STATEMENTS OF DAVID MAGEOR, EVAN GILLER, STEVE NADEL, PAUL GEFFNER, STEVEN BASS, PETER ARNO, AND MARK SCHWEITZER, STUDENTS AT STUYVESANT HIGH SCHOOL Mr. SCHWEITZER. One of the first things I would like to answer, you asked the question a number of times; Who dropped the paper plates? I heard sanitation cleaned up 8,000 tons after Earth Day. Mr. SCHEUER. Citywide? Mr. MAGEOR. 14th Street. Mr. SCHEUER. I think at 14th Street they had quite a problem on that day, and Fifth Avenue. It's very interesting that you saw a little bit of hope for the future. Let me ask a question. One or two of you can answer. What do you think we ought to do as a followup to Earth Day in our society to put meat on that skeleton and make it very real? Mr. ARNO. You are talking about education all morning long on what is being done and we wrote a high school curriculum for relating environmental problems to physical sciences, biology, physics, social sciences, English, math, art. We distributed these. Mr. SCHEUER. Off the record. (Discussion off the record.) Mr. SCHEUER. The students did this themselves? Mr. ARNO. Steve Nadel and I did in conjunction. Mr. SCHEUER. There being no objection, I will ask that this report be inserted in full in the record at this point. (The report referred to follows:) HIGH SCHOOL ECOLOGY RELATED CURRICULUM TO BE USED IN ALL SUBJECT AREAS ON APRIL 20 IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE "EARTH DAY" TEACH-IN The state of the environment concerns and affects all. On April 22nd and in the days and weeks following, a nationwide effort will be made to make the public aware of the gravity of our present environmental situation. As teachers, you and your colleagues enjoy a unique position. You have the capability of reaching the vast number of students across the country who will inherit this polluted world unless something is done. Please examine this suggested curriculum carefully. If you have any questions or suggestions, please contact us. The Time for Action Is Now! STUDENTS FOR ENVIRONMENTAL ACTION. CLASSROOM PROJECTS ON ENVIRONMENTAL CRISIS FOR HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS (A) Biology I. PHYSICAL SCIENCES (1) What is ecology? Explain the balance of ecosystems, food chains and life cycles. (2) Population: Is overcrowding a major cause of crime, disease, and drug addiction? Study of different theories: Malthus, Sadler, Doubleday, Godwin, Marx-what are the natural mechanisms of population control? (3) Pesticides: Pesticide content in foods-do pesticides always yield higher food production? (4) What is eutrophication? How can it be reversed? Compare a eutrophic lake with an oligotrophic lake. Oligotrophic lake many species, few individuals. Eutrophic lake--few species, many individuals. (5) What are the benefits of bio-degradable goods? (6) What is in our foods? (Food additives and preservatives) (B) Physics (1) Energy consumption: Is there such a thing as clean energy? What are the waste problems involved whenever man produces energy? (2) What is the potential of nuclear power? Can it replace convention fuel sources as a pollution free energy form? What about thermal pollution? Radioactive wastes? (3) What are the prospects of solar power? Tidal power? (4) Noise pollution: Have danger levels been reached? What has to be sacrificed in order to curb noise, (SST, new airports, machinery, etc.)? What can be done? (C) Chemistry (1) Air Pollution-Smog: What are the pollutants in our air? What are the photochemical reactions that produce smog? What are the effects of pollutants on health, weather, and the composition of the atmosphere? (2) Internal Combustion Engine: Why and how does it pollute? What are the pollutants? What are their effects? (3) Discussion: Can we afford to have 100 million internal combustion engines? Should we replace the internal combustion engine with the electric or steam car? What about improved mass transit? II. SOCIAL SCIENCES (1) Set up debates: Can there be infinite growth in a finite world? Does capitalism breed exploitation of natural resources? Is population control too late? Should we outlaw the internal combustion engine? Does overcrowding lead to crime, disease, or war? What is the future of the city? (2) Explore legislative approaches to a cleaner environment: What is being done? What bills are currently before legislature? What has been the effectiveness of past laws? III. ENGLISH (1) Effective education on our environmental crisis: Media, schools. (2) Read works by naturalists such as Thoreau and Frost. (3) Set up debates: Need we