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Hypothetical question: Suppose in the past hundred years a new species of gnat evolved to live in asbestos insulation. As asbestos is phased out, this species f

by xamuel 7y ago

Hypothetical question: Suppose in the past hundred years a new species of gnat evolved to live in asbestos insulation. As asbestos is phased out, this species faces an extinction crises. Should humans intervene to preserve the species? Daily reminder: extinction and speciation go hand-in-hand. It's not like there's a finite number of species and we're going to run out of them. "So profound is our ignorance, and so high our presumption, that we marvel when we hear of the extinction of an organic being; and as we do not see the cause, we invoke cataclysms to desolate the world, or invent laws on the duration of the forms of life!" ~Charles Darwin

throwaway94857 7y ago
It's hilarious that the continued existence of all species presently on Earth at this very moment has become some sort of moral imperative in the minds of activists. Let's flip the situation on its head: by not allowing species to go extinct today, we prevent new and better adapted species from evolving tomorrow.
- Retra 7y ago
  Extinction does not drive evolution, reproduction does, and if a species' food goes extinct, they reproduce less, not more. Secondly, these animals aren't abandoning their niches, they're losing them due to human activities. There is no room for another species to adapt to it, because there is nothing there to adapt to anymore.
- kyralis 7y ago
  Would you like to provide a source for "the continued existence of all species presently on Earth at this very moment has become some sort of moral imperative in the minds of activists"? Because it's certainly not generally true. The goal is to limit species loss due to human impact on the natural environment. Generally, no one's even suggesting that we stop impacting that environment; merely that we stop ourselves when our impact becomes great enough to threaten biodiversity loss.
SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
We're the only species that can make those decisions and the only species that can consider the consequence of those actions. We've grown beyond just letting things run their course and watching what happens - it's become increasingly obvious we work against our own self interest in how we run around destroying things. I don't find the ecological equivalent of "boys will be boys" in any way satisfying.
- xamuel 7y ago
  So in that hypothetical example, what are the dire consequences of letting the asbestos-gnat go extinct? Bear in mind that if we ever suddenly need to do studies on asbestos-gnats for some reason, we can just re-create the environment they evolved in and let them re-evolve.
  - SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
    That's entirely flawed though - we can't for certain replicate the exact conditions, and if it's proven to be valuable, we can't know that recreating it will have the effect we require it to have.
    - xamuel 7y ago
      Well then we're guilty by omission for all the trillions of species that could have evolved if we had done something different in the past. For example, maybe if we had used higher amounts of chlorine in our swimming pools all along, then that would have caused some new bacteria to evolve. Are we guilty because we never gave that poor, innocent, helpless bacteria a chance at life? (Queue images of bacterias crying into their handkerchiefs with tiny little violins playing in the background)
      - SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
        No, we aren't. Like I just said - you can't anticipate what's to come, but you can look at your actions right now, and if it's causing species to become extinct because of our interference, we can knock that out.
24gttghh 7y ago
Daily Reminder: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction It's not like there are just a few 'gnats' here and there going extinct. This is an ongoing ecological collapse we are the cause of, and in the middle of.

by xamuel 7y ago

throwaway94857 7y ago

It's hilarious that the continued existence of all species presently on Earth at this very moment has become some sort of moral imperative in the minds of activists. Let's flip the situation on its head: by not allowing species to go extinct today, we prevent new and better adapted species from evolving tomorrow.

Retra 7y ago
Extinction does not drive evolution, reproduction does, and if a species' food goes extinct, they reproduce less, not more. Secondly, these animals aren't abandoning their niches, they're losing them due to human activities. There is no room for another species to adapt to it, because there is nothing there to adapt to anymore.
kyralis 7y ago
Would you like to provide a source for "the continued existence of all species presently on Earth at this very moment has become some sort of moral imperative in the minds of activists"? Because it's certainly not generally true. The goal is to limit species loss due to human impact on the natural environment. Generally, no one's even suggesting that we stop impacting that environment; merely that we stop ourselves when our impact becomes great enough to threaten biodiversity loss.

SketchySeaBeast 7y ago

We're the only species that can make those decisions and the only species that can consider the consequence of those actions. We've grown beyond just letting things run their course and watching what happens - it's become increasingly obvious we work against our own self interest in how we run around destroying things. I don't find the ecological equivalent of "boys will be boys" in any way satisfying.

xamuel 7y ago
So in that hypothetical example, what are the dire consequences of letting the asbestos-gnat go extinct? Bear in mind that if we ever suddenly need to do studies on asbestos-gnats for some reason, we can just re-create the environment they evolved in and let them re-evolve.
- SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
  That's entirely flawed though - we can't for certain replicate the exact conditions, and if it's proven to be valuable, we can't know that recreating it will have the effect we require it to have.
  - xamuel 7y ago
    Well then we're guilty by omission for all the trillions of species that could have evolved if we had done something different in the past. For example, maybe if we had used higher amounts of chlorine in our swimming pools all along, then that would have caused some new bacteria to evolve. Are we guilty because we never gave that poor, innocent, helpless bacteria a chance at life? (Queue images of bacterias crying into their handkerchiefs with tiny little violins playing in the background)
    - SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
      No, we aren't. Like I just said - you can't anticipate what's to come, but you can look at your actions right now, and if it's causing species to become extinct because of our interference, we can knock that out.

24gttghh 7y ago

Daily Reminder: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction It's not like there are just a few 'gnats' here and there going extinct. This is an ongoing ecological collapse we are the cause of, and in the middle of.