Environmental determinism

Environmental determinism, also known as climatic determinism or geographical determinism, is the belief that the physical environment predisposes human social development towards particular trajectories. A nineteenth- and early twentieth-century approach to the study of geography argued that the general laws sought by human geographers could be found in the physical sciences. Geography, therefore, became focused on the study of how the physical environment affected, or even caused, human culture and activities. At the time that this field was expanding its knowledge, practices and theories, it allowed for geographers to create ""scientific justification for the supremacy of white European races and the naturalness of imperialism"". A prominent member in the study of environmental determinism, Ellen Churchill Semple, chose to apply her theories in a case study which focused on the Philippines, where she, ""sought to map the distributions of 'wild', 'civilized', and 'Negrito' peoples on the topography of the islands"". From Semple's works, other members within the field of study were able to find reasonable evidence to suggest that, ""the climate and topography of a given environment"" would cause specific character traits to appear in a given population, ""leading geographers to feel confident on pronouncing on the racial characteristics of given populations."" The use of environmental determinism allowed for states to rationalize colonization, by claiming that the peoples within the given land were ""morally inferior"", therefore legitimizing exploitation. Consequently, the use of this theory in explaining, rationalizing and legitimizing racism, ethnocentrism and development, has been strongly criticized, and in recent years, has become mostly obsolete.""