[HN Gopher] U.S. declares more than 20 species extinct after exh... ___________________________________________________________________ U.S. declares more than 20 species extinct after exhaustive searches Author : gmays Score : 269 points Date : 2021-09-30 17:51 UTC (5 hours ago) (HTM) web link (www.axios.com) (TXT) w3m dump (www.axios.com) | BrianOnHN wrote: | Some comments mentions bringing back species. Well, how would you | like to return to a home that is no longer hospitable? | | Just awful. | nixpulvis wrote: | How many more species would be classified as extinct if not for | zoos? | yissp wrote: | Wow, quite a few, and this isn't even an exhaustive list | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinct_in_the_wild | BitwiseFool wrote: | I guarantee you that when the technology exists to bring back | some of these species via cloning or genetic engineering, they | will have some habitat restored once they are ready to re- | introduce them. Otherwise it would be a complete waste of time | and money. | agilob wrote: | I think the comment it more about what if we have technology | but no space for resurrected species? | jjk166 wrote: | Then we wait until we have the space. There is no deadline | to meet. | agilob wrote: | Pretty sure the deadline is our extinction, but after | that, the animal kingdom can flourish again | RobLach wrote: | If you can't handle the heat get out of the Anthropocene. | goldenkey wrote: | "To evolve or not to evolve, that is the question" - William | Darwin | Bud wrote: | Among the species who are now tragically extinct: Republicans who | are not Nazis and who answer to reason. | dang wrote: | Come on, you know better than to vandalize HN like this. Please | don't. | | https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html | rwcarlsen wrote: | Funny - I'm sure many people could argue the same about | democrats - they're the ones firing people for not undergoing | unnecessary medical procedures and coordinating with | multinational companies on censorship guidance. | OJFord wrote: | 'Exhaustive'? They may have been exhaust _ing_ (!) but can you | really ever search _exhaustively_ for a species? | mumblemumble wrote: | At the very very least, "exhaustive" and "exhausting" are | potential synonyms. | | https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/exhaustive#Adjective | | I'd argue that definition 2 is also a decent fit, and | definition 1 is acceptable if you permit mild hyperbole. (Which | I'd advise doing, as mild hyperbole is more-or-less the default | register of Standard American English.) | OJFord wrote: | > mild hyperbole is more-or-less the default register of | Standard American English | | Well as a speaker of British English, I suppose that's where | I fell down. | | They're very much not synonyms as far as I'm concerned, my | 'exhausting' was a joke, being 'very tiring, causing | exhaustion' vs. the 'every possible element, comprehensive' | from your Wiktionary link for 'exhaustive'. | | You can't possibly check everywhere. I don't say that out of | some sort of extinction denial! I assume there are standards | in the field for time since sighting over certain number of | known habitats or percentage coverage of land or whatever | that indicates extinction. | | I just wouldn't call that 'after exhaustive search', | personally. 'Extensive', sure. 'Sufficient to meet criteria | for extinction' is what matters. | murphyslab wrote: | Tens of thousands of naturalists (e.g. birders) have been | looking for evidence for decades. It's a pretty wide net, | particularly with citizen science platforms such as iNaturalist | and eBird. | | As for whether it's possible, I would say yes. Environmental | DNA (eDNA) sampling can be used to see if a particular species | is present even if you don't visually or audibly observe the | species: | | > eDNA is increasingly being used for biosurveillance, species | occupancy studies, and the detection of endangered and invasive | species, particularly in aquatic ecosystems [0] | | There's a very recent paper that has demonstrated that animal | DNA can be obtained from the air and used to identify animals | present in a given space. [0] | | > Clare set up vacuum pumps with filters in 20 locations in | Hamerton Zoo Park and let each run for 30 minutes. [...] The | team identified 17 species kept at the zoo and others living | near and around it, such as hedgehogs and deer. Some zoo animal | DNA was found nearly 300 meters from the animals' enclosures. | She also detected airborne DNA likely from the meat of chicken, | pig, cow, and horse fed to captive predators indoors. [1] | | In the near future we'll probably see fairly widespread use of | this kind of tech in the search for rare and evasive species. | | [0] : https://peerj.com/articles/11030/ | | [1] : https://www.science.org/news/2021/07/dna-pulled-thin-air- | ide... | OJFord wrote: | Undeniably _extensive_. I don 't deny it as sufficient | evidence to claim extinction. I just don't think it can (or | could ever) be called 'exhaustive'. | ipsin wrote: | Once a species is declared extinct, is it legal to hunt? | | I realize this may sound like a weird question, but I'm curious | if there had ever been mistakes like this, with a lack of | protection leading to actual accidental extinction. | look_lookatme wrote: | Hunting laws in general vary state by state but for the most | part you can't just go out and kill any random thing flying | around. There generally has to be some sort of formal | designation that a species can be hunted. Otherwise don't kill | it. | oh_sigh wrote: | What law on the books says that it is legal for me to kill a | dragonfly? | nixpulvis wrote: | There's absolutely nothing stopping me from killing ants, or | even stopping my cat from killing rats. Hunting is regulated, | but it's not all species by default. | nixpulvis wrote: | If there's not already a case in the books, that simply goes to | show that we have done a good job not mislabeling species as | extinct. The Endangered Species Act surely still applies, if | anything the punishment would be more severe. | | This question is absurd. | mrfusion wrote: | It would be cool to see a list of all the species that have | recovered from near extinction in the last 50 years. (Just to | balance out the doom) | | Off the top of my head: bald eagles, other birds of prey?, | various whale species, what else? | openasocket wrote: | My favorite example would be Przewalski's horse, also known as | the Mongolian wild horse. In the 1960s it was believe extinct | in the wild, with a couple dozen in zoos. Zoos began a breeding | program and eventually began reintroducing them to their | previous habitats. Today there are something like 1,900 | Przewalski's horses, and over half of those are in the wild. | It's really a testament to the good that zoos can do for | conservation. | underbluewaters wrote: | In California, pelicans nearly were killed off by DDT but are | quite common now. Santa Cruz Island foxes almost went extinct | but are now very abundant. Bald Eagles are coming back to the | Channel Islands as well. | photochemsyn wrote: | From the standpoint of understandig molecular biology and | evolution, this is just basically burning the Library of | Alexandria to keep yourself warm for a few days. This is unique | information being lost forever. | prescriptivist wrote: | Many of these species were considered done for by the time they | were listed. The