The 11th Hour is a very powerful and thought-provoking film that explores some of the most important and pressing issues that face our planet and it’s people. The title of the film comes from the concept that human existence on our planet is in the 11th hour, the last hour in which change is still possible. From David Suzuki to former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, along with over 50 other leading scientists, the film compiles interview footage of some of the most respected and knowledgeable scientists and leaders of our time. It clearly outlines the reasons for which change is necessary, and explores how we have arrived at our current state – the 11th Hour.
Please take the time to read what my students – our young adults - have to say in response to watching this film. Read their responses below. Also, check out the 11th Hour Action website. If you haven’t already done so, view the film; here is a trailor.
Filed under: Sustainability Tagged: | student responses, Sustainability, The 11th Hour
The 11th Hour
The movie “The 11th Hour” talks about what were doing wrong, and how we can change it.
I think that after people watch this, well they will become more involved in taking care of the earth.
I’m starting to learn more and more about this problem that we have.
I’m starting to think more about this issue, and starting to realize that something is wrong in the world today, and that we have to do something before it’s too late to do anything at all.
The first big thing that stands out to me is, how the world today is warmer then it’s ever been, I guess you couldn’t tell by just looking outside, well maybe you can.
Anyways the way you can tell is that there is no snow on the ground, and for Regina, well there usually is snow on the ground by now.
On the earth today we do have a big problem in global warming, but really, what can we do about it?
The other thing that stands out to me is when someone on the video said “Every time you buy something, that’s just like you saying you approved of the item.”
Now, I don’t know who said that but it just stands out to me.
It makes me wonder if everything you buy, do you really approved of it, or do you just want the item, well I guess by wanting the item you really do approved.
Most people all over the world don’t even know if the item that their buying could really harm the earth, that’s where one of our biggest problems is, people not knowing what could and couldn’t harm the earth.
Sometimes people don’t even care about this issue, I should know because I was one of the people who didn’t/don’t really care.
I’m really starting to change my mind about all this stuff.
It make’s me think that what I’m doing could really hurt people.
The 11th Hour
After I watched the “The 11th hour,” I had a different outlook on my surroundings of nature, wasting, recycling and global warming. I look around the world today and see that people aren’t caring what they are doing any more. They are littering, wasting and polluting chemicals into the air.
People don’t take time to look at nature; they are either too busy on their cell phones or listening to their iPods. We spend a majority of our time using technology, going shopping (etc). I think the environment is suffering and is infected by our resources. I agree with the statement they make on the 11th hour, “We could live beautifully on earth without all the resources.” I agree because we were living beautifully on earth before all this technology came out.
If it wasn’t for earth, the plants, the species we wouldn’t be here today. Earth gave us life and we aren’t being fair. We aren’t maintaining a sustainable environment.
We are ruining life for other creatures. 50 to 55000 species are going extinct because of us. Extinction is a natural part of life but we are making it a faster process than it’s supposed to be.
The earth is very unsustainable. If we don’t change now we are going to run out of time to change. We keep continuing to abuse the earth, while others are trying to make a difference. I believe that if we make a change it would be a better, successful place for our future generations.
The 11th Hour
Watching The 11th Hour and seeing the pictures, video clips, graphs, hearing what they had to say really woke me up.
The thing that really had me upset and hurt was when they were talking about babies and how they are born with a variety of different illnesses and diseases. It effected me so much because this is our future generation, and they are being effect by what we did/do before they are even born.
Some people, after seeing The 11th Hour, would think that they don’t want to bring a baby into this world. at first I felt that way, but a baby is an important part of my life plan. Ever since I was a little girl, I’ve always wanted to be a mother. I never knew that polution could cause asthma and I also never knew that our way of living causes autism. Today, I still do want a baby, but I’m going to have a different way of raising my child than the way I lived personally through my early teen years(13,14,15). I think that this a good generation to be born into because we have the time to change an accomplish something.
The second idea that inspired me to change was how much trees do for us, and that we have the nerve to cut them down and replace them with expensive and harmful things.
When I lived on the reserve, I never depened on technology like i did living in the city. My mom is not to much into technology, she only uses it when it is need like looking up something on the interenet. She also teaches me not to be dependent on it, She limits me on what I go on or how much I’m on it. This makes it easier for me to live without it. I think the less I use technology the more I consume, without technology everyone would probably say they have nothing to do, I’m one of those people, to fill my boredem I go to the mall. When I was younger, the only time I used to get something new was Christmas or on my birthday. Now that I live in the city I’m always buying something. I don’t think that I could go back to my old ways of living. I miss it, but I don’t believe that I would servive a week, thats how much of an impact the city life has on me. now that i live in a city, with shopping malls, or stores, or restraunts, it temps me to consume.
