Human Population

CBR- crude birth rate- kids being born per 1000 people

CDR- crude death rate- people dying per 1000 people

TFR- total fertility rate- average amount of children a woman has

Replacement Level Fertility- 2.1 amount of children a mother must have to replace themselves

Population Momentum- a rapid growing population that levels off by lowering the tfr but still experiences growth for a little time longer

Net Migration Rate- immigration minus emigration

Family Planning- controlling the number of children born on intervals

Affluence- abundant wealth

IPAT equation- impact= population + affluence + technology

GDP- gross domestic product

Population Pyramid-

Countries have a bigger environmental impact as they transition through stages. As a country transitions from stage 1 to 2, it has more reliance on agricultural productivity. The environmental impact of this transition is that it uses more of the land at a higher level in order to sustain the population. When a country transitions from stage 2 to 3 it becomes more industrialized. Also the life expectancy of children increases therefore there is a higher population to tend to. When there is a high population to tend to, higher people use materials that cause harm to the environment. Industrialization and Urbanization also leads to harm of the environment. It has a greater effect than that of stage 1 to 2. When the country moves from stage 3 to 4, it has the highest ecological footprint. Because of its high populations, its greater consumption of food, and immense use of fossil fuels, this stage creates the most harmful environmental impact.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/22/opinion/chinas-brutal-one-child-policy.html

The article states that the one-child policy is a harmful one. It strains the poor and the women. It creates a situation in which the family can only have one child, and usually will abort or discard it if its a girl. It provides them with moral decisions that change their course towards a wrong choice. The pros of this policy is that it is stopping overpopulation. It allows the Chinese land mass to support the people already there and the people being born at a steady rate, instead of overpopulating the country. The cons of this are huge. Women have the highest suicide rate here in China because of this policy. Also it strains the poor at extremes. In order to get out of this policy, people must pay a a huge fine and such fine the poor cannot pay, so the rich get out, but the poor are stuck with dealing with abortion or running off to have children illegally. It is a harmful policy that has created a large strain on China.

Human Impact: Humans have the biggest impact on everything. We are the population that uses the Earth's resources to our own use. Because of our high population, we are slowly approaching overpopulation. If we reach this, then we will hit our carrying capacity according to the resources that surround us and we will have less and less materials to support us. Humans also cause a ton of pollution as countries move from demographic stages. Because they have moved passed the sustainability of life, they start moving towards luxury and other uses of the resources, such as fossil fuels and cars. These things are a direct release of bad chemicals into the air that cause pollution and it all starts from human invention and use. 

Environmental Impact: As countries progress through the demographic stages, they start to have a higher ecological footprint. The impact on the environment gets higher and higher. This happens because people start to move away from sustaining a future to live, to a more industrialized and urban society in which resources are used to benefit humans, but also tend to pollute the earth. The environment is impacted at its greatest in developing countries because they tend to use resources without caution. They use these resources because they are not stable as developed countries which know how to use the resources at the correct level and with regulations. 

Economic Impact: An increased population can have a large economic affect. The more people the more use of resources that need to be produced and paid for. As people start to live longer and need more, more and more agriculture will be needed to support them. This growth in agriculture will mean more money towards paying for food. A benefit of a greater population is a larger workforce. This workforce can produce higher goods and promote higher intellectuality. 

Government Legislation: In China there is the one-child policy limiting mothers to only have one child to stop the growing population of the country. It allows China to save itself from the future population by stopping the growth now in order to save resources and stabilize their use. The Title X family program also affects the people in the United States. Its a program, mainly for low-income families, that assists families by giving them advice on when to have children and what is the best outcome. This is somewhat of a way to limit birth of children, by giving advice to low-income families, but at the same time it benefits them by giving them the best outcome of having a child.

Unit 4

Species Richness- amount of species in an area

Species Evenness-the proportion of species in an area

Microevolution- evolution below the species level
Macroevolution- evolution that begets a new species and such

Evolution by natural selection- change in genes regarding which species will survive

Evolution by artificial selection- change in genes regarding human breeding

Allopatric Speciation- speciation with isolation

Sympatric Speciation- evolution of one to two 

Genetically Modified Organisms- taking genes from one organism and transferring to another to create a modified organism

Fundamental Niche- ideal environment for a species

Exponential Growth Model- estimates future size of a population

Logistic Growth Model- describes how the populations starts off exponential but then slowly decreases as it reaches its carrying capacity

Carrying Capacity- maximum size an environment can hold due to its resources

Keystone Species- a species that is more important than its abundance says it is

HOTspots- As defined by Myers, a hotspot is an isolated area that contains a high proportion of all the species found on Earth. These are important because they contain species richness and they are also the most threatened areas for plant and animal species.

