Environmental Misunderstandings

Let's take a look at this winter compared to last. By the time halloween came by last year, we had already had 30 inches of snow (normal Erie weather, huh?) compared to .7 inches this year. This weekend was our first major snowfall this year! Now let's look at what critics around the country would say about this. Some would be saying that CO2 is drastically warming our atmosphere, others would say that pollution is altering our climate. One specific, outspoken critic might even blame it on a fabled creature called Manbearpig. The truth behind this strange, lukewarm December Erie weather is called the El Nino, a weather pattern in the Pacific that causes warmer weather for about 9 months. This is happening on all different kinds of cases around the world. Like Mr. Corbin's examples with the polar bears and the shark attacks, we only hear half the story. Sure, the weather changes a few degrees here and there, some rare plant species in Bosnia went extinct, or more frogs have been found born with extra heads and legs, but doesn't that kind of stuff happen all the time? These are being blamed on things like chemical spills and increased fossil fuel use. The truth is, most harmful chemicals are being phazed out and 1st world country fossil fuel consumption is at an all time low. It's just that we haven't been around long enough to understand what's really behind these unpredicted changes. I think that we as a world just need to accept that the world is going to change whether we affect it or not. So let's just move on.

Soy in Real Life

When you go to the supermarket nowadays, you can usually find a soy substitute for just about anything: milk, cereal, bread, ice cream, even meat. What most people don't know is that some people use soy for reasons other than they are vegetarian. Soy has many benefits, like proteins that lower cholesterol and the risk of heart disease, and Isoflavones to reduce bone diseases such as osteoperosis and bone cancer. However, those same Isoflavones combined with the phyto-estrogens found in soy are harmful to people with some types of cancer such as breast cancer. But, the benefits definitely outweigh the risks.

Industrial Farming is Really Bad

I think that industrial farming needs to stop, but it's already too late to reverse the trend. Even though industrial farming can poison our food with pesticides and other chemicals, we still rely on the farms to supply us with ALL of our food. Most people don't grow any food in their backyard, so they have to pay for their food. Too many people already rely on the farms that there is no way the farms can return to the older ways of farming naturally. Though there are some financial and governmental benefits to industrialized farming, the environmental and human health is too much of a risk factor.