雅思阅读

📖 Reading Passage

The concept of 'environmental carrying capacity' refers to the maximum population size of a species that an ecosystem can sustain indefinitely, given the available resources. In human contexts, this notion is complicated by technological innovation, which can temporarily raise carrying capacity by increasing resource efficiency. However, such expansions often lead to unintended consequences, such as habitat degradation or resource depletion, which may ultimately lower the long-term capacity. Critics argue that relying solely on technological fixes ignores the ethical dimensions of consumption and distribution, suggesting that sustainable management requires not only scientific insight but also policy reforms addressing social equity. Thus, carrying capacity is not a fixed biological limit but a dynamic threshold shaped by both ecological constraints and human choices.