In his essay, When Everybody Wins does the Environment Lose?, Timothy LeCain describes three different types of technological fixes. These three categories are the transformational techno-fix, the relocational techno-fix, and the delaying techno-fix (LeCain 138). LeCain states that in most cases at least two of the three categories are used in each techno-fix. He also describes technological fixes to be used by employers as a means of keeping profitable production or mining steadily moving forward. And in this, the employer do not bother to think of the consequences as they are only in the business for the money. LeCain uses a great example of the Ducktown area of Georgia. The smelter located there was destroying forest land and allowing toxic gas to be let into the air in an area where people were living. In order to fix this the smelting company created a plant that took the harmful sulfur dioxide gas and turned it into sulfuric acid (LeCain 140). This is a perfect example of the transformational and relocational techno-fixes as it transformed the toxic waste into useful by-product and also relocated to by-product onto farms, being used as fertilizer. LeCain goes on to describe how these seemingly helpful techno-fixes create even more problems with fertilizer runoff which causes pollution. This in turn he uses to describe his view on technological fixes.
I believe with how much we have invested in the mineral of copper that we do indeed need copper to stay functioning as a society. Almost every single electronic item we own requires copper to be created. LeCain makes a very valid argument and I think he is correct on many things. This being said I don’t think we can just ditch the idea of mining copper as every single person in the US relies on its usage. I is also inevitable that we will not stop advancing forward when it comes to our electronics as well as our technological fixes. We just have to hope and work at making our technological fix advancements keep up with the electronic advancements in order to keep things as clean and efficient as possible
I agree with everything you wrote, especially the fact that the people in charge don’t stop to think about the horrible environmental impact that smelting and mining cause. Unfortunately people have always been greedy, wether they’re from the beginning of the industrial revolution or from now and some, but not all people care much more about the money they could make regardless of the environmental impacts of their business. Techno fixes seem to be a way to justify what they are doing, when in reality they solve the current problem just to create another problem thats often worse. I agree that completely stopping the mining of copper is almost completely impossible because of how widely used it is. However, in the near future I think scientists will find new and better ways to conduct electricity. Very well done blog.
Hello Blaze, great blog post altogether. I liked how you started off the post by posting the question in the reading by Timothy LeCain stating, “When Everybody Wins does the Environment Lose? I also really enjoyed the example about the Ducktown area of Georgia that you told. It’s a really horrible story that is hard to imagine because of what the people in that area had to go through. This was a great example of how techno-fixes have come into play before. On the other side, the techno fixes have also caused problems as well. I agree with your opening thought of the second paragraph about Copper. We need Copper to be successful. We need to do just as you said and keep mining Copper.