My hotspot is located in Europe and Central Asia. More specifically, it is the Mediterranean Basin. Shrublands and marine ecosystems are located in this hotspot.

Plant-Aphyllanthes monspeliensis

Animal- Scimitar-horned oryx (Oryx dammahI)

An Endemic Specie is a specie that live in a small area of the world and nowhere else.

Humans have been living in this hotspot for a very long time. The most intense reasons why biodiversity has decreased is because of human impact. Impact includes deforestation, grazing and fires, and infrastructure development. The replacement of friendly environment mechanism has also decreased biodiversity in this area. Along with human impact, the industry of tourism has affected this area. More and more people visit this area, therefore changing the environment into a business.

Romans and Greeks set aside land that was protected and now only 4.3% of the land is considered protective. Some conservation action that is being taken is the European Union's Habitats Directive. Along with the directive, regional cooperative programs have furthered conservation.

Pick a Side-

The fundamental niche of a species is its ideal environment. To determine a species ability to evolve it must be placed in an ideal place. To give the best results of evolving and reproducing, the environments carry capacity must be very high to keep the species exponential growth high. But once it reaches it carrying capacity it will start to decrease and move towards a logistic growth. Before it can reach this logistical growth, the species will overcome specific gene changes and evolve during the period of time. It will go through evolution by natural selection in order to reproduce individuals with the best genes and traits to maximize its survival chances. Allowing a species to grow in an ecosystem will increase the species' richness, and increase its proportion towards the other species, therefore increasing its species evenness. With a greater richness, greater change will occur. More mutations will happen in order to produce the best genotype and phenotypes. Species will adapt to the environment and reproduce to maximize survival in this specific environment and allow the individuals to evolve in this niche.

Human Impact: In the evolution of biodiversity, human impact is large. It can either help the biodiversity increase and prosper or decrease it. Also Humans can impact the populations and its ecology. We can sometimes act as parasites and feed off of the environment therefore harming one species fundamental niche. Take for example, in the observation of an animal's living space, we would turn over a rock to count how many Rolypoly's were there. Thus, humans would be disturbing the community of the animals, even if it was the slightest of movement. This slight adjustment could interfere with the community's ecology and disrupt normal interactions. Humans can also have a beneficial impact on some biodiversity increase such as evolution by artificial selection. Humans can breed the best type of animals with the highest chance of survival or any other trait by using this method therefore increasing biodiversity.

Environmental Impact: In the development of species and the growing number of them, they can have many different impacts on the environment- some good and some bad. An increase of species can result in species richness, but if the numbers get too large then it can overpopulate an area and also cause it to reach its maximum carrying capacity. Once it reaches its max carrying capacity its ability to replenish resources will slow down because more will be used. But a growth in species will create a community with a high biodiversity. It will allow more and more animals to evolve to have better traits to live in that ecosystem. Take for example living in a small area with the necessary resources to reproduce a cricket population will grow and grow, but will slowly die off after it reaches its carrying capacity because it will no longer have the required resources. 

Economic Impact: Economically humans act as parasites to the ecosystem by cutting down trees and using animals to take to zoos. This gives us humans a benefit economically. We use the trees to create boats, lumber, and paper. We also use the animals commercially in zoos to gain profit off of them. A large biodiversity can have many beneficial impacts on the world. It can help increase the population of marine ecosystems and cause the fishing industry to grow. It can also increase the community ecology and therefore creating a system that fixes itself when humans disturb it. Therefore when humans take something from the ecosystem, the ecosystem can repair itself and replenish what was taken thus creating a never-ending cycle.

Government Legislation: The endangered species act protects species that are endangered from humans. It allows them to survive off of what little they have of each individual and possibly reproduce to increase biodiversity. The forestry act has many different aspects. A main one is in section 37 of the act and it limits the number of trees that can be cut by an individual or company. This allows the ecosystem to stay alive and not be destroyed. Then there is certain legislation for national parks and wildlife centers. This legislation states that national parks and centers shall be created to keep the enriched biodiversity of the community at a high, to keep the species alive and well.