Essay about Four Challenges Of Sustainability

Submitted By sami112233
Words: 781
Pages: 4

Four Challenges of Sustainability
With more than 7 billion people in the world, sustainability can be very challenging. According to Orr, humans are self-centered and don’t necessarily care about their surroundings. Over all he argues that the world is changing over time, the demand for products increasing, human race is only getting greedy each day and therefore, we can see the drastic change in our climate. In order to maintain sustainability, we will have to care about our environment and the future of the earth.
It’s not possible by one-person or one group of people but every individual have to work together for sustainability. Orr brings up few prodigious points in the reading where he mentions the possibility of failure in the process of sustainability. Just like any other missions, there will be obstacle and challenges to bring changes in environment but that’s the risk we have to take. The barriers to a graceful transition to sustainability, whatever forms it may take, are not so much technological as they are social, political, and psychological (Orr). He thinks that it’s not just the technology but also the society and its people who are responsible for damaging the earth. In order to keep the environment clean, we will have to cut down on our daily products. The results of cutting down on products can lead to decrease in earning for companies and government, there will not be enough for everyone to live a luxury life and there can many other conflicts but it’s a decision we have to make. Orr made an excellent point where he talked about the power of government. We live in a world here people are selfish, self-centered, greedy, unkind, and ignorant. Everyone just care about power, money, fame, and profit in business. Government should take the initiative to be stricter on the rules and regulations for the environment. One of the failure that he stated is “it is possible that will fail to make a smooth transition because of political ineptitude and a lack of leadership and/or because power is co-opted by corporations and private armies.” I do agree with Orr’s argument and his concerns about sustainability. Just like everyone, I also want variety types of clothes, foods, and luxury life, which involve lots of products that are made in factories. To open factories, there might be the need to cut lots of trees or cut open a mountain, and release toxic chimerical in the air. To be realistic, it will be impossible for me to just give up on all products and technologies that I am using in daily basic, and live an agricultural, simple life. But we can try to reduce our daily needs and care a bit more about the environment, in which we all are living and the future generation will live in. If not all at once, but slowly we should manage to live a comfortable life and at the same time try to do less damage to the earth. Though I agree with most of the things that Orr stated about sustainability, yet he did over look few