tools we have to rehabilitate our ecology from | the brink of near total destruction really only came online in | the late 60s through the 70s and it's taken time for them to be | effective, but they have been in a lot of ways, whether it is | the ESA, CWA, NEPA, etc. | mistrial9 wrote: | s/super depressing/super distressing/g | | agree, signed Extinction Witness | mhalle wrote: | Well know species, such as the Monarch butterfly, are candidates | for extinction, but don't make it to the list because other | species are "higher priority": | | https://www.fws.gov/savethemonarch/ssa.html | sethammons wrote: | As a kid, I loved the monarch migration that came through our | mountain community. Thousands and thousands of them. Then | hundreds. Then dozens. Then lucky to see a single one. | sethammons wrote: | I see so many monarchs | | Then man fails his role | | No longer do I see them | daveslash wrote: | Does the list have a maximum quota? I would have thought that | the list could grow to accommodate any species that meet | certain criteria? | EastOfTruth wrote: | And we are still discovering new ones: | https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/7-new-animals-... | [deleted] | BitwiseFool wrote: | I like to think that the Hawaiian practice of using native bird | feathers for large and elaborate cloaks might let us pursue de- | extinction through DNA extraction and cloning: | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%CA%BBAhu_%CA%BBula | | Just think about how many individual birds' feathers contributed | towards making these. And we know plenty of the yellow feathers | are from the Kaua`i `o`o bird which was declared extinct. The | Kaua`i Akialoa was also declared extinct and they had yellow | feathers too. There could even be feathers from species that went | extinct before being cataloged by science. There is so much | potential in this area, yet I don't know if there are any | proposals to attempt DNA extraction or try to examine feathers | and determine which species each came from. | | Edit: This is food for thought and I'm in no way advocating we do | any less to prevent extinctions today. I just like having the | hope that future generations might be able to bring a few species | back. | nly wrote: | Do feathers even contain DNA? Aren't they just keratin? Hair | sans follicle can't be used for DNA extraction for example | BitwiseFool wrote: | The base of the feathers do, "Feathers are known to contain | amplifiable DNA at their base (calamus) and have provided an | important genetic source from museum specimens." https://roya | lsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2009.075... | | There are also museum specimens, but as you can imagine, | _way_ less diverse genetic material can be gathered from | those collections. | lawrencevillain wrote: | I love that the answer is always more technology will save us. | Whether it's carbon removal advances or cloning, we just look | towards future advancements instead of cleaning up our act. | | I understand that expecting some sort of big shift in how we | live is not feasible, it's just a shame. | MattGaiser wrote: | Has worked so far though with all constraints (political, | economic, and scientific). | WalterBright wrote: | > I love that the answer is always more technology will save | us. | | The solution to extincting the whales for whale oil was | petroleum. The solution to denuding the landscape of trees | was coal. The solution to coal is natural gas, solar, nuclear | power. | | The only alternative to technology is to shrink the human | population by about 95%. | titzer wrote: | You do realize that the switch from whale oil to petroleum | caused a massive, orders of magnitude increase in human | footprint and ecological destruction? Had we not discovered | petroleum, or had it not been there, human civilization | would have plateaued or even declined, right after the | extinction of these beautiful animals, because we would | have absolutely hunted them to extinction unless they were | protected. We would have been forced to live in balance | with available resources. | | The arc of whales would have followed the arc of so many | other natural "resources" that are produced or even consist | of living beings. There are several native hardwoods that | are either effectively extinct or impossible to obtain | because they were mined out. | | No, we stumbled on a vast reservoir of energy buried under | the ground and we've been draining that reservoir as fast | as possible. We'll transition off petroleum about the time | it becomes economically infeasible to extract and burn it, | and not a second sooner. | | By all means, bring on solar, nuclear, wind, whatever. They | are just more reservoirs to tap to run this machine. Just | so we can dig up, slice up, chop up, burn down, and chew up | another order of magnitude of the biosphere. Because money | and grandkids and ice cream. | | We are too many and too greedy, and this planet has finite | resources. "Technology". Always magical technology. Well | until technology can grow a watermelon in a lightbulb, we | are gonna keep munching away at this planet until the | biosphere collapses around our ears. | WalterBright wrote: | The extinction of animals caused by humans has been | ongoing and increasing since the stone age. There's no | way that not having petroleum would have stopped it. | | > this planet has finite resources | | No matter is being destroyed or is escaping the planet, | aside from a solar system probe now and then. Energy can | repurpose and reconfigure existing resources. | mhh__ wrote: | Helium is a counterexample to that notion even if it is | vaguely true for most other things. | voldacar wrote: | Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that this planet | has finite entropy | shadowgovt wrote: | Tech is what humans do. What humans are _bad_ at is | artificial limits on growth. | | Between the two, I very much expect one to save us before the | other, if either can save us at all. | BitwiseFool wrote: | I wasn't trying to imply we can just "let it be" because we | can undo it later. I actually follow Hawaiian Ecosystem | conservation and I do what little I can to help. But I | understand where you are coming from. Simply consider my | original post hopium. | lawrencevillain wrote: | Sorry I wasn't trying to downplay your response, I agree it | is the only hope we can actually have these days. | | It's awesome that you are giving back though, Hawaii has | got to be a really fascinating and challenging case study | for conservation vs. consumerism. | BitwiseFool wrote: | >"Hawaii has got to be a really fascinating and | challenging case study for conservation vs. consumerism." | | Indeed, and it is actually something I personally | struggle with. The situation is actually much more dire | than people realize. I myself am actually part Native | Hawaiian and it is so disheartening to see fellow locals | actively protest conservation measures. I do what I can | to testify in public meetings but local pushback on | things like ungulate eradication or land use laws are | intense. | | I don't want to dismiss them entirely because the | concerns come from a real place, but those reasons are | all economic in nature. And, you end up in the unenviable | position of being a relatively privileged person telling | a disadvantaged community they can't have the economic | advancement they want. It is genuinely