Technology

Pollution is the introduction and accumulation of contaminants in the environment, generally attributed to man-made wastes. It is a kind of habitat destruction, negatively affecting both physical and biological components. It comes in the form of air, water, noise, light, visual, thermal, chemical and radiation pollution. Evidently, both the non-living and living elements in the environment are prone to different kinds of pollution.

Pollution happens because the natural environment cannot process the decomposition of the contaminants. The inability of the environment to decompose the contaminants causes the harmful substances to accumulate until the adverse effects are worse. As the famous saying goes Anything in excess is not good. The excessive accrual of detrimental elements makes the environment a less healthy place to live in. In effect, human beings suffer the consequences of their actions and carelessness.

As aforementioned, pollution is by and large caused by destructive human activities. The fast-paced improvement of human technology took its toll from the environment. As science and technology flourishes, the environment suffers degradation. Pollutants can be foreign or naturally occurring. Naturally occurring pollutants are substances that naturally exists in the system but exceed the natural level. One very good example of this is carbon dioxide. Although it naturally occurs in the atmosphere, increased level becomes harmful to all members of the ecosystem.

Air and water pollution are the most critical problems that human beings are faced with. Air and water are basic necessities of all living things  plants, animals and humans alike. If air and water are contaminated, the life cycle of all living things will be negatively impacted and if worse, ceased. Air pollution is evidenced by acid rain which in turn, destroys crops and poisons fishes in the lakes. In addition, the most critical of all effects of air pollution is the depletion of the ozone layer. This depletion of the ozone layer causes the very alarming global warming. Global warming caught the attention of the scientific community especially recently because of its rapid development. Its effects are becoming more and more evident and worsens as time passes.

Pollution is slowly having its revenge to human beings. Not only that it degrades the world that people live in, it also causes birth defects to newborns, physical disabilities and psychological disorders. Pollution disrupts the development of fetus in the womb, causing several forms of physical disabilities and worse, sometimes, mental degradation. The effect of pollution to human brain is not only evident to newborns. Even grown-ups suffer the adverse effect of pollution, specifically pollution caused by heavy metals, on their mental capacity. Diseases like Parkinsons and Alzheimers are primarily caused by environment contamination.

Pollution has existed for a long time. But its long existence does not mean that it can be continuously tolerated. As time passes, its effects to the environment and human beings are becoming worse. Being the root cause of the problem, human beings must incessantly exert greater effort to stop pollution. Indeed technology makes life convenient and easy but the downside is that the quality of the planet we live in degrades. Thus, the clamor for change is immense and urgent.