4 ms·

Are any of those issues comparable to cutting all the trees down? Fires and beatles and dead wood are natural.

• zdf 8y ago
  For the beetles in particular, they're only natural inasmuch as logging is natural. The beetles are able to survive because of human activity. Logging is just as natural, because it's done by humans, which are a natural species. We have to have some common sense boundaries on what is or is not natural for the term to have any usefulness in environmental discussions. In this case, the beetles are unnatural and invasive. Moreover, they're harmful in that they kill trees more quickly than the forest is equipped to handle.
• sgc 8y ago
  Japanese beetles are not native to the area and wipe out hundreds of thousands of acres at a time. Then it is a tinder box.
  • jmspring 8y ago
    Drive Sonora pass sometime and look "south". So much dead forest. That isn't particularly natural.
    • sgc 8y ago
      No it is not.