"The concept of limits on growth is something that unites fetishers but divides managers." How much control is too much control? Humans have found ways to escape the limitations on growth by adding variables. We can fit more people in smaller spaces because modern architecture has allowed us to build incredible skyscrapers. Modern science helps us to live longer, healthier lives. But on the flipside, natural disasters, power outages, and the outbreak of disease can have dramatically worse effects if people are living in closer quarters. Now the exponential increase in human population seems like it's headed for an inevitable leveling off. Unfortunately, as we continue to multiply, cheating the system and finding ways around mother nature's boundaries, the environment around us is feeling the consequences.
In an effort to feed and house earth's booming population, a lot of land is cleared. Eisenberg says that, "[i]f there is one thing ecologists have learned in recent years, it is that wilderness cannot be kept in boxes; and the smaller the boxes, the more frantically they must be managed to retain even a semblance of life. ...Wildlife biologists now speak of wilderness areas as 'megazoos' in which endangered species are tagged, tracked, and provided with dating services." 362
As an extreme and literal interpretation of this quote, allow me to introduce Bert.
Bert is my pet turtle. I found him a week ago on the beach, and he is probably less than one month old. Bert is messy because he likes the water in his terrarium to be everywhere. I have to clean his tank daily, or else it gets stinky, or Bert risks a fungal infection from clammy, wet, vegatation. I don't plan to keep Bert once he reaches an adolecent size; I'll take him back to the shore of his origin. But in the meantime, his box of wilderness is exceptionally small, and I work frantically to make his stay pleasant.
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