Experts' Tier FINALE: Environmental Protections vs. Resource Extraction

Thanks to Bench for a fabulous debate! In this round, I will defend my case, address Bench's case, and summarize with some reasons to vote Pro. PRO's CASEDefinitions and Framework are concede. The round is to be evaluated on a cost-benefit analysis. C1: Poverty ReductionCon's analysis here focuses on "protected by national parks. " Clearly, environmental protections are far more expansive than simply protecting natural parks. Environmental protections, given the definitions from R2, include things as diverse as caps on air pollution to safe disposal of hazardous wastes. Natural parks are one miniscule fraction of the resolution. So, what does this mean? It means that Con is missing the point--i. e. that environmental protection improve health and sanitation by cutting back on noxious, unhealthy, and environmentally degrading practices. These regulations do not just help the environment, therefore, but they make the environment cleaner and safer for everyone. So, let's refer back to my sub-point B, "environmental hazards are major contributors to poverty…Low income is a risk factor not only for exposure to environmental hazards but also for possibilities of rapid and effective treatment because of the lack of healthcare services…Such hazards impose large burdens on such groups in terms of ill health, injury, and premature death. These health burdens are a major cause or contributor to poverty…. Controlling occupational exposure is particularly important, from large factories down to small, backstreet shops. ”In other words, environmental hazards have negative economic impacts that entrench poverty. These include preventing people from working, expenditures on healthcare, and death (potentially of sole breadwinners. ) CON NEVER ADDRESSES THIS. He just goes off on an entirely separate tangent about parks, which has nothing to do with my argument. Con then says that good ways to fight poverty include "healthcare. .. clean water, and sanitation. " I agree 100%. Environmental protections are key to achieving these three things. When an environment is unclean due to excessive pollution or industrial degradation, healthcare costs increase, forcing people to pay more for care than on other necessities. When companies are allowed to dump toxic wastes into waterways or to engage in extraction that pollutes water supplies (fracking, mining, logging, etc. ), water becomes unclean. When a company is allowed to spew unsafe levels of pollution into the air and to engage in practices that promote disease, as I shall show does occur, a company reduces sanitation levels. Environmental protections are thus beneficial for healthcare, clean water, and sanitation. Con is making my case for me. And, just to emphasize the reason why environmental protections do help with these three things, we can refer to the example of the mining and logging industries: "mining operations, which involve the removal of what the industry calls over-burden--the soil and rock that obstruct access to desired ores. But along with this overburden, rich vegetation is removed as well, destroying or compromising the quality of natural habitat for many plants and animals. Moreover, mining companies use a range of toxic chemicals to treat the ores extracted. The resulting waste streams are often either intentionally dumped or leaked accidentally, contaminating rivers and lakes. As for logging. .. many timber operations still engage in devastating clear-cutting practices. The toll inflicted by large-scale logging includes soil erosion, more severe flooding, and the destruction of wildlife habitat and fisheries. ” [1]Therefore, I clearly have solvency in terms of reducing poverty, and can easily access the impacts outlined in sub-point A. C2: Public HealthNowhere in his last speech does Con even mention this at all! Extend this entire contention. Therefore, in sub-point A, I show, and Con concedes, that pollution causes diseases (both via airborne and waterborne contamination), that extraction increase human exposure to pathogens, that extraction deplete resources key to producing medicines, and that ozone degradation caused by pollution will impede our immune system's functionality, making us less disease-resistant. In sub-point B I show that disease has negative impacts on GNP (gross national product), labor quality, and the economy as a whole. I also show that environmental factors as potentially the largest contributors to disease, imperiling literally millions of lives. Remember, all of this offense was conceded by Con. C3: ExtractionCon never refutes that extraction harms the environment, including through mining and logging. Con also never refutes that people in developing regions face serious environmental hazards in their homes and workplaces, and that the world's biodiversity is in grave danger. Con also never refutes that some extraction industries actually