Is humanity trying too hard to maintain status quo in nature?

Think about it: Anyone with basic knowlage of natural history knows that species going extinct is part of the procces of evolution, but whenever something goes extinct NOW, people immediatly go "OMG the enviroment is falling apart!!!".

I am not surprised, considering how many species go extinct as a result of our actions, but still, extinction is a large part of nature anyway.

Discuss.

Less species means less biodiversity. Less biodiversity is bad.

I have not much problem with species going extinct due to nothing that we've done, but extinctions that we make end up having a long-term negative affect on the food web, which could turn around and affect us.

EDIT: Apparently less biodiversity is linked to a rise in infectious diseases.

See what I mean? If species keep going extinct, that eventually comes around to bite us in the arse.

edited 25th Jun '11 8:19:45 AM by annebeeche

I kind of think we do try too hard and that we overestimate our influence. Not all the species that go extinct are for humans to blame

NZM gets my point. I am all up for helping the biosphere so that humanity doesn't collapse, but we need to know that some animals go extinct anyway, even without humans.

I get your point too. I just said that I have no problem with extinctions that occur naturally and not as a result of our actions.

Some species we destroy were already on the way out, and I don't feel bad for them, but the rest I do.

I recently read an article somewhere that roughly one third of mammal species declared extinct in the last 200 years have recently been proven to still be around. Don't know how accurate it is, but it certainly made me think.

Not to sound defending of intentional species extinction but how? Ecosystems change all the time increasing or decreasing biodiversity with it.

Interesting how many people are just shrugging and saying "Oh, humans aren't to blame for all of it" as if that somehow gave you the excuse to just ignore the issue.

Maybe you really don't think that way, but I have my doubts. Is there any responsibility you genuinely DO want to acknowledge?

edited 25th Jun '11 9:22:37 AM by blueharp

A different ecosystem than the one we live in and have adapted to would be bad for us. This is self-preservation first and foremost.

edited 25th Jun '11 9:23:49 AM by Quoth

Yes, I agree with the self-preservation thing, but I think we overreact a little too much.

We're currently in the midst of one of the most severe mass extinctions the Earth has ever seen, primarily as a result of human activity. To some extent, yeah, I think if a species is already going extinct, that's nature's way of saying "Welp, that design was a failure", and we should just let them go (I'm looking at you, giant pandas), but it's worth bearing in mind that of all animal species in the world, human beings have an unprecedented level of influence on their environments, and that also means an unprecedented ability to protect endangered species.

So I guess from where I'm standing, the people who care are trying too hard to maintain the status quo, but the people who can actually make a difference aren't trying hard enough.

• sidelong glance at BP*

The answer to your question is 'No.'

Bobby elaborated with enough eloquence that you could carve that into marble for the illumination of future generations.

edited 25th Jun '11 9:32:08 AM by Karkadinn

We hardly react at all. I mean, you've got those anti-whaling types who sink ships, but those guys are froth on the surface.

If anyone is overreacting, it's the hard right dubbing anyone even vaguely green as an "environmental extremist", whatever that means.

Here◊

Sorry for the size.

@ blueharp — there is a lot of biodiversity that is destroyed by humans. Most of it actually. But when a species is down to a few square miles before humans really started to encroach... they were already on the way out.

^^ I'm not sure what that's supposed to prove. I mean, it's mildly amusing to compare two strawmen, I guess.

Treating "nature" as an external object that humans are not part of that always knows best is really, really, dumb.

15

And this discussion has been a bunch of complete focus on one, with no acknowledgement of the other.

Was the Passenger Pigeon down to a few square miles? The American Bison? Various sea turtles? The Bald Eagle? The wolf?

All this focus on some species you claim were already dying is, I fear, an excuse to completely disregard any human environmental impact.

I never implied that humanity isn't part of nature.

Wanting to maintain status quo in something does not make you not a part of it.

edited 25th Jun '11 9:47:54 AM by paradisedj32

@ Myr: Yeah, OK, but I was speaking metaphorically.

But you will not see a normal environmentalist claim that "Gaia is angry", or that nature is some kind of force that will wipe us out to restore the balance, or anything like that. That's more of a new age hippy thing.

edited 25th Jun '11 9:48:34 AM by BobbyG

There is no status quo in nature. And if there was, we have no duty to allow it to happen.

No. I said that most loss of biodiversity is due to mankind. How is that disregarding humanity's environmental impact?

What I did say was that when an animal has already been reduced to a few square miles before they were impacted by mankind, they were about to go out naturally, so I really can't make myself feel bad about those specific cases.

Clearly the American Bison, sea turtles, and your other examples are mankind's fault. However, a type of frog that is only found in a two square mile pocket of untouched forest (ie. before mankind's influence reaches them) is clearly already on the decline, so their situation cannot be fully blamed on humans.

The status quo meaning the way things are right now, at this point in time.

Is it inherently desirable? Nope. Is it a climate which happens to be fairly hospitable to human life? More or less, yes.

I'm referring to this discussion here, which is focusing on those two square mile frogs as if they were the only things being worried about, or as if they were a primary focus of environmental protections.

It's a typical pattern, pick out some absurd situation to discredit some cause, and then tear down all the protections that were built up around it.

You're trying too hard to defend your ideas, and not realizing that my problem is with what I consider to be a scam job using innocuous language to conceal a far more predatory intent.

Maybe you don't feel you are, but is it so hard to think that it'd be worth assuring me that you're really not?

Besides, is it really so hard to not cut down two square miles of forest?

edited 25th Jun '11 10:04:20 AM by blueharp

To be fair, I think the concept cancerlad is conveying is this: At that point, it's not Humans Are Bastards, it's survival of the fittest with humans being the fittest.