difficult. | jjk166 wrote: | No amount of "cleaning up our act" will undo damage already | done. The solution is always technology because that's what | technology is - solutions to problems. Changing behavior can | allow you to avoid a problem, but only technology will fix a | problem you've failed to avoid. | asdff wrote: | I think what OP was implying is that the solution is always | posited as in some future technology just on the horizon. | We will save the day in the final act of the trilogy, this | is just the empire strikes back, right? | | Except that's not where our solution to this problem lies. | We have all the technology we need to be carbon neutral | today, namely in the form of nuclear power. In fact, Nixon | planned on 1000 nuclear power plants operating in the U.S. | by the year 2000. The reason why we don't have that reality | today has nothing to do with technology, and everything to | do with behavior and choices we've made. We chose to | protest nuclear power, we chose to close down power plants | that were generating electricity carbon free, we chose to | do this because we decided that it was nuclear power that | was the enemy of ecology, in the face of this misinformed | public politicians found it easier to keep their jobs by | walking back plans for nuclear power than to educate the | populace. | | Decades later today, we find ourselves forced to sleep in | this bed of coal and natural gas, but we ignore that this | is a bed that we ourselves willingly made by choice, and | continue to maintain by choice using bullshit excuses such | as cost or time or profitability to bury any practical | alternative (in a society where for the first time since | the invention of currency, government mints can generate | money out of plain air no less). | mensetmanusman wrote: | Vertical farming is one solution, albeit expensive. | tamaharbor wrote: | Since we are still discovering some species, there is a good | chance that these are not totally extinct. | TheChaplain wrote: | This is just the beginning I believe. | | 20 years ago we were 6bn humans, today we are very close to 8bn | and in a little more than 20 years ahead we are 10bn. | | It's an alarming growth rate, and considering how much each | person use resources and produce waste during their lifetime, I'd | say we are looking at quite a bit more extinct species in the | future. | gbear605 wrote: | The human population is expected to flatten out at around 10-11 | billion in 2050 or so, and then decrease. Bringing people out | of poverty decreases the amount of children they tend to have | without having to go to any extreme measures. | azifali wrote: | :-( | BelenusMordred wrote: | For anyone out there I highly recommend reading The Sixth | Extinction: An Unnatural History by Elizabeth Kolbert | | It's a plain, almost coldhearted look at what we are doing to the | planet and where this path leads. Something needs to change | urgently. | shakezula wrote: | Someday we're going to hit the cascade point, where we've | simultaneously and severely damaged or disrupted so many | ecosystems that they won't be able to recover and it all just | collapses. | jrwoodruff wrote: | Great thing is, we probably won't know what that point is until | we've past it. | shakezula wrote: | It will hit us like a brick wall when we start experiencing | actual environmental ramifications for this, too. | | Ocean acidification, the methane clathrate gun, some of the | most serious climate issues that we've identified aren't even | within the window of public discussion. The Green New Deal | isn't even close to being passed. | | I can't even imagine America pulling together to pass a | boring infrastructure bill right now. I honestly can't fathom | how previous presidents got anything done at all, let alone | the massive public works projects that shaped America in the | middle of the 20th century. | fleddr wrote: | It's even worse. Fighting climate change, which seemingly | already is controversial, is purely about human self | preservation. It doesn't address biodiversity, pollution, | habitat destruction, the oceans being empty, none of it. | titzer wrote: | The future is here already, it's just not evenly distributed. | There are countless examples of local ecosystems that have been | entirely decimated as a direct result of human activity. It's | been going on for millenia. The Tigris/Euphrates river region | used be a lush, fertile paradise. Thousands of years of human | agriculture has turned it into what it is today. | | Clear-cutting of forests throughout North America, Britain, New | Zealand are other examples. Recent collapses of kelp forests | off the coast of California. Not to mention coral reefs dying | and the great desertification of western China. | | It's happening all over. It's here now. | veb wrote: | I'm in NZ, and we have very large (I'd wager true wilderness) | forests with native trees and fauna. Even cutting native | trees on your property can be pretty bad (people get | convicted for this). Unless say, the tree is about to fall on | your house. We have a lot of national parks, I just would | like us to get some more national marine reserves considering | we have a pretty large EEZ zone around the country: | https://teara.govt.nz/en/map/33830/exclusive-economic-zones | (which is the forth largest in the world). | | There's so much we can do better, and we are trying. Pine, | etc we don't care about cutting down. Ngai Tahu a South | Island Maori tribe actually own a lot of these forests and | the idea is that when they're felled for timber, natives are | grown in place. I hope they keep that up, and to be fair, | they're not really in need of much more money considering | they are the richest tribe in NZ as they've re-invested | everything they got after the Treaty of Waitangi. | | We should do more though, always. | | If you ever visit, there's places in Stewart Island for | example that have been completely made rodent free - and | things are blooming there. On a school camp (we stayed on a | yacht for a week), we got to experience a magical full moon- | lit beach and got to witness all the wee kiwis come out and | play. It was the most magical sight I've ever seen. | whymauri wrote: | I can't recommend david attenborough's "a life on our planet" | enough to gain some perspective on this. You're completely | right: it's already happening. | shakezula wrote: | I understand what's happening all over, but those are the | small collapses I'm saying will eventually all string | together and start to cause wider collapse that we won't be | able to stop. Right now, we can still rewild an ecosystem | fairly easily, but that won't be feasible when multiple | ecosystems are collapsing all around us. | | Don't get me wrong, I think we should be in panic mode and | start a full redirection of public funds towards serious | preservation of natural species and habitats, with carbon | sequestration implementations, both short and long term | solutions, and a serious jobs program to implement all of the | above. | | But it won't happen because the public is too removed from | the problem. Most people haven't felt any real impact, and we | probably won't be able to get massive legislation passed | until that point, and I fear it will be too late once they | do. | fleddr wrote: | Wait until urban people find out what role insects play in food | production. Insects in turn relying on healthy habitats. | | They'll