Why is it that when an animal ends up in an area where it doesn't already live due to humans bringing it there, people are quick to say its a terrible thing? We know animals evolve and change over time to better suit their environments and so forth. So if a human for example brings a snake of some sort to an environment where it doesn't already live and that snake species survives we start freaking out. Oh no that animal doesn't go there! Well its living and often doing well in these 'new' environments. The animal may destroy other species of animals, but at the same time it creates an opportunity for new life. Why are we so eager to preserve nature as we see fit and as we see it today? Also, wasteful killing? You kill something like a turtle for example and leave it there to rot. You killed one animal, but at the same time you created life for many more animals by creating a miniature ecosystem for larvae and other insects. These insects in turn feed things like birds, which feed things like snakes, and so on. Why is it that we're so eager to preserve life as it is, rather than realize the potential good that comes from death? These two things go together in a sense. You release a new species into an enviroment and while it may make it poor for some species it helps other species to thrive. For example a new species of spider is released. The spider in this area eats some of the insects that are competing with other insect species for the same food. The insects its eating may be lowered in population and survivability, but at the same time another species of insect is allowed to thrive and possibly feed other species. Any thoughts or opinions on either of those things? Perhaps both combined? I realize those are very basic ways of looking at these two topics, but still the point is there. I propose we quit calling them ecological disasters and start calling them oopsie daisies.
Because (intentionally) messing with an ecosystem can bring drastic changes upon it, often for the worse. You're right, death is something that happens in the natural world. When it happens, it happens, and the scavengers and other populations of organisms (biotic & abiotic) can benefit from its remaining body parts. A great example of this is when Cicadas rise from being underground for 17 years to reproduce, lay eggs, and die. Any cicadas not eaten die quickly after reproducing and could possibly be the best nutrient rejuvenation to a seasonal forest in 17 years. Moving an animal from a ecosystem they are accustom to, to a new one is not good. Even if they can survive, they will not likely prosper. Animal species evolve over time to their own environment...and they are not likely to have the skill-set that allows them to be successful when living in a new ecosystem.
You're thinking about this the wrong way… we're not "keeping things the way they are" we're trying to not fuck shit up any more than necessary. It's not right to impose human ideals of how things should be in nature, so we try not to change anything if we can help it.
Yeah, but we are nature... So any affects we may have on our surroundings are natural. That includes houses, condoms, cars, space ships, etc... This thread is old as fuck though...
[quote name='"Sam_Spade"']biodiversity is negatively impacted.[/quote] This If a foreign species enters am ecosystem it competes with a local species.
The things we make are, by definition, artificial. They don't exist in nature outside of humanity, and wouldn't if we didn't exist. You wouldn't find a Mercedes or a heap of nylon out in the middle of the Amazon if we hadn't put it there. So what humans do isnt really the natural progression of things, otherwise Wed see it SOMEwhere else in nature. Other animals don't have (or don't exhibit) a sense of abstraction, the ability to separate themselves from the world around them. We seem to. So what humans are capable of doing (and, in fact, do do) is by effect unnatural.
Maybe by the literal definition of "natural" but humans are animals, and we came to be through evolution. We're nature.
I agree with that sentiment... until we started smelting metals and building machines Manipulation of the natural world by things other than "nature itself" is, inherently, unnatural
[quote name='"Internetz"']You're thinking about this the wrong way… we're not "keeping things the way they are" we're trying to not fuck shit up any more than necessary. It's not right to impose human ideals of how things should be in nature, so we try not to change anything if we can help it.[/quote] Why not humans ideals are "naturally" human?
[quote name='"Internetz"']I agree with that sentiment... until we started smelting metals and building machines Manipulation of the natural world by things other than "nature itself" is, inherently, unnatural[/quote] The world humans built is like a different style of nature.... An expression of life in a way so odd we call it unnatural.