Pittman 1

Joe Pittman
ENG 112-78
Connie Douglas
1 November, 2016
From Different Perspectives
It is commonly known that an argument can only exist with two or more differing
perspectives on an issue. Individuals perspectives can be derived from many different
influences: personal experiences, their own self-interests, religious influence, facts on the issue
and much more. People with similar perspectives get grouped together and from this group a
common voice prevails among the people. As these voices gain support and more people
begin to side with their beliefs on the issue, the voices will get louder and their point can
clearly be heard and recognized. One issue that has several loud voices is whether we should
continue our reliance on fossil fuels for our primary source of energy?
Over the last couple of decades, the term global warming has become more prominent in
the news and the problems surfacing have been getting more severe with time. Originally global
warming was blown off by many and seen as more of just a natural cycle our planet goes
through. Once researched, the main contributor to global warming was found to be our reliance
and constant use of fossil fuels for energy. In order to obtain the energy from fossil fuels, they
must be combusted and during this process harmful greenhouse gases get released into the
environment and are trapped by our ozone. With these gases trapped in the ozone, heat from the
sun gets blocked from escaping, causing the planet to heat up. Now this sounds great, everyone
wants an extra-long summer and short winters, but when the heating causes environmental shifts
and increases in natural disasters, it is not quite as much fun. According to Michael MacCracken

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and James J. McCarthy, in their 2009 article Its Time to Turn Green Talk into Action, This
year, we have suffered through a string of record-breaking extreme weather events, all worsened
by climate change. These included "summer in March," the hottest month in U.S. history, the
worst drought since the 1950s and a wildfire season that is rivaling the worst ever, a record set
only six years ago. As the debate and the problems associated with global warming grow, three
main voices on this issue have become most dominant. The first is the voice of the people who
believe fossil fuels are still our best source of energy, the voice of the impartial scientific
viewpoint who presents the facts, and the voice of the people who believe fossil fuels must be
replaced by alternative clean energies.
Originally one of the loudest voices, the voice of people who believe fossil fuels are the
best energy source, has in recent years gotten less support as more factual evidence is presented.
The people who speak this voice are a large group of the Republican Party, oil lobbyist, the oil
companies themselves, and the vast number of people who benefit financially from oil. The
people who fall under this group typically seem to be people who have some type of self interest
in oil and would be hurt from the discontinuation of its use. They tend to stay away from the
issues caused by fossil fuels and focus more on how much we have gained from them, and how
cheap and efficient they are.
The viewpoint shared by people in this group is that without the continued use of fossil
fuels, there will not be an energy source that will be able to support our needs as cheaply and
efficiently. They argue that all the new renewable energy technologies; such as, solar energy, are
too expensive to produce the same amount of energy output. One fossil fuel lobbyist, Alex
Epstein, argues that we owe all our technological advances to fossil fouls stating that, [Fossil
fuels], in turn, [were] used to create the technological and economic advances that took us from

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no indoor plumbing to landing on the moon in less than 200 years. (Epstein 1) A good point
now comes to surface, since fossil fuels have been used we have advanced more in the last 200
years than we did in the previous few thousand. The last argument from people in this group is
that switching of our entire system off fossil fuels would cost an absurd amount of money. Our
entire infrastructure is built around the use of fossil fuels from our cars, to our lights, to our
heating, almost everything is set up to use these fuels. The voice from this group does bring up
many good point of how cheap and efficient fossil fuels can be but fail to provide a suitable
solution to fix the issue of carbon emissions causing greenhouse gases.
The next voice on the issue is from the scientific community. The people that speak this
voice are experts in environmental fields of study, researchers of renewable energy sources,
geologist, and researches in related scientific fields. This voice serves as a checks and balances to
the other voices on the issue. Global warming is a problem, and scientist in the field are
constantly presenting new information from the results of the effects it is having on the
environment. The scientific voice serves the purpose of bringing the most current information
into the argument and bases its decision on what is best for the environment.
The standard viewpoint shared by the scientific voice is, that fossil fuels are releasing
greenhouse gases that are hurting the environment, but it is inconclusive on the path that should
be taken to resolve this problem. While all experts in the field do agree that current methods of
fossil fuel consumption are hazardous and present a problem with greenhouse gases and that they
will eventually run out, some differ on the approach that should be taken for their near future.
Individuals like John Reilly and Allison Crimmins believe that fossil fuels are not running out
anytime soon and will be the primary source of fuel throughout this century. They also state that
the needed reduction in greenhouse emissions can be met through greatening the efficiency of