find out when shelves are empty or prices go x 10. | Johnny555 wrote: | Scientists have a recording of the mating call of the last known | Kaua`i `o`o that could never be answered. | | https://youtu.be/5THqAY3u5oY?t=44 | | "That's the last male of a species... singing for a female, who | will never come.... he is totally alone.... and now his voice is | gone." | | I find that to be very sad | Diederich wrote: | That tore me up. | efitz wrote: | I am probably just a horrible person, but I just don't care about | the extinction of such specific species. Often a member of one | species is practically impossible to tell from a member of a | different species save for where the individual was found. I care | a lot more if "crows" are endangered than if "efitz' southeastern | marble crested crow" is endangered. [ed: spelling] | | Also, I suspect that such narrowly defined species go extinct | rather frequently; it's sad that human destruction of habitats | contributed but as a species we Homo sapiens outcompeted them and | made the world better (in someone's point of view) for Homo | sapiens, or we wouldn't have been developing the land in the | first place. | | In policy setting I would strongly prefer that we look at things | less granularity than the species, at least for small animals. | ogaitnas wrote: | This is the type of proud indifference that is going to lead us | down the path of no return in no time. | | The world is not made better by shrinking biodiversity | especially in the long term. But screw posterity right? | | I hope you don't have kids. | ApolloFortyNine wrote: | Personal attacks do not belong on hacker news. | ogaitnas wrote: | How is what I said a personal attack? I sincerely hope that | someone with such little regard for the environment and | therefore the future of this planet isn't someone who is | willingly bringing more humans to it. That isn't a personal | attack but rather my personal belief on the matter. | exporectomy wrote: | That's called bigotry. And yes, it was a personal attack. | fleddr wrote: | How absolutely pathetic is it that the above 3 comments, | all showing care and empathy for non-human life, are | massively downvoted? The state of this community. | exporectomy wrote: | Conservation absolutely is nothing to do with care and | empathy for non-human life. The proof is that one of the | main tools of conservationists is mechanical and chemical | killing machines to help them kill and even exterminate | all the non-human life that they deem unworthy. Please | don't confuse caring about life with caring about the | environment. The two feelings are in direct conflict. | brundolf wrote: | What's important is biodiversity. Diverse biological life is | more resilient, and it takes a really long time in human years | for that diversity to come about in the first place. So if | we're destroying it faster than it develops naturally, | ecosystem health as a whole declines. | | I think that's a valid point though about "how often does this | naturally happen?" Surely a certain amount of extinction is | natural, and we have little frame of reference for what the | magnitude of that is (at least we as laypeople; maybe even | scientists, I don't know) | cmpb wrote: | >we Homo sapiens outcompeted them and made the world better (in | someone's point of view) for Homo sapiens | | I think what's coming into focus for a lot of people nowadays | (i.e. the last 50ish years w.r.t eco conservation) is the idea | that we are actually making the world worse (for humans) - that | actually making the world better for ourselves necessarily | includes limiting or reversing our out-competition of other | life. While it may not be noticeable to humans that a single | species has been driven out (even just out of a region and not | necessarily to full extinction) over the course of 10 or 50 or | 500 years due to human activity, that does still represent a | change to the established biodiversity, which (many people | believe) is likely to be net-negative for humans. | | Reasons for these beliefs likely vary according to people's | experience and interaction with the physical world. Personally, | I find great joy experiencing wildness and nature, and I worry | that my daughter will not have that. Others might be concerned | that the loss of species incurs the loss of some aspects of | nature from which we might be able to learn - that there was an | opportunity to better ourselves that is now gone forever. | asdff wrote: | In this case its a good proxy for understanding what's going on | with ecosystems in response to change. Caring about crows as a | whole will probably mask the point. You might see that this | year there are 1% less crows in an area and think all is well, | maybe that's within your measurement error. If you noticed | however that all crows are doing fine, but efitz' southeastern | marble crested crow numbers have declined significantly, then | you have some evidence here. Maybe you look at the particular | ecological niches that efitz' southeastern marble crested crow | occupies, whatever they might be, and see that there is | something bad affecting that particular niche that you would | have not had enough statistical power to see if you considered | all the crows in one big bag. | burnished wrote: | These living creatures can't be brought back. Do you have the | wisdom to tell which creatures are pillars of their biome? | Further, do you alarm when the match is lit and the flame is | spreading or do you wait until your home is already aflame? | | I don't think you are a bad person. I suspect you and I grew up | in a time where species dieing out is the norm as opposed to | the exception, so it simply doesn't stick out for you. Its just | how the world works to you. But it is recent, and I'd argue | we're making a poor trade as a species, trading bio-diversity | for.. frequently, strip malls or strip mining. | exporectomy wrote: | They're mostly on islands so it's very unlikely they matter | at all outside of their island. If Hawaii had never been | discovered, we wouldn't have to worry about losing them. | | I live in a country filled with endangered "native" species | but after I grew up, I learned that many of them are | basically the same as common species in nearby countries, so | similar that even the experts keep disagreeing on whether | they're the same species or not. | | If their numbers are already extremely low for a long time | and everything else is doing fine, it's unlikely they're | "pillars of their biome". | wittycardio wrote: | Yup you said it best, you are indeed horrible | exporectomy wrote: | No. You've been indoctrinated to believe that | environmentalism is like a religion so that you're a bad | person for being an infidel and must not question the flimsy | claims that the authorities make. | ogaitnas wrote: | So much bigotry and ad hominem in this comment yet you have | the gall to accuse me of the same. Environmentalism is | nothing like religion - it's science based on empirical | evidence and not on blind faith. I struggle to see what is | so flimsy about the findings of this article. | kevmo wrote: | It is true that some sub-species are always going extinct. | | That said, we're in the middle of a man-made mass extinction | event. | | Scientists and systems thinkers have been warning about | ecological collapse, particularly in the oceans. | | I recommend you start caring. | gotostatement wrote: | > made