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Re: fHuman vs. natural influences on the environment
In article <4vn11r$9h3@igc.apc.org>, tomgray
<tomgray@igc.apc.org> wrote:
>jscanlon@linex.com (Jim Scanlon) wrote:
>>In article <4um1hj$6s4_002@pm6-81.hal-pc.org>,
charliew@hal-pc.org
>>(charliew) wrote:
>>
>>> ALL species must adapt to survive, and they
>>> have always been under this "pressure". If they can't
adapt,
>>> they will surely go extinct, with or without our help. I
>>> will discuss what rate of adaptation they are capable of,
but
>>> I do not intend to worry one iota about some creature
that
>>> has lost its ability to adapt. If this is true, the
species
>>> doesn't deserve to survive, because it doesn't have "what
it
>>> takes" to survive. Too harsh? Too bad. That is the way
>>> that nature is, and has always been.
>>
>>Individual adaptation and species adaptation are much
different on a
>>vastly different time scales.
>>Some species change, or evolve and turn into something
else. Others hardly
>>change over millions of years like bacteria, or the
horseshoe crab. Some
>>change very radically and lose functioning organs (i.e.
degenerate) in
>>adapting to their environment like so many parasites.
>>The wretched inhabitants of the ruins of Imperial Egypt and
the
>>descendants of the Mayan Kingdoms adapted and survived to
reproduce.
>>That's the way "nature" works: whatever it is that survives
is the
>>fittest. Fitness can only be determined by humans in
retrospect.
>>From what I understand about mass extinctions, they are
caused by radical
>>changes in the environment, which is to say habitat. These
radical changes
>>do not usually occur suddenly or that often. Our earth is
undergoing
>>several kinds of simultaneous rapid, radical change right
now.
>>It may be impossible to alter these changes, but it seems
to make more
>>sense to at least try to do something reasonable, rather
than just let
>>nature (or "the market") take its course.
>
>Definitely "the market," I would say, as what we are talking
>about here is NOT letting nature take its course.
>
>Charlie's statement sounds very Darwinian, and all that, but
a
>moment's reflection will expose its weaknesses. Consider
the
>passenger pigeon. It is extinct today because it failed to
>adapt. But what did it fail to adapt to? Humans shooting
>millions, some for food, but many for feathers to decorate
>ladies' hats. No matter. The point is, using Charlie's
logic
>("Don't worry one iota about species that can't adapt."), if
>the pigeon were being hunted to extinction today, the proper
>course would be to do nothing. It would be have "lost its
>ability to adapt" and therefore be quite deserving of
extinction.
>
>Consider the buffalo. Again, we should do nothing, let it
>become extinct. Notice, though, how stupid this would have
been,
>even from a totally self-indulgent, anthropocentric point of
>view. Today ranchers are discovering, wonder of wonders,
that
>cattle don't seem very well-equipped to survive the
occasional
>harsh winters of the northern plains, and that the buffalo
is.
>So buffalo ranching is growing steadily and rapidly.
Imagine
>what an intelligent thing it would have been to think about
>this possibility in the first place.
>
Tom,
You are once again taking things way out of context. It's a
long way from hunting a species to extinction vs. worrying
about whether or not a species can tolerate a 1-2 deg F
temperature change in its environment. I never advocated
humans totally having their way with whatever species they
see fit. I would like just as much as anyone to keep whales,
rhinos, elephants, and other species on this earth. However,
these species all have to compete within their environment
against nature and other species. If something comes along
that is much more successful than an individual species
(excluding man; I was explicit this time!), and that species
goes extinct as a result, so what? This has been going on
>from day one, and there is little we can do to stop it.
Hopefully, you will not take my followup out of context.
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