dismantle our technological society in order to end pollution? How does our society train people to be polluters? Must man change his life style to save his environment? (4) Write poems and essays on environmental problems. IV. MATH (1) Provide illustrations of geometric progression vs. arithmetic progression. Illustrate Malthusian principles. (2) Explain population curve. (3) Calculate surface area of earth. Compare area taken up by human beings to area taken up by autos, highways, garages, etc. Calculate for now. In 100 years. V. ART (1) Make collages showing contrast between a clean and polluted environment. (2) Have a poster, button, or cartoon contest. (3) Have a sculpture exhibit on pollution. If you have not already planned projects for your classes we hope the above suggestions will be of service to you. BIBLIOGRAPHY GENERAL De Bell, Garrett, "The Environmental Handbook," Ballantine, N.Y., 1970. AIR Battan, Lewis, "The Unclean Sky," N.Y., Anchor Books, 1966. Edelson, Edward, "Poisons in the Air," N.Y., Pocket Books, 1966. Jacobs, Morris Boris, "The Chemical Analysis of Air Pollution," N.Y., InterScience Publishers, 1960. Stern, A. C., "Air Pollution," N.Y., Academia Press, 1968–69. WATER Kneese, A. V., "Why Water Pollution Is Economically Unavoidable," Transaction J92:B24. September 1968. Scott, H. G., Oceanologic Environmental Health," Journal of Environmental Health 31 (6), 1969. SOLID WASTES Salvato and Litchfield, "Environmental Sanitation," N.Y. John Wiley and Sons. "Waste Management and Control." National Academy of Sciences, Report to Federal Committee, 1966, Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. NOISE Rodda, M., "Noise and Society," N.Y., W. A. Benjamin, 1967. Schurcliff, W.A., "S/S/T and Sonic Boom Handbook," N. Y., Ballentine-Friends of the Earth, 1970. "Noise Sound Without Value." Committee on Environmental Quality of the Federal Council for Science and Technology. September 1968. Washington, D.C., Government Printing Office. CHEMICALS Novick, Shelton, "Vietnam Herbicide Experiment," Scientist and Citizen now Environment. 10:20-21, January 1968. Rudd, Robert L., "Pesticides and the Living Landscape," Madison, Wis.: University of Wisconsin Press, 1966. POLITICS Graham, Frank, "Disaster by Default: Politics and Water Pollution, N.Y., Evans, 1966. "Arguendo: The Legal Challenge of Population," Law and Society Review 107, 1968. "Population: Pressure Housing and Habitat," Law and Contemporary Problems, 1967. "SST: From Watts to Harlem in Two Hours," 21 Stanford Law Review, 1968. THE CITY Duhl, Leonard, "The Urban Condition," N.Y., Basic Books, 1963. Fein, Albert, "Landscape Into Cityscape Ithaca, N.Y." Cornell University Press. 1967. Herber, Lewis, "Crises in Our Cities," N.Y., Prentice-Hall, 1965. Holland, Laurence B., "Who Designs America," N.Y., Anchor Books, 1966. Jacobs, Jane, "The Death and Life of Great American Cities," N.Y., Vintage, 1961. McHarg, Ian, "Design With Nature," N.Y., Natural History Press, 1969. ECONOMICS Goldman, M. I., "Controlling Pollution: Economics of a Clean America," Englewood Cliffs, N.J., Prentice-Hall, 1969. Grass, M. M., "The Biophysical Environment," Action Under Planning: The Guidance of Economic Development, N. Y., McGraw-Hill, 1967. Ciriacy-Wantrup, "Resource Conservation," Berkeley, Calif., University of California Press. Douglas, D. O., "Wilderness Bill of Rights," Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1965. "Aesthetics in the Law," 22d Record of the N.Y.C. Bar Association, 1967. Dasmann, Raymond, "The Destruction of California," N. Y., MacMillan, 1965. Ewald, William R., "Environment for Man-The Next Fifty Years," Bloomington, Ind., Indiana University Press, 1967. SUPPLEMENTARY BIBLIOGRAPHY OF PERIODICALS Article Topic area Suggested use in Pesticides: Vietnam.. Ecology.. Control. Life, Feb. 20, 1970, Control of Population, Robert Ardrey. Sci. Am., January 1969. Abortion by Chris Tietze and New Republic, Jan. 10, 1970, Overpopulated America. New Republic, Aug. 2, 1969, Unwanted People. Natural History, May 1968, Coming Famine, P. Ehrlich. Sci. Am., February 1964, The Black Death, William L. Sci. Am., February 1962, Population Density and Social Chemistry, biology, social sciences. New Republic, Jan. 10, 1970, What Have We Done to Biology, chemistry... do.. Biology, chemistry, social sciences. Physics, biology, chemistry.... Vietnam. Pollution: Control. Biology.. Science, Mar. 6, 1968, Pesticide Pollution Control H. P. Science, Aug. 1, 1969, Warm-water Irrigation: An Answer Nat. Wildlife, August 1969, Our National EQ: The