the world better (in someone's point of view) for Homo | sapiens | | The capitalist ideological trick is: "are you happy houses were | built? Do you enjoy the convenience of modern living? Then | don't get mad at us for the tradeoff." | | Don't forget that there have always been better ways to | accomplish these goals - more equitable, safer for the | environment - but they were not done because they did not | achieve maximum profit for the individual who, through various | historical factors not related to their merit or wisdom, could | control the capital necessary for the project. | fleddr wrote: | You're indeed a horrible person, but at least an honest one. | Seeing planetary scale habitat destruction and the wiping out | of the complex web of life that took hundreds of millions of | years to evolve, all in a single century, really is quite a win | indeed. | | Besides individual extinctions, most of the 2 millions or so | other species are in deep decline. The IUCN's most positive | status for a species is "least concern", really quite telling. | | You'd have somewhat of point if a reasonable quality of life | would only be possible at the direct expense of other species | and habitats, which is not the case. | | We sacrifice the world's jungles and its massively complex and | old wildlife systems for palm oil. Which is absolutely not an | essential requirement for human life at all. | | Most other forests are sacrificed to plant crops. Not for us, | to feed cattle. So that we can eat beef, the least efficient | food. There are alternative meats, less eating of meat, or none | at all. | | We scrape the ocean floors, use electricity or even dynamite to | fish in such a way that collateral damage is off the charts. | | We spread our filth (plastics) across the world, it's now found | at the poles and even at the bottom of the deepest oceans. | | We do trophy hunting on already rare animals for superstition | or a quick profit. | | None of the above things are required for us to have a | reasonable or good quality of life. They are short-sighted, | careless and aggressive profit optimizations with disastrous | and irreversible consequences. And even if you still don't | care, those profits won't end up in the workers pocket or in | yours. | | No, wildlife habitats do not have to be stripped bare or | otherwise we'd go hungry. It's bullshit. | throwaway09223 wrote: | Yes, I agree. Counting species is a terrible metric. We | discover something like 15,000 new species every year. We | really have no idea how many species are vanishing each year, | because we're only examining a tiny percentage. | | Another way to frame this is to ask: How many _new_ species are | created each year? Well, we don 't really know-- but we do know | that a new species can form in just two generations [1]. There | may be thousands of species being created and destroyed every | year for all we know. Not a useful metric. | | A more useful metric is how common a species was before | extinction. Using an example from the article, the Ivory-Billed | Woodpecker was very common before its extinction. Native | Americans used its skulls as decoration and currency. Its | eradication is a pretty big deal - BUT - I see some other HN | comments lamenting how much things have changed "in my | lifetime" and I think people may be unaware that these | extinctions basically occurred approximately 200 years ago. | There have not been sizable populations of this species for a | very long time [2]. | | Again, the presentation of data and metrics appears to be | painting a misleading picture. | | [1] https://www.princeton.edu/news/2017/11/27/study-darwins- | finc... | | [2] https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Ivory- | billed_Woodpecker/... | anonAndOn wrote: | Those narrowly defined species might be the only thing keeping | other species alive either directly (eg, pollinators) or | indirectly (eg, biome creators). When individual species | disappear, we often lose much more as collateral damage. | exporectomy wrote: | This seems to the basic understanding most people have. At | school, they teach you about food webs and how breaking one | link can ruin everything. That's an enticing idea but is it | really true? I'm sure there have been some known cases or it | wouldn't be in the text books, but is it common enough to get | worried about every obscure species? | ogaitnas wrote: | Planting seeds of doubt about established science are we? I | thought HN was pro-science and environment?? | anonAndOn wrote: | How about vanilla going extinct in the wild? Any real | vanilla you have ever had was likely hand pollinated (and | probably not from Mexico) because the bee that pollinates | the vanilla orchid is thought to be extinct and the orchid | that depended on it is now on its way out.[0] | | [0]https://phys.org/news/2013-12-professor-vanilla.html | lawrencevillain wrote: | This is super depressing, it's crazy to see how much the | flora/fauna have changed locally in my lifetime. | | It makes me wonder how much worse it actually is. Is looks like | most of these were initially listed in the 80s, not too long | after Endangered Species Act passed. | | Is there some sort of time limit before they officially declare | something extinct? | prescriptivist wrote: | Sounds like the limit is discretionary. From the NYT: | | "Scientists do not declare extinctions lightly. It often takes | decades of fruitless searching. About half of the species in | this group were already considered extinct by the International | Union for Conservation of Nature, the global authority on the | status of animals and plants. The Fish and Wildlife Service | moved slower in part because it is working through a backlog, | officials said, and tends to prioritize providing protection | for species that need it over removing protection for those | that don't." | alistairSH wrote: | From the article: _Many of the species were likely extremely | endangered or extinct before the Endangered Species Act was | passed in 1973, meaning that possibly no amount of conservation | would have been able to save them_ | | Most of these wouldn't have been around in any sustainable | number well before most of us were born. The real question is | whether or not conservation efforts are working on species IDed | in the 48 years since. I suspect not, given climate change is | bigger than any single species. | beerandt wrote: | The Ivory Billed Woodpecker hasn't had a confirmed sighting | since 1944. | | Lots of these species have been long gone. But the landowner of | that 1944 sighting probably couldn't turn over a rock on his | property without fines and lawsuits coming at him, at least | until now. | | ETA: If I'm remembering the stories right, either the last or | one of the very last IBW sightings was doubted by officials, | because the guy was a farmer or something and "not a scientist | or expert". | | Not getting them to pay him any attention, he went home, shot | the breeding pair, and returned to the officials office with | proof. | bluejekyll wrote: | Not the same species at all, but you just reminded me of the | family of three Pileated Woodpeckers that I saw with my | parents this summer in rural NY. They are really amazing | looking (and bigger than I thought) birds. Hopefully more | people will recognize the importance of saving our natural | habitats and preserving species like these: | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pileated_woodpecker | | btw, I'm not saying this particular bread is at risk, it is | not, but for how long before they are in a similar situation? | beerandt wrote: | It's funny, because the number of people who regularly | claim to have seen an IBW is really high. And 9 out of 10 | times you can show them a picture of a pileated, and they | instantly realize their mistake. | | Idk why people who can't ID fairly common birds get so | certain in thinking they've ID'd a really really uncommon | one, but they do. | Johnny555 wrote: | _Lots of these species have been long gone. But the landowner | of that 1944 sighting probably couldn 't turn over a rock on | his property without fines and lawsuits coming at him, at | least until now._ | | The endangered species act wasn't enacted until 1973, so I | think that landowner had plenty of opportunity to do what he | wanted with his property. | beerandt wrote: | That's not really a fair comparison/ justification. | | I don't know how much "warning" was given for the | endangered species act, or if that even matters, since land | that's about to be worthless is already worthless. | | Also, I have no idea what actually happened in this case. | But to speculate/generalize: | | IBW were already (obviously) extremely rare in 1944, so | there would have been an intense amount of pressure | preventing him from "doing" anything with the land, and in | a rural, wooded area, there probably weren't many options | at the time besides farming it, anyway. | | If the guy would have known in 1944 that the endangered | species act would be passed in 1973, you'd maybe have a | point. But he wouldn't have known. | | If the government suddenly told you tomorrow you couldn't | sell your house, then claiming it's fair because you could | have sold it all the way up to yesterday doesn't do you any | good if you had no advanced knowledge of it. And if it were | public knowledge, who would want to buy it anyway? | beerandt wrote: | There's also the perverse incentives of developers and | farmers not wanting endangered species to be "discovered" on | their property because of the restrictions that will incur. | | But what gets _really_ interesting is re-introduction of | endangered species, like with sandhill cranes being re- | introduced to Louisiana (transplants from other surviving | populations). | | Is government introduction of an endangered species on/near | private land, in a way that will certainly incur restrictions | on that land (to protect said species), considered a "taking" | under the constitution, or should it be? | | More practically, as was the case with the sandhill crane, | the government had to make concessions to land owners to get | them on board and make the project politically viable. | | Now they're protected, but it's a "special/experimental | program" where farmers and other land owners aren't | restricted in the ways they would be if they were still | naturally occurring in that location. | | (Of course it's still illegal to shoot them, but every few | years someone manages to misidentify a 6 foot tall bird as a | goose or something else legal to hunt.) | inter_netuser wrote: | How come they don't investigate WHAT is actually causing this | exactly? | | Yes climate is changing but did it change that much since 80s? | | What if it's some pesticide? or some food packaging or | something | pvaldes wrote: | How many times have you heard the past government talking | about the problem with Californian porpoise? | openasocket wrote: | In the case of the ivory-billed woodpecker it was probably | extinct in the 80s too. There hasn't been a universally | accepted sighting of one since 1944, the few sightings made | since then aren't really conclusive. | | For most of these creatures they only existed in one | particularly small region or area. The San Marcos gambusia, | for instance, historically only lived in a single 1km stretch | of the San Marcos River. Species with that tiny of an area | can be driven extinct by a single bad weather event or | epidemic. Or because some real estate developer decides they | want to build a couple apartments. It doesn't even | necessarily have to be something big. It's unfortunate, but | sadly something like the San Marcos gambusia would probably | have gone extinct within a few centuries, human activity or | not, unless it was able to adapt to expand its range. | | While climate change is definitely something to be concerned | about, it is not, currently, the main driver of extinction | events like this. The far bigger cause is more direct human | activity, like poaching and land development. | inglor_cz wrote: | This fish lives in a single rock hole in Nevada. Fewer than | 200 individuals alive. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devils_Hole_pupfish | beerandt wrote: | Hawaii had iirc 14 species of birds on the list that were | all native to either one island or a portion of one, with | some preferring certain altitudes or only living on certain | plateaus, etc. | | The funny thing about Hawaii though, is that there are only | two or three (extremely isolated) places that remain with | any true Hawaiian plant habitat, because Polynesians | brought their own plants with them that almost universally | outcompeted the native plants. | | Birds on islands are some of the quickest animals to | specialize and differentiate into new species. | | Which makes Hawaii incredibly interesting, from an island | biogeography perspective. | | Something as simple as the fact that no mosquitos made it | to Hawaii until Captain Cook accidently introduced them, | means no native fish, frogs, birds, lizards, or anything | that specialized in eating them. | | Now extrapolate that to wiping out all the native flora and | replacing it. | | That so much biodiversity remains in Hawaii today ought to | actually give us some comfort in nature's ability to | quickly adapt to significant change. | bpicolo wrote: | The introduction of the mongoose to hawaii was a big | problem for bird biodiversity | shadowgovt wrote: | Over 20 species, so causes are as varied as the species. | | In several cases, it was a combination of human activity and | (relatively) fragile initial population conditions. 11 of the | species are native to Hawaii and Guam, and when human | expansion puts pressure on your ecosystem, there's nowhere to | move to. One of the fish species lived in one particularly | slow-flowing section of one river. | | When your whole universe is one island, there's a lot of | things humans can do that would render 100% of your habitat | unusable. | daveslash wrote: | Yeah, I agree. To add onto your sentiment that it was a | combination [of things]... I'd like to add that it's a bit | reductionist for people to suggest an extinction is one | thing (e.g. it was pesticides, it was climate change, | etc...). Sure, sometimes it might be ONE thing, but I would | guess that in most cases it's a combination of stresses | coming together. | justin66 wrote: | > How come they don't investigate WHAT is actually causing | this exactly? | | Who exactly do you believe should be studying causes of | species extinction but is not doing it? | 09bjb wrote: | Us! | lawrencevillain wrote: | From the article it sounds like invasive species, plus the | fact that we have royally screwed up the local ecosystem. | | For instance -- white-tailed deer are growing exponentially, | eating all the underbrush and outcompeting other animals, and | they have no/few natural predators left. | | I agree that not much has changed since the 80s, I think it's | just catching up to us now. | techrat wrote: | Ripple effects. | | Humans have ruined a lot of ecosystems that had a natural | balance. Wolf culling being one of the most obvious | examples of our cause and effect. | | https://www.yellowstonepark.com/things-to- | do/wildlife/wolf-r... | jakemauer wrote: | White-tailed deer have only recently recovered from over- | hunting and returned to their pre-colonization population | levels.