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our fossil fuel combustion methods, gaining more energy off less of the fuel. (Reilly) Whereas
others believe like Georgia Destouni and Harry Frank, from their work Renewable Energy,
where they state: By the year 2050, renewable energy is expected to reach 35% of an estimated
global primary energy supply of 170,000 TWh [terawatt hours] and 50% of an estimated global
electricity production of 45,000 TWh.(1) While their methods do differ slightly the scientific
viewpoint agrees that a switch off fossil fuels will need to be made in the near future.
The last voice, which has gained the most support in recent years, is of those who believe
that fossil fuels should be replaced with alternative forms of energy. The people that speak this
voice contains a large group of Democrats, many environmental scientists, Obamas
administration, and many well-respected universities. Alternative energy, or renewable energy, is
energy that can be obtained from clean and renewable sources such as wind, solar, hydroelectric,
and biofuels. These sources are primarily free of pollution and could solve the issue of global
warming, but the lack of technology in this area leads to the obtainment methods not being as
efficient or yielding as much energy as gained from fossil fuels.
The viewpoint held by this voice is that a stop to the use of fossil fuels needs to happen as
soon as possible and they will need to be replace by alternative clean energy sources. This
viewpoint is believed because of the detrimental damage that global warming is having on the
environment. In recent years problems attributed to the use of fossil fuels have emerged, for
example natural disasters have become more powerful and frequent, ice in the poles is melting at
an unseen rate, global temperatures are on the rise, and sea levels have gone up. These problems
come with serious consequences and because of this people who speak this voice urge for people
to support renewable forms of energy. With greater support, more research can be done and the
gap in efficiency between renewable energy yield and fossil fuel energy yield can be diminished.

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This voice asserts that continued use of fossil fuels will only hurt our future and all our
investment needs to be shifted towards renewable energy sources.
After hearing the voices of the supporters of fossil fuels, the scientific viewpoint, and
those who want to replace fossil fuels with alternative energy, it can be seen that the issue has
many different views and a clear solution to the problem is uncertain. Can we afford to make the
switch off fossil fuels? Is it best to continue our use of fossil fuels, maybe enhancing their
efficiency to reduce emissions? Should the shift to renewable energy begin soon? Have we
already caused to much damage too the environment? Is an immediate shift needed? All these
questions are still unanswered and it is left up for the people of this generation to educate
themselves on the issue and make the best decision for mankind and mother Earth.

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Work Cited
Destouni, Georgia, and Harry Frank. "Renewable Energy." Ambio 39 (2010): 18
21.ProQuest. Web. 20 Oct. 2016.
Epstein, Alex. "Fossil Fuels have made all of our Lives Better." South Florida Sun SentinelNov
29 2014. ProQuest. Web. 20 Oct. 2016.
MacCracken, Michael, and James J. McCarthy. "It is Time to Turn 'Green' Talk into
Action." The Journal News: 21. Dec 26 2012. ProQuest. Web. 20 Oct. 2016.
Reilly, John, and Allison Crimmins. "MYTH v. FACT." Mechanical Engineering 133.1 (2011):
24,26,28-29. ProQuest. Web. 20 Oct. 2016.
Schoder, Carl E. "A Convenient Truth about Clean Energy." The Futurist 45.1 (2011): 259. ProQuest. Web. 20 Oct. 2016.