First Sci. Am., April 1958, The Ecosphere, Lamont C. Cole. Life, Mar. 6, 1970, Editorial, The Rhetoric of Ecology. Mr. NADEL. Basically this is an outline curriculum for discussion. Mr. ARNO. Right. We are writing to the teachers, asking them to send to us and we are in the process of devising more comprehensive programs right now. We don't feel we know more than the teachers, but there are hundreds and thousands of educators in the country, but I have never seen an ecology-related high school or college curriculum. Mr. SCHEUER. If you talk to the witness who preceded you, I think you will find some. Mr. ARNO. We saw that. It was far from adequate, we thought. Mr. SCHEUER. I am sure what you have given us for the record will give us all food for thought. Mr. GEFFNER. I think, answering your original question, we have to make a choice right now. If our basic growth is good, we have to make a choice whether we want to follow that. Mr. SCHEUER. You don't believe in exploding GNP for the sake of exploding GNP? Mr. GEFFNER. That's right. This is exactly why education is so important because, if we don't change that ingrained value system, that constant growth is good, nothing is going to be accomplished. Mr. GILLER. I would like to point out, if we are to change the style of life in society in the United States, I think right now the burden for leadership is on all people in Government because on their own I think the majority of people in the United States do not realize the problem and are not willing to give up the luxuries they are used to, and it is only through legislation and education and I think that legislation will have to be the answer right now. Perhaps that may not be the answer. If you people—I mean people in general-in Government are not willing to provide us with the correct legislation, then there has to be another alternative. I don't know. As the people from Fordham said, maybe it is revolution. Mr. GEFFNER. I think that's the point. You have to try to change the values but that may take too long. You can't sit around and wait. for that to happen, as he said. You are not going to be able to get people to give their luxuries up. It has to be the Government in this case. Mr. SCHEUER. You don't think attitude changes are important? Mr. GEFFNER. It might take too long. It's up to the Government. Mr. GILLER. It's not that attitude changes are not important but they will not occur by themselves. We can't sit around and wait for people to realize the problem and not drive automobiles. Also one other point. If we hope to solve the problem, I think things have to be done by government that will really give people substantial alternatives, like mass transit for instance. People will not give up their automobiles unless they have comfortable mass transit. Very logical. And unless we stop spending money on other things such as the SST. Mr. SCHWEITZER. But I think the backbone of any legislation that's going to come is going to have to be a change in social revolution. Ecology we call a science but actually it's a basic philosophy. People have to become ecology sensitive-if legislation is going to last and bring a permanent change in the country. Mr. ARNO. Ecology says to us all power pollutes. There is no form of energy we can harness that provides clean air, that provides clean water. You have nuclear energy. There's thermal pollution. There's the radioactive byproducts and, so far as we know, the technology right now has no answers to clean energy. So you say that we will all turn to mass transit. Sure. But mass transit is going to require the energy also. What has to be done, you have to slow down the fact that the automobile is a sex symbol in the United States, it is a symbol where people think that they have to own one out in these rural towns, and there are other methods of transportation such as walking. Mr. SCHEUER. And it has to be 350 horsepower, has to be able to go from 0 to 60 miles in 8 seconds. Mr. ARNO. That's right, and in the city actually the quickest and most economical method of transportatoin would be the bicycle. Mr. GAFFNER. We think a tremendous advance on that, a bill introduced by Mayor Lindsey, I think, to ban automobiles in midtown. If you had a bicycle, something to increase the transportation system among these lines would really be fantastic. I think it was pointed out before this country is the only country that doesn't use bicycles extensively. Mr. GILLER. It is an interesting fact that it is almost impossible to get from Queens to Manhattan by bicycle, and it is illegal |