I guess ever since young, I have always been bemused. A quick introduction:

Human behaviour, human reaction, psychology. These intriguing humans have always piqued my interest. They love to look for loopholes, take advantage, and waste time, money, resource on unnecessary ‘red tape‘ to solve the problems they create. Think lawyers, traffic police, politicians. Having always been a proponent of the perfect world, call me idealistic or dreamy, I pine for a perfect utopia where things function.

For a more succinct math reference which everyone loves:  A perfect world exists at the most optimal solution, not the Nash equilibrium.

 

Our world now I feel is akin to wobbling coin, been knocked off its vertical perch, tumbling around.

One very fascinating behaviour I read about recently is the onset of Urban Sprawling. In a nutshell, contrary to common sense, people from rich and populated cities basically roam out to the less populated country side or urban areas. So the city essentially expands, or more accurately, diffuses outwards.

Reasons for such atypical behaviour are, just to name a few (Conserve-Energy-Future, 2013):

• People in cities are getting richer, allowing them greater flexibility to pick and choose (e.g. preference for more pristine environments, availability of more convenient transportation)
• Lower taxes in more rural land (chiefly property price & tax)
• Overpopulation in the city
• Avoid noise and crime

 

Aberrant behaviour as illustrated. They fight to get in the city, and when they do, they yearn to get out, creating a host of problems. What problems? You may ask. Many, but I’d delve into the more concerning environmental impacts for this one.

Firstly, by virtue of living further away from the workplace, most commuters (I assume boldly) would choose to burn fuel instead of fat to get to work on time. With a less-than-sterling public transportation system in urban areas, cars will proliferate, and carbon footprints go through the roof.

Secondly, the drinking water may be polluted by the “increasing the amount of surface runoff”, contaminating rivers. (Frumkin, 2004)

Thirdly and most importantly, barging into these areas will cause a detriment to its wildlife and of course, also deforestation and its subsequent snowball effects. (Frumkin, 2004) This, in my opinion, is a struggle. Everything has its opportunity costs. In order to satisfy a human want, something has to be given up, and that something may mean the world to few, but worth less than a penny to others.

 

There is a perfect solution to this, I believe, but just like my aspirations, it will not work out. A tumbling coin cannot become erect. Where human greed and evil has perforated, selfish interests will always be put first, be it economically or otherwise. For now we can only try and compromise, give in and maybe hopefully one day we come to a state of agreement, where with rational knowledge of other’s thinking, each party settles in the best of their interest . Just like how in game theory they call it: The best response.

 

 

References
1) Conserve-Energy-Future. (2013). Causes and Effects of Urban Sprawl – Conserve Energy Future. [online] Available at: http://www.conserve-energy-future.com/causes-and-effects-of-urban-sprawl.php [Accessed 24 Aug. 2016].

2) Resnik, D. (2010). Urban Sprawl, Smart Growth, and Deliberative Democracy. American Journal of Public Health, [online] 100(10), p.1852. Available at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2936977/ [Accessed 24 Aug. 2016].

3) Frumkin H, Frank L, Jackson R. Urban Sprawl and Public Health. Washington, DC: Island Press; 2004