Since I still live with my family, I think im going to try change, and hope it effects them as well. I think that when I start a life of my own and stop depeneding on my parents, and start making my own money, I will be wise on what I buy and I will only buy what I need. Also getting married and starting a family will give me a good role to change and nature, that way I won’t be thinking independently.
The 11th Hour
For thousands of years, humans have been able to use things to live in a sustainable way. Humans haven’t been on the earth very long compared to the time that the earth has existed and in that short time we have manage to screw up our planet in a big way. We have become an unsustainable species that can’t even identify ten species native to their home, but can identify thousands of logos.
The enormous destruction and damage that we are causing has been carried out only in the past thousand years or so. When the industrial revolution occurred and humans discovered fossil fuels and we began to destroy ourselves slowly. This wasn’t an issue when we could sustain ourselves. We have been filling the air we breathe with pollutants by pouring carbon into the atmosphere so we can satisfy our need to consume. This isn’t fair to the planer or our future generations.
I think we need to do anything we can to save our home right now. If humans are really the smartest animals, we should be able to get something this simple though our heads. We aren’t only hurting the planet and all of the animals that inhabit it, we are also hurting ourselves. There are many different diseases and illnesses that never existed before. We are also destroying the only place we have to go.
Many people don’t believe that global warming is a big problem. A lot of people I’ve talked to about this don’t care. Even I never used to until a few years ago. If humanity is going to continue on like this, it won’t exist anymore. The planet isn’t going to have to suffer much longer, humans will either change or they will die.
There are many small things that anyone can do to help such as using CFL light bulbs, buying less, using a re-usable thermos or water bottle and ensuring that the air pressure in your tires is correct. These things can help out a lot if ever one does them. They can also save you money which is just another reason to try and help.
The 11th Hour
Me I personally don’t believe that there is global warming happening.
I really don’t think we need lights on at night it is a waste of a resource.
Yes we are putting a lot of pollution and toxins in the air everyday. We are doing a lot of littering and putting lots of garbage into the land and the ocean.
The garbage will never dissolve into the land it will stay in the land forever. The same is with tires and rubber it will sit their forever. We can not waste our resources; we can not pollute the air. We need to stop using so much oil and gas and we have to reuse more things.
We have been wasting a lot of none renewable resources. I think that we need to stop polluting the air and the land. I think we should stop using plastic for water bottles and use reusable ones. We shouldn’t waste a lot of our food or forests for lumber. We can not use up all the lumber it dose not grow back fast enough.
We need to stop cutting down forests and not replacing them. We need to plant lots of trees to stop floods and make the air cleaner. We need to be careful of what we have left and how we use it.
THE 11th HOUR
The earth is changing dramatically everyday; sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worst. Right now climate change, or “Global Warming”, is one of the biggest environmental concerns right now. It affects everyone and everything on this planet from the fish in the sea to the polar bears in the arctic. The earth is heating up and humans are the main contribution.
People know this. Some people are trying what they can to help, but too many of us are ignoring it. But if you were to ask people if they want more efficient and eco-friendly products, the answer will unanimously be yes. So we tell the higher powers, our government, but they’d rather invest their money on oil; one of the major things contributing to global warming. As for the products that are helping, they can be much too expensive and many people can’t afford them. There are many energy efficient products like refrigerators and washing machines, and near everyone has one. Little things do help, but we need bigger changes in our lifestyle.
We also throw away too much. Where are we going to put two Mt Everest’s of garbage? We dump our waste into the oceans and it harms many species. However, that harm is being put back into us. There are many people becoming sick from food poisoning. For example, it’s more harmful for pregnant women to eat fish because the fish are high in mercury. The fish are mistaking our garbage for their food and end up digesting things not meant to be eaten. And it’s not just fish. We learnt about birds that live around the Midway Atoll called the Albatross. They too are eating what they find floating on top of the ocean and feed it to their children. These birds are being filled with plastics that can’t even be dissolved by our stomach acids. I’m certain that many other species are trying to digest our plastic without knowing the difference. Who is it that’s putting the mercury into the water? It’s us. So, in a roundabout way, it’s karma biting us in the rear. However, the fish and other sea life are also dieing because of our neglectful ways.
