Day 8 Summary and Questions

Leopold -
"Wildlife in American Culture"
Cultural Values -
1. Experience that reminds us of our distinctive national origins and evolutions
2. Experience that reminds us of our dependency on the oil-plant-animal-man-food chain and of
the fundamental organization of the biota
3. Experience that exercises those ethical restraints collectively called sportsman ship

Split-rail - a handmade fence that is made from wood that is split oneself
-represents heritage, self-reliance, and being in touch with the land

Sportsmanship - the voluntary limitation in the use of tools that give humans an advantage
over wildlife
-defined by pioneer period, foundation for American tradition
- A bow and arrow is more sportsman like than modern gadgets
- Wild husbandry - stalking herds, Leopold's way to justify losing spiritual value
- things can be done to encourage control and regulate activity

Mechanization is progress
-Ethical restrains - hunter's safety
-If hunting is about "filling the freezer" than it is considered more acceptable because this
represents understanding where the food is coming from. (split rail)
-wildlife management - mechanized and industrialized
-there is a split between the thrill seeker and the nature lover
- this exaggerated dualism is what creates the tension between people in open space
- Mechanized activity is restricted in resource areas
The concept of wilderness is a problematic area
- the way we define wilderness excludes humans
- if all resources go into preserving wilderness and the rural areas are let go, a bad system
is developed
The Wilderness
How should "wilderness" be defined?
- Some definitions say humans are NOT part of wilderness
- Has a true pristine wilderness ever existed since humans have been on most landscapes
at some point?
Wilderness is very degraded especially in coastal areas.
The problem with preservation is the segmentation of preserved areas with access trails.

The modern views
- recreation is non-work
- If wilderness is functioning abnormally there must be a prescribed fix

Wilderness is a resource that can shrink but not grow.
It is difficult, if not impossible, to bring back the wilderness after it is gone.
Often times we only see the effect of environmental degradation, rarely the process.
Forming an understanding of how an undisturbed ecosystem functions is important in helping
already damaged ecosystems. However, this is far more difficult than it sounds because there
are not many undisturbed ecosystems.
Canadian Rockies and Alaska are among the few remaining pristine wildernesses.

Discussion
How can we prevent environmental problems rather than just react to them?
Open spaces? Education?

"The Land Ethic" - Part 1
The Ethical Sequence -
- Related in history, compares land to property
- land = economics, privilege not obligation
Community Concept -
- individual as a member of community, compete for place in community but still has to
cooperate
- rules are not followed by what they really mean
- there are historical analysis of abusing land
Ecological Conscience -
-conservation is the harmony between man and land
-self interest drives conservation, therefore it is a slow process
-conservation attempts to make it easy to not abuse land but this really just makes it
trivial
Substitutes for a Land Ethic -
-specific reasons to save certain animals are advocated
-this justifies having to save an animal which is wrong
-the things that are ignored are actually the main problem
There is a split between philosophy and land conduct
-land ethic needs to be treated the same as social ethic
-If economic rationalization is relied on, not enough is done
In order to properly conserve land, more needs to be done than legally required

Suzanne Larsen presentation (Suzanne.Larsen@colorado.edu)
Library webpage �~@~S libraries.colorado.edu
VPN - Allows students to access the libraries�~@~Y databases from off campus.
Electronic books �~@~S full contents of a book online in PDF format.
Map library �~@~S in the lower level of Benson earth science library
Find It at CU- This icon will bring you to where to find the article or book in the library
or an electronic version if its available.
Finding Articles
Engineering Village -
-engineering, focuses on water and pollution
-Inspec - atmospheric concepts, climate change

Georef
Goes back to articles published in the 1600s. Georef finds geological and some environmental
articles.
Nice features
�~@� Can use discriptors which are controlled vocabulary, these terms are a good place to
search good terminology for more comprehensive searches.
Web of Science
Searches only peer reviewed articles various scientific fields (interdisciplinary).
Nice features
�~@� Says how many times an article has been cited and by whom.
�~@� Shows articles references. Those in blue are in the database.
�~@� View related records: Takes references and citations and compares with all citations
and references from other possibly related articles in the entire database.

If an article has more than 40 references it is most likely a review article
�~@� Go look at the references for yourself to make sure the author didn�~@~Yt use them
with a bias.



Questions -
1. Name two of the three cultural values that Leopold mentions?
1. Experience that reminds us of our distinctive national origins and evolutions
2. Experience that reminds us of our dependency on the oil-plant-animal-man-food
chain and of the fundamental organization of the biota
3. Experience that exercises those ethical restraints collectively called sportsman
ship

2. What is represented by the split-rail value?
represents heritage, self-reliance, and being in touch with the land

3. What is a problem with preservation in the wilderness?
the segmentation of preserved areas with access trails

4. Name a sport that has been heavily mechanized according to Leopold.
Duck hunting

5. According to Leopold what are two remaining pristine wilderness areas?
Canadian Rocky Mountains and Alaska
6. Conservation is the harmony between what two things?
Man and land

7. True or false. Wilderness is a resource that can grow but not shrink.
False

8. What do you need to download on your personal computer to access CUs library resources
from home?
VPN (virtual private network)

9. What are two databases Suzanne talked about in class?
Engineering Village, GeoRef, Web of Science

10. Which database is interdisciplinary and accesses only peer-reviewed articles?
Web of Science


Hilary Stammich
Max Goossens