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Humans can have a beneficial impact on the environment too, by terraforming and making the land more productive. There's some evidence that the Amazon mix of f

Humans can have a beneficial impact on the environment too, by terraforming and making the land more productive. There's some evidence that the Amazon mix of fruiting tree and nut species were selected for by humans. "The Supposedly Pristine, Untouched Amazon Rainforest Was Actually Shaped By Humans" https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/pristine-untouched-amazonian-rainforest-was-actually-shaped-humans-180962378/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/pristine-untou... Since some people us this as political grounds for eugenics and population control. Such as one child policies, like China used to have. I think the proper way need to view ourselves, is as "gardeners" and caretakers. What we destroy in one area, we should rebuild in another, or make better. For example, we could make connected "green corridors" that span the entire country, through which animals can migrate and live in. We have disrupted the migration paths of some species with out cities. But nothing says that we can't make it better by providing routes for these animals around our cities and farms.

Onanymous 6y ago
> Humans can have a beneficial impact on the environment too They can but they (mostly) do not. And the best way to have a beneficial impact on environment in the current situation would be "simply" to reduce its numbers. Unfortunately that's not so easy.
rbg246 6y ago
May I kindly ask, why do you feel the need to jump out and defend the human species as also being good in the face of what is described in the article? I am genuinely interested in understanding what motivates this reaction.
- jungletime 6y ago
  You are here, so obviously you feel "good" enough and worthy to exist. With population control its always the "others" need to be eliminated. No one wants to start with themselves. Its an extremely selfish position really. Its also not very logically viable, since those that feel the world is over populated and kill themselves, will just be selected out of the gene pool. Leaving only those that want to live, procreate and prosper behind.
  - DyslexicAtheist 6y ago
    there is no need to kill oneself. but making a start by not choosing the ego-project of procreation would already make a huge difference. if people really want to have children there are enough orphans out there and which would make the world better by raising them instead.
    - RcouF1uZ4gsC 6y ago
      > making a start by not choosing the ego-project of procreation would already make a huge difference. In general, it is procreation that makes humans think about the long term. The truth is, no matter what you do, you will be dead in a hundred years. Wanting to leave the world a better place for your children and grand-children is a much more powerful motivator than abstract philosophical principle.
      - rbg246 6y ago
        I wonder if this is the majority view? I hear it often but it's not something I feel (disclosure: I have one child). I certainly think in terms of leaving the world better for all living things rather than for my children (although I guess they would benefit). I personally feel shame that I am a part of the destruction of this world which in turn motivates me to want to make it better. This is something that has grown as I have aged, I feel now that I'm older I can see things in the longer term and I can see how long it takes to make change and make it stick.
    - mikelevins 6y ago
      That's true. On the other hand, if the desire to have one's own biological progeny is heritable, then the previous poster's point still stands. Given a mixed population of people who want to reproduce their own genomes and those who don't, over time the balance will shift to favor those who do. Parents who don't care whether the children are theirs biologically will have a greater tendency to raise children regardless of biological relationship. That means they are more likely to expend their finite resources on other people's children. That increases the likelihood that other lineages will prosper and expand, and decreases the likelihood that their own will. Therefore we should expect that, with the passage of generations, the desire to have one's own biological progeny will spread and come to dominate the population. That is, if such inclinations are heritable--or if a heritable desire to have one's own children appears in the population at some point.
- darkerside 6y ago
  Seems pretty natural, when information is provided, to offer another perspective. It's one of our core functions as human beings in a social construct. I also think there's a tendency to anchor on what "is". Just because things are natural doesn't make them implicitly "good". And how does one define quality in the first place? Put another way, what is the distinction between natural and artificial? Are humans not part of nature? And will "nature" not be here long after we've destroyed ourselves, if in fact we do?
- yosito 6y ago
  Humanism is a fairly common value system.
29athrowaway 6y ago
Do we live on the same planet? You are cherrypicking one profoundly irrelevant phenomenon taking place in the Amazon rainforest, and arriving to the conclusion that humans are somehow good for the environment. Your comment is as nonsensical as the man posing next to a pile of 1.5 million heads of bison in 1873. Perhaps that person thought at the time it was the right thing to do. Today, we would say that person is an idiot that lives in a world dominated by irrationality, and that there would be no valid reason to do that unless you are an idiot. And that's the same people will think about your comment when are all starving and looking for something to eat. What today you think is "making land more productive", is effectively unsustainable and is consuming everything that can make the land productive in the long term... The human cultures that respected the fragile balance of nature and lived in a sustainable manner were annihilated through genocide and ethnic cleansing, to make room for our irrational "civilization" of unsustainable growth that will likely implode in a few decades in a series of self-reinforcing, cascading ecological disasters. Everything Native Americans preserved for over 10,000 years is going to be consumed in roughly 400 years: groundwater aquifers, fish, topsoil/arable land, megafauna, biodiversity... When all that is gone, land is not going to be "more productive". It is going to be non-productive, sterile land. Our increased short-term productivity is achieved at the expense of long-term sustainability. Sure, nature can heal or adapt to whatever we do to this planet, but it can do so over thousands to millions of years, not decades. Unless we talk about microorganisms like bacteria. Right here in North America, the Ogallala Aquifer, one of the largest in the world and once thought to be infinite, is going to be dry in the next decades ruining the agriculture in at least 6 states where agriculture is one of the main economic activities. Have you asked yourself: what is topsoil? how is topsoil irrigated? how are plants pollinated? No. You just live in a FarmVille-like reductionist model of the planet where those things just exist and are infinite, and ours to take indefinitely without limits so then we can live beyond our means and proliferate without limits. But in reality, those things are going away within our lifetime, because our civilization is irrational and founded on unsustainable philosophical values that are not rooted in the limits of the real world. It is sad that your comment is the most upvoted right now, it just reflects how doomed our society is.

