3 ms·
These sort of naturalist arguments seem to make little sense when thought about more clearly. Of course that: a) Destroying the environment is probably more d
by george3d6 6y ago
These sort of naturalist arguments seem to make little sense when thought about more clearly.
Of course that:
a) Destroying the environment is probably more destabilizing than keeping it intact... that's almost always the case with conservation vs change, conservation is the safe move
b) Destroying all insects (i.e a whopping 2/5th of all multi-celular bio diversity) would result in catastrophic damage... destroying 2/5th of all biodiversity would result in catastrophic damage.
The onus on any given insect conservation advocate is to prove:
1. Insects are more critical to the environment than other things we put more money and time into preserving (e.g Australia should spend more on preserving black widows and less on preserving koalas)
2. A very specific insect is critical and thus should be preserved at all cost, even if it means putting more money into the nature-preservation system
3. The bio-diversity of insects as a whole is dropping at an alarming rate compared to other species and this is harmful and unprecedented (biodiversity boom and bust cycles are the norm, usually)
I'm not saying the above 3 points can't be made.
But this article doesn't make them.
It sounds just like someone signaling "Hey, I'm a hippie ecologist, I love nature, even insects that sting, I'm that much of a group member, love me" rather than providing any new information or concrete policy proposal or even a meta-level argument for getting new information or creating new policy proposals.
The general idea of "we shouldn't destroy" nature has been around since, I assume, at least 5000 years ago or so, when bronze-age humans burnt down most forests in Europe and then realized this was bad and proceeded to replant and protect, or even venerate, forested areas. It's old new, nobody disagrees we should protect nature, it's just a typical tragedy of the commons problem, and one that hasn't been handled that badly thus far.
- kzrdude 6y agoGovernment and engineering alike usually apply the precautionary principle - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precautionary_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precautionary_principle Which says we need to use grave caution if we make changes with uncertain long-term effect.
- beaconstudios 6y agoYou should consider Chesterton's fence before either destroying something, or allowing it to be destroyed. Chesterton's fence is the idea that you should understand a thing thoroughly, including its present function and what might change if it disappeared, before removing it. The hypothetical example being a fence in the middle of nowhere - seemingly useless, but you should really make sure before pulling it up as it may be serving a vital function to somebody else (or the system at large). The point being, we're stumbling into an scenario where we've killed off the majority of animals in a major ecological category, which is likely to destabilise the environment in both known and unknown ways. If we value the environment's self-sustaining capabilities, this should be greatly concerning.
- TomSwirly 6y ago"Maybe we can wipe out insects and everything will be just fine," is NOT what I want to base the future of humanity on. I'm an older guy. In my lifetime, we've killed half the flying insects, half the wild mammals, half the aquatic mammals and in fact half the aquatic creatures bigger than my two fists put together. And the devastation only continues to accelerate. And your response is just that we can't prove for sure that killing everything else off is bad for us. https://xkcd.com/1338/ https://xkcd.com/1338/ > Hey, I'm a hippie ecologist, The appropriate response to your cynical screed would have me thrown off this site. For shame.