Heres a dumb question about 2 adams

[William Mortensen]

I think that two different minds having two different reactions to RA's work is a good thing. This disagreement and the points it entails on both sides are perhaps the most and best one can hope for from work of this nature. Even if no one changes their mind, the thought process of justifying and documenting one's positions is good mental exercise and may likely influence the future thaoughts (and photographs) of those reading and participating. Thanks for keeping it more civil than another recent thread; it's an enjoyable read and the type of discourse we should have more of.

To my mind, that these conversations occur gives Robert Adams' work great value.

[paulr]

There's a difference between clearcutting for the purposes of forest management (which is controversial, but has its defenders) and commercial clearcutting, which is synonymous with deforestation. The latter is defended only by those who stand to make a pile of money from it.

Saying that being against clearcutting means being against forests seems a bit specious ... the forests did fine for a lot of millenia before we showed up! Controlled clearcutting may well be a good antidote to other forest mismanagement policies, like our stance toward forest fires over the last hundred years or so.

At any rate, the clearcutting Adams speaks against is not the controlled kind.

[tim atherton]

I am entirely against short-term goal profit-driven clear-cutting of the likes of the ancient rainforest of Clayoquot Sound for example.

That has nothing to do with managemnt and everything to do with making money from an irreplaceable "resource". As such, being against what is also known as "coventional clearcutting" (as opposed to clearcutting for forest management) is also being for the forest.

If the Libertarians had their way, government would not have stepped in to stop this and a huge chunk of the the temperate rainforest would have have been eaten up for short-term profit

[Oren Grad]

I think Adams is recognizing that owning a piece of undisturbed land is a common desire, but now, because of the scarcity we've created, it IS a privilege limited to a very wealthy few.

Fine, but there's a weird contradiction between dropping a heavy hint that socialism is the answer while framing the issue in terms of the ability to enclose the commons for private benefit.

There will always be people with worse problems. That doesn't make it dishonorable or trivial to worry about the ones we have. Or are we supposed to feel bad about feelling bad?

No. Just acknowledge that Robert Adams is saying quite plainly that he is willing to condemn millions of Mexicans to an impoverished life, and to increase the cost of living for impoverished Americans as well, in order to defend something that he values especially highly. In the end that may be a tradeoff worth making, but don't forget that it is a tradeoff, one that off-loads some of the heaviest costs onto others less privileged so that we can enjoy the benefits.

I think it's a low blow calling it that. He articluates a position that is widely held among ecologists, which is that certain regions of our country are already beyond the carrying capacity of their natural resources.

There are many other ways he could have made that same point; he chose that particular way, and I extend him the respect of assuming that he did so knowingly and intentionally.

I relate to Adams first because I think his pictures are remarkable, and second, because we share similar feelings about the land--and because he's been able to articulate those feelings, in words and pictures, better than I've been. I think that makes for a profound relationship between an artist and a viewer ... when the artist is able to say clearly what the viewer has only been able to sense.

No problem with that.

Well, what he's done for me and for others that I know is deeper than that. he's helped us to get beyond bitterness, and to find an affirmative way to relate a damaged landscape. I think his work is about hope, not conceit. It's about finding an affection for life in times and places where it's not so easy to do.

There's no contradiction here. I was making the observation with respect to the question of where he fits relative to environmentalism and public policy, but of course there are many people that have resonated with his work on a personal level, which is fine.

I started out my academic career as an economist before I found photography. While those guys are useful. They have no god but the bottom line.

Kirk, I respectfully disagree. Economics is not finance, nor is it primarily about money. The essence of economics can be captured in three simple words: goods are scarce. And the point of economics as an analytic exercise is to understand how human beings make tradeoffs among competing values. Although there are certainly plenty of bad or unreasonably tendentious economic analyses out there, it is impossible to understand environmental issues without grappling with the notion of tradeoffs among different goods - that is, among different things that humans value. Any position that simply asserts the absolute primacy of some environmentalist value without acknowledging and justifying the price to be paid - in dollars, in material resources, in lost opportunities - is fundamentally unserious.

At this point I'm going to stop, because this is turning into a non-photographic debate that really belongs in a different venue.

I second Mark's point - I really appreciate the chance to have a very hard-hitting debate that nevertheless remains civil and substantive. Thanks to paulr, Mark, Kirk, Frank and everyone. I'll close by reiterating that there is much in Robert Adams' work that I do value. To continue my own education I'm going to order a copy of Beauty in Photography today.

[Kirk Gittings]

This thread is a model of civilized disagreement. Well done.

[paulr]

thanks to everyone from me also ... in part for getting me to reread some good words and revisit some good pictures, and to think again about what it all means.

[Frank Petronio]

"If the Libertarians had their way, government would not have stepped in to stop this and a huge chunk of the the temperate rainforest would have have been eaten up for short-term profit"

Ahh, but in a pure Libertarian society, the value of preserving that pristine rainforest would be so high as to outway any short term greed motive to chop it all down. The problem we have is that our society is not placing a monatary value on preservation, and instead relying on government edicts and enforcement. This prevents a home-grown culture of conservation from taking root on its own merits, and results in greedy people going right to the limits of government enforcement.

If we the people who actually owned the Federal Lands charged the timber companies what the timber was really worth, including the road building and environmental clean up costs, plus the loss of habitat and lost tourism and risk of loosing unique species, then no right minded timber company would bother with VERY EXPENSIVE old growth and stick to properly managed forests and more selective cutting methods.

In other words, don't blame the timber companies or loggers for answering a need. Blame the electorate and their politicians who trade our forests for a few short term but high paying logging jobs in depressed rural discricts. In other words, blame your neighbors and yourself.

I tend to side with conservative, capitialistic arguements over legislation that tends to have many unintended, easily corrupted and often counter productive consequences. Conservatives should be the leaders in conservation... Of course I think Teddy Rossevelt was the last great US President.

[Frank Petronio]

Oh, and thanks for keeping it from getting silly too.

[paulr]

"If we the people who actually owned the Federal Lands charged the timber companies what the timber was really worth, including the road building and environmental clean up costs, plus the loss of habitat and lost tourism and risk of loosing unique species, then no right minded timber company would bother with VERY EXPENSIVE old growth and stick to properly managed forests and more selective cutting methods."

that's what I'd vote for, but the trouble in these situations is that so many of us, who technically own the forest, would only be aware that suddenly paper and lumber and furniture costs more. the connection between people's buying habits and what they are actually supporting seems to be a tough one to keep in mind ... if it even occurs to anyone in the first place. a friend of mine in colorado used to lament the irony of the students who would drive in their SUVs or ride their titanium mountain bikes to go protest a strip mine. not that these students were doing anything wrong--it's just that some of these connections never even occured to them.

the conservative, capitalistic arguments would work if people seemed more willing or able make decisions based on a long view rather than short-term gain. this is what i see as fundamental to our failures at land stewardship.

[paulr]

"Oh, and thanks for keeping it from getting silly too"

don't speak too soon ...

a recent Onion headline: "Libertarian calls Fire Department."