I believe that we need to change, even if it’s a little bit at a time. Everyone can help; young and old, tall and short. It’s not “un-cool” and in the end, we all will be greatly rewarded. Humans will be able to stay on this beautiful planet for much longer so that future generations can live on. Did you want your grandchildren to be the last on earth? If we don’t act sooner than that, even our children will be obsolete within time. As it was said, we are at December 31st, 11:59:59. We are out of time.
The population of the people is increasly growing. In the 1800’s there was only 1 billion people. Once we have reached the 1930’s we have no reached 2 billion people. 1960 came around and than there was over 3 billion people. That’s a huge difference in over 30 years. But in the present day that we live in there is now over 6 billion people in the world. To many people on the world are living a way that wont work for the near future. I am one of them. I can see these changes occur, but I cant do anything about it. There are people all around the world trying to speak to people, show people, and make people listen. The problem is that a lot of people are just not listening to what people are to say. Its obvious these events are happening; and nothing is being done about it. The day will come to when situations in the effect of global warming will reveal its self in indestructible ways and people will than wish they had don’t something about it. The 11th hour was an amazing movie that shows what’s happening all around the world. Involving the waste of garbage, use of energy, and population
This movie is a very good example on showing what’s going down on global warming. Global warming is a huge affect on the world and its going to hit hard. Extinction is a normal cause that happens very often over the course of life. 99.999% of all species on earth go extinct in the course of life. Something like the fall of all civilization will be something that will be natural to life. Most people may not think that it mat be fair in some ways, but it will happen. The use of energy we use is unacceptable. You can go to almost any major and in the darkest time at night see huge building’s lighting up using a ton of energy for nothing, and there can be no one in the building what so ever. We use huge amounts of energy to which wouldn’t be needed; yet, people just don’t seem to care. Fuel is a huge major in society. The ways we heat our homes, and drive our cars is a raw amount of fuel going to waste. People all around the world must start living a way suitable to the world we live on.
Jimmy Christopher Mather’s.
The 11th hour
after watching the 11th hour, I feel that we, as humans have caused this upon ourselves.
I also think that we are the reason global warming is an issue on our planet. We are losing control of our climate and earth and the humans on earth need to harmonize with each other. The reason for this is possibly the increase in population, the way we are using our technology and using up many of our resources has caused us to have major unsustainably
Technology plays a big role in our society. A lot or most of it actually I believe is based on our oil industry and our greenhouse gas emissions. We are using technology to produce toxins into our air. I think often time we do this without noticing it. Our global mass consumption has and is becoming a big issue.
Because of our irresponsible ways, are planet, and man kind is in danger. Our resources are being limited because we are basically destroying them. We are destroying our forests we are polluting our oceans and our landfills. Our icecaps are melting, soil erosion is happening, and our oil is being used up.
A quote from the film was “Global warming is the revenge of the gods,” Which I believe is true. The earth is simply suffering and is being abused. This brings me back to my main point about how we caused this, but not only to ourselves, to our home too. Our industrial civilization is corrupting our global ecosystems. But also as much as some of us want change, most of the time we don’t have authorized rights, especially when it comes to changing the economy for our better.
I believe the issue clearly is the government. They think that the environment are external issues, (outside issues) oppose to the economy and money. In the video they said that they are not externalities because the economy only runs because of nature. Nature is doing twice as much service for us than any industrial system would. While here we are destroying it. When we lose biodiversity, “our system” will fail. The fact is we are not maintaining nature. And it will take approximately 3.5 trillion per year, to repair nature because of us ruining it and taking all the resources. That just goes to show us how much damage we have cost ourselves and our environment.
The environment is okay, and it has a capability of fixing itself, if humans weren’t in the way the earth would probably still be as beautiful as it once was. In reality people are blaming everything on the environment and think they have nothing to do with it. But the problem is human thinking, we are very disconnected from our resources (nature), and our thinking is very problematic. Our species is taking up so much of our earth while we think its okay. We are barely leaving any room for other species to have habitants in.
The 11th Hour…..
Some of the scientists believe that global warming or climate change are caused by the Greek Gods for what we are doing to the earth and the climate. They said this because of how much the storms have increased like hurricanes, tornados. The amount of Co2 has increased by 30-35%.I think that we need to change the way we are thinking. We need to use less plastic and use more renewable items.
