Environmental topics pervade classrooms today, but true understanding of them is elusive. All too often, subjects such as global warming, species extinction, and the role of pesticides are reduced to simple slogans because accurate information is hard to find.
Yet there is enormous scientific debate about these topics. Thomas Jefferson said that "difference of opinion leads to inquiry, and inquiry to truth." Critical Thinking About Environmental Issues will prepare young people to become inquiring citizens by introducing them to the scientific and economic debates that underlie environmental issues.
Each volume will provide readers with a range of scientific views and theories on an environmental topic and introduce facts that are sometimes ignored. Each will help readers use their critical thinking skills. By exposing students to differences in opinion, this series will enable them to search for the truth and to make their own decisions.
Grade 7 Up-Both the editor of this series and the author of this book are members of PERC, the Center for Free Market Environmentalism, a group dedicated to bringing market principles to environmental issues. Simmons is actively involved with working for the elimination of the Endangered Species Act, which he considers an imposition on the rights of landholders. Throughout this volume, the right of species to exist is placed in direct opposition to the rights of people. Unsubstantiated anecdotes suggest that economic harm is caused by the Endangered Species Act as well as other worldwide programs meant to save threatened species and habitat. Programs such as the farming of salmon and turtles are lauded as economically acceptable ways to save species but little note is taken of the potential dangers created by such free-market actions. Murky black-and-white photographs, often of no relation to the text, and a dry, dogged writing style do not enhance this work. Noel Simon's Nature in Danger (Oxford, 1995) is far more balanced and readable. For a variety of opinions, Helen Cothran's Endangered Species (Greenhaven, 2001) is an excellent choice.
Eva Elisabeth VonAncken, Trinity-Pawling School, Pawling, NYCopyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Reviewed with Jane Shaw's
Global Warming.
Gr. 7-12. These two titles in the Critical Thinking about Environmental Issues series offer balanced, nonalarmist introductions to major global issues. Global Warming considers the current debates, the potential causes for rising temperatures, and expert opinions on the threat of global warming and its possible consequences. It ends with a look at the failings of the Kyoto Protocol of 1997 and suggestions for addressing global warming from well-known scientists. Endangered Species introduces different viewpoints about the issue's urgency and shows the shortcomings of the U.S. Endangered Species Act. An insightful chapter about the uneasy relationship between humans and animals is followed by discussion of current successful efforts to save diminishing species. The series format is extremely lackluster, with grainy, too-small, black-and-white photos, and in an effort to present a balanced viewpoint, there are a few statements that differ from general consensus: the series foreword, for example, refers to scientific studies that suggest "pesticides cause little harm to humans." But the text in both books is engaging, and it shows the complexity of the problems as well as the dangers of superficial solutions. Extensive source notes and further readings conclude. Gillian Engberg
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