have greater burdens on national GDP (in terms of energy consumption, wildlife loss, etc) than benefits. Moreover, nations are extracting faster than nature can renew--the possibility of having nothing left is a real one. CON's CASEC1: Success + C2: IndustrializationCon drops my clarification of success. The key thing to remember here is that success is more than just pure economic growth--it's about societal welfare and quality of life. That means reducing disease rates and cutting back on poverty, which require some environmental protections. Let us assume for a moment that industrialization is the only way to modernize--though con simply assumes this (bare assertion fallacy. ) Can I still win this debate? Yes, and I can do so easily. The question arises: what is the best way to go about industrializing? My response to this is that some resource extraction, tempered by environmental protections is the best way to industrialize. In other words, we should PRIORITIZE environmental protections, while still continuing to extract resources. I will synthesize this point later in the debate, but I will endeavor to show that Pro is actually a better position, economically, than Con. If that is true, virtually all of Con's offense, which is based upon industrialization, will be moot. Con asserts next that much of the damage from industrialization can be fixed or reversed later. This is a new, and intriguing claim Con makes in R3. But it is erroneous. "Ecosystems are kept stable by. .. biodiversity. If a species disappears from a community, its niche will be more quickly and effectively filled by another species if there are many candidates for the role instead of few…If the forest is biodiverse, it recovers. .. more quickly. ” [3] Consequently, if it is not biodiverse, or if too many species are killed, the environment will be unable to bounce back. Earlier in this round, I extended evidence (my case, C3, sbp A) that wildlife is being destroy at a tremendously fast pace. Therefore, biodiversity is, essentially, being wiped out. If this occurs, environments will be unable to recover. Prof. J. Fiskel notes, "pressures on natural resources can lead eventually to irreversible system impacts, including depletion of resource stocks (e. g. , timber) or degradation of environmental quality (e. g. , climate change). .. once a threshold is reached the resulting impacts can be sudden and severe. ” Regarding the middle class, Con drops that wealth has enclave traits which exclude many of the middle class. Con drops that the middle and poor classes lack things like livestock and land, which are necessary for building an economic base. When people with those resources make money, but everyone else doesn't, we're back to the enclaves. Finally, Con attempts to dismiss Nigeria as corrupt. Unfortunately, developing nations are, overwhelmingly, among the most corrupt in the world [4]. Therefore, in a developing nations, the wealth of the nations is stolen by a few elites, and denied to the majority as with Nigeria. The result: the middle and poor classes don't benefit. C3: Extraction + C4: ElectricityI gave three reasons why extraction did not "drastically" increase a nations wealth.1. Extraction promotes conflict. Con claims here that I am conflating corruption with extraction--but I am not. When rebel fighters are clashing, for example, over access to mines, mining equipment, and labor, they are clearly fighting for control over the extraction process. Con's sole attract here fails. Extend this my argument.2. Failure to diversify. Con defeats himself when he says that "governments. .. don't understand that extraction is the key to starting. .. not the solution itself. " Yes, while extraction is not meant to be sustainable, countries, regardless, become reliant solely on extraction, and fail to diversify. Q. E. D.3. Unsustainable + Dutch Disease. Con drops this point--that extraction booms eventually end up in severe downswings because of a failure to diversify. So, if you buy point 2, then you buy that countries will suffer because of a lack of diversity. VOTING ISSUESI have shown that, without prioritizing environmental protections, extraction will increase disease, which has severe negative impacts on the economy, will perpetuate poverty, and will lead to rapid, economically unsustainable exploitation of the environment. This means that environmental protections actually help developing nations economically. So, the Pro world might even be the most pragmatic way to industrialize. Moreover, I have huge impacts with poverty solvency and disease solvency. The lives I save aren't worth permanently destroyed environments, especially when we can save the lives and save nature by affirming, while still industrializing. SOURCES1 - Renner, Michael, (previously cited, R3)2 - Wilson, Edward O. , 2002 [Harvard Professor-Museum of Comparative Zoology] The Future of Life, p. 1093 - . http://upload.wikimedia.org...Thanks!