Is Studying Social Change "An Inconvenient Truth"?

Over the past month we have been studying the topic of social change, including different theories explaining the change and causes for it. But why is learning about social change so important? It seems at first glance somewhat useless, if we are to continue to progress forward then how can we continue to look to the past? After reading the article titled, "A Tale of Two Farms" and furthermore watching Al Gore’s inspirational documentary, “An Inconvenient Truth” many extremely substantial reasons became clear.

First, understanding social change is crucial because patterns of change often repeat themselves, and learning from the past is an excellent way to ensure that an even better course of action can be taken for the future. In "A Tale of Two Farms", famous American Geologist and Anthropologist Jared Diamond wrote “The past offers us a rich database from which we can learn, in order that we may keep on succeeding.” This is because in the article Diamond compared and contrasted two farms: The Gardar Farm from Norse Greenland and the Huls Farm in the American State of Montana. The two farms faced very similar economic and environmental conditions, yet it failed and went under, whereas the American Farm is currently prospering. Diamond is an expert on social change, especially after his extremely solid Pulitzer Prize winning book Guns, Germs, and Steel. In this novel he explores the factors dating back to the earliest forms of civilization that lead to the ultimate supremacy western civilization had compared to any other societies.

After introducing the article with the strongly thematic farm analysis, Jared Diamond writes about how and why societies from the past have collapsed and furthermore, contemplates whether or not it is possible or not in our modern and extremely technological society. He ties their tragic downfalls to environmental factors, such as running out of a crucial resource. All of these cases followed very similar sequences, which lead to a civilization with a massive population, rapidly decreasing. Diamond states, “Past peoples were neither ignorant, nor bad managers who deserved to be ex-terminated or dispossessed, nor all-knowing conscientious environmentalists who solved problems that we can’t solve today. They were people like us, facing problems that we can’t solve today.” I honestly would have doubted the last fact before seeing “An Inconvenient Truth”

Al Gore, 45th Vice President of the United States and active environmentalist’s passionate and shocking documentary brings up this very same issue. He describes in extremely clear and well thought out, relatable description the foreboding dangers of Global Warming and more importantly tries to provide plausible solutions. His many examples of effects of global warming and shocking graphs, especially some extremely off the chart bring his point into clear sight. When he showed the chart of how high the carbon in our atmosphere was in the past several decades and how massive a role it could play within the next 50 years (OUR lifetime) my eyes were definitely opened. Global Warming is a very real threat and will take a Global effort to stop. His warnings were extremely factually based, he took models of data in some cases dated back to prehistoric days and compared them with our own time, and the result was outrageous. Our society has changed so drastically from prior years that maybe we have come too far. Although there is no fighting the speed and influence of technology, we will definitely need to find an equilibrium with the environment if we are to continue to grow and expand as a society. The former Vice President also mentions that it is our own ignorance which is hindering the efforts to stop Global Warming. This also relates to the note about obstacles to social change (such as Mr. Sirianni’s dad)

In conclusion, understanding Social change is absolutely necessary in ensuring a sustainable future for our Canadian as well as our Global society. Jared Diamond’s "A Tale of Two Farms" article proved in his article that all societies can reach collapse due to factors that at the time seem completely out of their control. Al Gore’s film “An Inconvenient Truth” has explained the extreme dangers, in which our society today is facing. Perhaps looking to the past and studying the accomplishments mistakes of our ancestors’ developing societies can help us make the acceptable decisions on ensuring our survival.