Species extinction [split]

[bascule]

walrusman, have you ever heard of the naturalistic fallacy?

[AzurePhoenix]

They did not defeat their attacker. In the proverbial eyes of nature, they are unfit to survive.

Humans aren't a species that can be allowed any sort of excuse like that. As I've said before, we are thinking beings better able to make choices, seek alternatives and actually be moral. There might not be a "right" or "wrong" in the grand universe, but we have the ability to understand a set of ideals, and we shouldn't pretend that we don't.

 

Do you also think war is unnatural? That would be silly to think that. Countless numbers of humans have been slaughtered over time - not to eat - but still for survival.

We aren't lions, you can't rationalize such acts by saying it's part of nature. Humans are different. Humans are excessivley smart. We can make choices. Such needless horrors as these are in no possible way justifiable as "natural".

 

Perception is reality.

Reality is reality, and nothing changes it. Perception is a limited, incomplete and oft-times innaccurate picture of that reality. To imagine otherwise is childish.

 

If humans believe something to be a threat, it's perfectly natural to attempt to eliminate it.

Same lousy argument. Same response. You can't rationalize away evil and immorality when it comes to humans.

[Mokele]

Oh, for the love of Zombie Jesus!

 

Hands up everyone who's ever read any of Raup's work on extinction?

 

Nobody?

 

Good, now sit down and shut up. The persistent stupidity in this thread is about to end.

 

Extinction is not "good" or "bad". Nor is it even survival of the fittest. Lions do not drive antelope into extinction, they just produce an evolutionary arms race. Species go extinct when exposed to something they cannot deal with: changes in habitat, loss of species they depended exclusively on, temperature changes, exceptionaly long famine, exceptionally long drought, shopping malls, invasive species, etc.

 

The point is that animals adapt to their immediate, local environment (biotic and abiotic). When something drastically changes in that environment that pushes the species in ways it has not adapted to, it goes extinct. That's the important part: things it has not adapted to. Species are not "good" or "bad" or "smart evolvers" or "dumb evolvers". Every species evolves to suit it's niche. Extinctions occur when that niche disappears or becomes uninhabitable. Faulting a species for that is like faulting a fish for having gills.

 

Raup has done extensive work on evolution, particularly in relation to extinction in the fossil record. Do you know what he found?

 

The pattern of extinction with respect to phylogeny is RANDOM. In any given time span, we're as likely to lose a mouse species as a crab or worm or fish.

 

Entire lineages die off not because they were 'less fit' but because, by chance, they faced an environmental challenge which they were unable to deal with due to factors present in all of them by shared descent, factors that may well have been adaptive in normal circumstances. Maniraptoran theropods' high metabolism was a bonus that helped them catch prey, but it was a fatal flaw when a big space rock caused a worldwide famine.

 

The effects of extinction are mixed: important lineages can die out, extinguishing ancient and interesting groups, but in doing this they can make way for previously marginalized groups to diversify. Some lose, some win. That's life. No 'good' or 'bad', just change.

 

Where do humans come into this? Well, first, we're no different from anything else in a major way: the arrival of a new species often causes widespread destruction, whether it's an invasive snake or new disease or a very smart ape.

 

However, we're different in a major way: we're the first known species to be able to see on a long term extending into centuries. We can extrapolate our effects.

 

Now, while nothing we do is *innately* good or bad, we, as humans, assign such labels to things, and, of course, different humans have different labeling schemes.

 

Two things we are aware of, though: humans cannot be wanton in our environmental exploitation, or we'll sabotage the very infrastructure that supports us. Many fictional dystopias focus on this possibility, indicating that humans are indeed aware of it, though of course disagree about our path exists. Still, most humans agree that staying alive, at least on a personal level, is good.

 

The other is that other species are useful. This plays into extinction because in many cases, we're just beginning to see how useful some are. Chemicals from rare sponges or plants may help save many lives. Some species might provide useful scientific models in the future as zebrafish and fruitflies do today. Basically, we can't fully asses the value of any species, because we don't know what the future holds.

 

Of course, there's other arguements, about the value of biodiversity and species and such. But that's more apes sticking labels on things and flinging poop at each other when they disagree.

 

The punchlines:

 

1) extinction is essentially random with respect to fitness

2) extinction can either harm of benefit a species, so 'good' or 'bad' depends on your perspective as a species.

3) while there's lots of disagreement about humanity's effect on the world, we all basically agree that we don't want to die and we want nifty things from nature.

4) everything else is apes slapping labels on things.

 

Done, problem solved.

 

Mokele

[walrusman]

Oh my AP, you are completely ridiculous. How old are you? You don't seem to have much life experience or they're not teaching very well in schools nowadays.

 

Those are FACTS dear. I'm not giving you some reason to feel sorry or understand or empathize with germans for slaughtering jews. I'm simply stating that they saw the jews as a threat. You can take away from that sentence whatever you want to, but that's YOU, not ME. I'm just stating the fact. No judgements are being made in these statements.

 

Perception IS reality whether you like it or not. It doesn't matter if you think it's childish, or what you or I think at all whatsoever. It exists regardless. Islamic terrorists hate us and perceive us as the great satan. That's even more insane than your interpretations of my posts. But they perceive it and act on it.

 

Let's try another..shall we?

 

The Bonobo sees a banana dangling from a string and goes for it. He "perceives" there is a banana hanging from a string from god. In reality, it's a plastic toy banana. But since he "perceives" it is an actual banana, he goes for it. See how that works?

 

Hey, maybe you can explain to him the whole "reality is reality" thing...

[walrusman]

Done, problem solved.

 

Can I still fling poop at AzurePhoenix?

[Mokele]

No. I'm closing this pathetic excuse for a thread, and it's bastard cousin.

 

The conduct in this thread has been atrocious, and I had beeter not see any hints of a repeat performance.

 

Mokele