Onanymous 6y ago

> Humans can have a beneficial impact on the environment too They can but they (mostly) do not. And the best way to have a beneficial impact on environment in the current situation would be "simply" to reduce its numbers. Unfortunately that's not so easy.

rbg246 6y ago

May I kindly ask, why do you feel the need to jump out and defend the human species as also being good in the face of what is described in the article? I am genuinely interested in understanding what motivates this reaction.

jungletime 6y ago
You are here, so obviously you feel "good" enough and worthy to exist. With population control its always the "others" need to be eliminated. No one wants to start with themselves. Its an extremely selfish position really. Its also not very logically viable, since those that feel the world is over populated and kill themselves, will just be selected out of the gene pool. Leaving only those that want to live, procreate and prosper behind.
- DyslexicAtheist 6y ago
  there is no need to kill oneself. but making a start by not choosing the ego-project of procreation would already make a huge difference. if people really want to have children there are enough orphans out there and which would make the world better by raising them instead.
  - RcouF1uZ4gsC 6y ago
    > making a start by not choosing the ego-project of procreation would already make a huge difference. In general, it is procreation that makes humans think about the long term. The truth is, no matter what you do, you will be dead in a hundred years. Wanting to leave the world a better place for your children and grand-children is a much more powerful motivator than abstract philosophical principle.
    - rbg246 6y ago
      I wonder if this is the majority view? I hear it often but it's not something I feel (disclosure: I have one child). I certainly think in terms of leaving the world better for all living things rather than for my children (although I guess they would benefit). I personally feel shame that I am a part of the destruction of this world which in turn motivates me to want to make it better. This is something that has grown as I have aged, I feel now that I'm older I can see things in the longer term and I can see how long it takes to make change and make it stick.
  - mikelevins 6y ago
    That's true. On the other hand, if the desire to have one's own biological progeny is heritable, then the previous poster's point still stands. Given a mixed population of people who want to reproduce their own genomes and those who don't, over time the balance will shift to favor those who do. Parents who don't care whether the children are theirs biologically will have a greater tendency to raise children regardless of biological relationship. That means they are more likely to expend their finite resources on other people's children. That increases the likelihood that other lineages will prosper and expand, and decreases the likelihood that their own will. Therefore we should expect that, with the passage of generations, the desire to have one's own biological progeny will spread and come to dominate the population. That is, if such inclinations are heritable--or if a heritable desire to have one's own children appears in the population at some point.
darkerside 6y ago
Seems pretty natural, when information is provided, to offer another perspective. It's one of our core functions as human beings in a social construct. I also think there's a tendency to anchor on what "is". Just because things are natural doesn't make them implicitly "good". And how does one define quality in the first place? Put another way, what is the distinction between natural and artificial? Are humans not part of nature? And will "nature" not be here long after we've destroyed ourselves, if in fact we do?
yosito 6y ago
Humanism is a fairly common value system.

29athrowaway 6y ago

Do we live on the same planet? You are cherrypicking one profoundly irrelevant phenomenon taking place in the Amazon rainforest, and arriving to the conclusion that humans are somehow good for the environment. Your comment is as nonsensical as the man posing next to a pile of 1.5 million heads of bison in 1873. Perhaps that person thought at the time it was the right thing to do. Today, we would say that person is an idiot that lives in a world dominated by irrationality, and that there would be no valid reason to do that unless you are an idiot. And that's the same people will think about your comment when are all starving and looking for something to eat. What today you think is "making land more productive", is effectively unsustainable and is consuming everything that can make the land productive in the long term... The human cultures that respected the fragile balance of nature and lived in a sustainable manner were annihilated through genocide and ethnic cleansing, to make room for our irrational "civilization" of unsustainable growth that will likely implode in a few decades in a series of self-reinforcing, cascading ecological disasters. Everything Native Americans preserved for over 10,000 years is going to be consumed in roughly 400 years: groundwater aquifers, fish, topsoil/arable land, megafauna, biodiversity... When all that is gone, land is not going to be "more productive". It is going to be non-productive, sterile land. Our increased short-term productivity is achieved at the expense of long-term sustainability. Sure, nature can heal or adapt to whatever we do to this planet, but it can do so over thousands to millions of years, not decades. Unless we talk about microorganisms like bacteria. Right here in North America, the Ogallala Aquifer, one of the largest in the world and once thought to be infinite, is going to be dry in the next decades ruining the agriculture in at least 6 states where agriculture is one of the main economic activities. Have you asked yourself: what is topsoil? how is topsoil irrigated? how are plants pollinated? No. You just live in a FarmVille-like reductionist model of the planet where those things just exist and are infinite, and ours to take indefinitely without limits so then we can live beyond our means and proliferate without limits. But in reality, those things are going away within our lifetime, because our civilization is irrational and founded on unsustainable philosophical values that are not rooted in the limits of the real world. It is sad that your comment is the most upvoted right now, it just reflects how doomed our society is.