around the mountain. This mountain has got natural vegetation which provides the deer with adequate food. The exponential increase in the number of deer around the mountain would result to increased number of deer that can be supported by the ecosystem. This would bring about environmental destruction, since the vegetation would be eaten up completely. The land would be bare and susceptible to soil erosion. This is in context with the rest of the text, it is important not to interfere with the manner in which nature regulates itself. Elimination of predators from the system would be catastrophic to the carrying capacity of the ecosystem around the mountain.
(b) "On a global basis we have exceeded carrying capacity; global climate change is one outcome of a degraded biospheric system. Is this the negative feedback that will correct our overshooting of carrying capacity?"
This is an excerpt from page 70 of the book The Myth of Progress: toward a Sustainable Future by Tim Wessels. It is also a reaction to the comments made by the then president Bush in 2002, that economic growth is key to environmental progress. The impact of the rapidly growing population is that it has resulted to pressure on the carrying capacity of the ecosystem, which has in turn brought about increased competition of the available limited resources on the planet. People end up engaging in destructive practices such as deforestation in pursuit of land, which in the long run results in climate change. All these are the products of economic growth. There are negative feedbacks observed when this excerpt is placed in context to the rest of the text. Application of the second law of thermodynamics comes in to disagree with the assumption that economic progress or development must be facilitated by the insatiable demands for energy. The whole discussion of this book basically centers around the need to understand nature as a self-sustaining entity, complete with its own checks and b...