The things that we could reuse are water bottles. We need to plant more trees so we can have more clean air then all of this polluted air… to breath. We also need to stop cutting trees down because once their cut down they take a long time to grow back. Also we need to conserve energy and water. We also need to conserve oil and gas.
Trees are a big part of the human race. They help us breath, clean air and water. We need to reconsider how many tress we cut down. Trees can hold a large amount of water for floods and heavy rain storms. I think we should just stop cutting trees down.
We need to stop using a lot of energy and water (use some but not a lot) and all the earths natural resources. The way we can do this is by turning t v/lights off when they are not in use. We can change the way we use our resources all we have to do is think and have a idea of how we can change it.
I think that the world isn’t very sustainable because all we are doing is using all the earths resources for all our wants. But what we have to think about is what we have to start thinking about is our needs. Like I mean we need to use less water, lights televisions. Maybe we can just start with those small things like stop using plastic and rubber, oil, gas. Then work up to the bigger things like re-planting tree’s.
The 11th Hour
After watching the 11th hour, and hearing about all the problems we are causing on this earth, has really inspired me to help make a change. People have lost their conection with nature and are destroying the earth and it’s resources.
A major problem that we are facing today is air pollution. Air pollution causes many health problems such as asthma, emphysema and lung cancer. One of the biggest air pollutions today would be gas from driving a car. This has a huge impact on the earth and its atmosphere. People need to realize that this can lead to drastic climate change and major catastrophies, and is ruining our earth and our chance for suvival.
Another major problem human beings have today is cutting down trees, which cut off our oxygen supply, in which we need to survive. In our world today we only think about the present, not so much about the future and what lies ahead if we don’t change our ways. I feel that in order for the world to change we have to understand that what we are doing to the earth has a
huge affect on us.
My thoughts on the 11th hour is that we need to change now, before it’s to late and our earth is ruined. We need to find oursevles and the connection to nature we once had, and realize the earth is apart of us. In conclusion we need to understand that we are slowly ruining the earth and in order to change we need to change ourselves and remember who we are as human beings.
Our planet is hurting right now. Humanity; has done extensive damage to nature, industrial companies are using nature just as a resource; the community is using too many resources too fast. The human mind created the concept of the future, but the human mind is also what has thrown us out of balance. Humans still have not found a way to change our ways.
The whole concept makes me heart ache knowing that if humanity continues living this way, we are going to reach our tipping point. When I first heard about climate change or global warming, my first thought was about the governments and how they just ignore the idea that Mother Nature is going to get her revenge. Instead they only care about the fossil fuel industry and how much money they spend and bring in. Governments do not seem to realize how every living system is declining. Our world is not stable nor is it improving. Much of this occurs in the ocean because humanity is taking millions, to even, billions of animals out of the ocean everyday and most of which are wasted.
Humanity has poisoned the ocean, polluted the atmosphere and exhausted the land. We have no more land to waste.
If humanity drives nature off the planet, technology is going to have to replace nature which would cost around a trillion dollars a year to do what nature does for free; if this is even possible.
We are increasingly infecting our lives. Humanity is taking to many resources and it is getting harder for other creatures to live. Humanity has just turned their backs on natures warning signs and the consequences are just going to be harder and harder to deal with.
This is the most critical time so far in human history. The planet has all the time in the world to regenerate and humanity does not.
The 11th hour really made me think about global warming. The statistics they were talking about, like how for every truck load of useable goods made, there are 32 bags of garbage that came from making it, are insane. When I saw Chris Jordan’s pictures about large statistics, it did make me realize there are many problems in the world with global warming, but actually hearing information about it from scientists and important people like Leonardo Di Caprio, made it seem way more real.
There were two quotes in the play that really spoke to me. The first one was “Every time you buy something, it’s like you approve of it.” I never thought of it that way before, but it really is true. If something is made of non recycled material that is bad for the environment, and you buy it, it’s just like saying you don’t care that it will harm the earth. Or even buying a drink everyday from the convenience store. All of those plastic bottles add up if you don’t recycle.
The second quote was, “global warming is the revenge from the gods.” That one definitely made me think. We are doing so much damage to our earth, some not even realizing it, and soon we will be the ones suffering for it. It’s like they are giving us a second chance to make things right and stop wasting so many things, and yet, people still aren’t listening.
People need to stop all the wasting and make a change in the way they live. The earth needs to reach a sustainable level because right now, with the way we are wasting things, it is defiantly not sustainable. If we dont start changing right now, before we know it, it’ll be too late!