[1] Do you have a source that frames their growth as | exponential? | | 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White- | tailed_deer#Population_a... | rubylark wrote: | Deer population growth during that recovery period (of | white tail deer at least) seems pretty exponential. [1] | However in the absence of natural predators it seems that | disease and human culling have pretty effectively kept | their population to stay at about pre-colonial levels | rather than continuing upward to the point of over | population. | | [1] http://www.deerfriendly.com/decline-of-deer- | populations | lawrencevillain wrote: | Apologies, I'm based in Pennsylvania and it's definitely | more noticeable here. I expect it will become more | apparent elsewhere too. | | We're at 3x the total population that existed when | europeans started settling here, and without an | appropriate way to cull the herd I don't see that | changing. We have milder winters (so no starvation), less | interest in hunting, and again a lack of natural | predators. | | https://extension.psu.edu/white-tailed-deer | cultofmetatron wrote: | plus the parasites that they spread are decimating moose | populations yearly | titzer wrote: | > white-tailed deer are growing exponentially | | Yes, and worse, some (uninformed people) see the growth of | _any_ species as a positive sign that nature is bouncing | back, or whatever. When in reality, ecosystems are hugely | out of balance and the vast growth of one species is just a | spasm as the system shakes itself apart. The knock-on | effect of one species 's sudden growth spurt may take | decades to play out in the shadows, but it is almost | assuredly _not_ a good thing. | hanniabu wrote: | > What if it's some pesticide? or some food packaging or | something | | What if it was? I don't expect things to change much with | corporate's death grip on the government. | WalterBright wrote: | > I don't expect things to change much with corporate's | death grip on the government. | | Statements like this always imply that if the government | ran the businesses (socialism) things like this wouldn't | happen. But the evidence is it is _worse_. The USSR had | major problems with their heavily polluting industries, | which persist today. | dmkolobov wrote: | Comments like that suggest no such thing. | | There is plenty of middle ground, including restrictions | on corporate election donations, and generally limiting | corporate lobbyists access to our legislators. | WalterBright wrote: | Again, you're saying government control won't have these | problems. | | Socialist governments produced tremendous environmental | problems because even though the government consisted | solely of altruistic, self-sacrificing, dedicated, | incorruptible administrators, the people still needed | food, clothing, and washing machines. And the government | would try to provide them, rather than face mass | starvation. | dmkolobov wrote: | And speaking from a Russian perspective, your assertion | that anyone in the USSR viewed their officials as self- | sacrificing and altruistic is quite frankly hilarious. | WalterBright wrote: | I have friends who grew up in the Soviet bloc. I once | witnessed a hilarious conversation between one of them | and another friend who was a committed socialist (I don't | de-friend people because of their politics). My socialist | friend would say "X under socialism would be better". The | other would say "I lived under socialism, and here's how | and why X was worse." Socialist would say "but that won't | happen under socialism". The other would say "you have | zero experience with this, I lived under it. You have no | idea what you are talking about." | | The back and forth like this would go on for a while. | mcguire wrote: | Clearly, there's nothing to be done. | | Thoughts and prayers, ivory-billed woodpecker, thoughts | and prayers. | bumby wrote: | I don't understand why this is portrayed as some sort of | false dichotomy. | | There can be government regulation without reverting to | socialism. There can also be systems of checks and | balances to both the ills of unfettered free-market | economics and government power structures. | dmkolobov wrote: | No, I am not. | | I am saying corporate interests are not aligned with | those of the people at large, they are aligned | exclusively with those of their shareholders. I do not | want my country's laws to reflect a small group's desires | to make money. | WalterBright wrote: | This completely overlooks the desires of the people that | want the products the company provides at a reasonable | price. This is not going away, regardless of how you | structure things. People like to eat food and use washing | machines. | | The notion that profit is the root of the problem is | implying that removing the profit will resolve it. | History shows that this never works. | | Socialism produces more environmental degradation, | because it cannot produce things as efficiently as free | market businesses can. So, to make up the gap, they pay | little attention to the environment. | dmkolobov wrote: | I don't know why you keep bringing up socialism. My point | is that corporate lobbying and donations should be | restricted, not that free market businesses shouldn't | exist. | | There is a broad, non-linear spectrum between socialism | and unrestricted corporate influence on government. | mcguire wrote: | Because Walter doesn't see any difference between | Stalin's Soviet Union and election regulations. | WalterBright wrote: | You're never going to get money out of politics. Even in | the Soviet Union. Do you really think the Soviet Union | did not have endemic corruption in government? | | Here in Seattle, the Council created "democracy vouchers" | paid by the taxpayer to give to the candidate of their | choice. What it really is is the incumbents using | taxpayer money to fund their campaigns. If you're not an | incumbent, good luck getting any of those vouchers. | dTal wrote: | >Do you really think the Soviet Union did not have | endemic corruption in government? | | Literally no one thinks that or implied it in this | conversation. What a non sequitur. I don't think you're | even properly reading the comments you reply to. | WalterBright wrote: | > unrestricted corporate influence on government | | Your notion that absent corporate lobbying, government | control would work out in the best interests of everybody | is utterly without foundation. | | Your complaint about the profit motive being the root of | evil also implies that without profit, things would be | better. Without profit has been repeatedly tried. It | _never_ produces better results. | | My father grew up a socialist. Then he joined the | military, and spent years living on military bases. There | is zero profit motive on a military base. But there was | no end of ridiculous problems, enormous waste, glacial | bureaucracy, etc. This thoroughly disabused him of his | socialist notions. | | For one small example, on a new base, furniture for the | base housing had to be supplied. The base commander | delegated the selection of furniture to his wife (men | rarely care about these things). She picked all the | furniture, confident in how great her taste was and what | a big favor she was doing to the ignorant masses on base. | | The servicemens' wives all hated that furniture. My dad | would always have a huge laugh at how much they loathed | it. | | P.S. When my parents got married, my mom hated all of his | furniture. He had to buy all new stuff to her | specifications. | shkkmo wrote: | Please try responding to what people are actually saying | rather than inventing endless strawman arguments. | | There are important functional distinctions between a | government run enterprise, a government regulated | enterprise and a completely unregulated enterprise. | | There are different types of inefficiencies in | heirarchical systems and market systems. Markets tend to | duplicate effort often in unnecessary zero-sum games. | Heirarchical systems have trouble routing around | incompetence and corruption. | | If you pay attention you'll notice that the systems that | work best are hybrids that layer market and heirarchical | systems. | | While the army seems like a purely heirarchical system, | it is really a hybrid system since interfaces heavily | with the market systems which we call the military- | industrial complex. | WalterBright wrote: | > While the army seems like a purely heirarchical system, | it is really a hybrid system since interfaces heavily | with the market systems which we call the military- | industrial complex. | | That has nothing to do with how things are run on a | military base. | | Besides, if you've got any evidence that the military | worked better in a non-market system, like the USSR, | please present. | | > Markets tend to duplicate effort often in unnecessary | zero-sum games. | | Another word for that is "competition". Competition makes | them efficient. Eliminating competition leads to gross | inefficiency and incompetence, making things far worse | than the duplication ever did. | shkkmo wrote: | > Eliminating competition leads to gross inefficiency and | incompetence. | | It can, especially if poorly managed. However, there is a | reason why most companies are heirarchical systems. | | If markets were truely the "one true way to do things" | you would see markets all the way down. That simply is | not the case. In fact, instead we see that "vertical | integration" can be extremely successful and can multiple | companies linked purely by markets. | | Similarly, you don't see very many successful truely free | markets. It turns out that you need the rule of law and a | regulating authority to minimize unproductive competition | that would otherwise swamp the benefits of the productive | competitive. | | We don't want companies competing for sales by blowing up | each other's stores. We want companies to compete for | sales by making better products. | | Deciding when and how to mix markets with heirarchical | and other systems is extremely complicated and hard. But | it is simple minded to pretend that pure markets are | always the best solution when reality so clearly shows | the benefits of hybrid systems. | wittycardio wrote: | I love reading the ramblings of the developmentally | challenged at the end of a workday | bumby wrote: | > _There is zero profit motive on a military base._ | | And yet, the military is one of last institutions that | the American public still has faith in. It's almost as if | people realize there can be many motives, beyond profit, | that drive people to act in a certain way. | | I'm fairly blown away on a regular basis by how otherwise | smart people revert to utterly simplistic models of the | world. | _jal wrote: | The "Ranting about Socialism" session is down the hall. | This one is about extinction. | dTal wrote: | Bro, the government forbidding companies from using a | certain pesticide because it's driving the ivory-billed | woodpecker extinct isn't "socialism", man. Or if it is, | then the very premise of governance is socialist. You're | so desperate to attack your personal bugbear that you're | thrusting it into a totally unrelated conversation by | quite extravagantly strawmanning someone. | bparsons wrote: | It is usually just plain old development destroying their | habitats. Suburbs, highways, logging etc. destroy their home | and the species dies out. | SamBam wrote: | Far more extinction is caused (so far) by land development, | logging, and things like that. | | Though probably in the next couple of decades we'll be seeing | waves of extinctions caused by global warming. | Taylor_OD wrote: | It's absolutely changed that much in since the 80s. For | humans? Not that much. For tiny animals and bugs? Small | change is massive change. | laurent92 wrote: | I'm appalled by the housing codes (PLU in French). They do | require to estimate and compensate the fauna and flora, by | providing other shelters in another forrest for example, or | manually moving individuals (butterflies, birds). | | But it will never be the same! Maybe that land was in the | middle of a communication axis, maybe it had the right fungus. | If you move all the species around, it's like when you move all | the humans around: They become unrooted, and, ultimately, | stress on their lives shows up as obesity or as socially | disordered! | | We need to stop colonizing more land. We need to limit | population in a country. | Retric wrote: | It's less about structures than it is other modifications to | natural habitats like pollution, cutting forests, draining | swamps, introducing invasive species, and growing crops. | 5faulker wrote: | With the current development in climate change and resource | exploitation, one can expect this to be the tip of the iceberg. | Taylor_OD wrote: | There are far less bugs than there were 50+ years ago. Without | bugs birds and other small animals have to struggle more to eat. | Work that all the way up the food chain. Its very sad and it will | only get worse. | mdni007 wrote: | I have a flat pigtoe in my aquarium. What should I do? | MattGaiser wrote: | Do you genuinely have one? | BitwiseFool wrote: | How did you acquire it? Have you had it for a long time and are | you certain it is really a flat pigtoe? Don't let any doubt | stop you from reaching out, though. It would be a shame | otherwise. | fogihujy wrote: | Call the authorities | arcticfox wrote: | Is that a theoretical question or a real one? Because if it's a | real question, that would be really spectacular | eightysixfour wrote: | Here's the contact page, select your state and call your local | office: https://www.fws.gov/offices/ | bluedevil2k wrote: | In theory, species should be going extinct all the time as the | climate changes, from ecological changes, invasive species, new | species forming, etc. The real question, is the rate of species | going extinct increasing? (I believe the answer to that is yes). | But the mere headline "species goes extinct" should make us react | "yeah, that's how evolution works". | Andrew_nenakhov wrote: | We are currently experiencing sixth Mass Extinction event. It | started at least 20k years ago, and is generally linked to the | end of glaciacion of the northern hemisphere and human | activity. | | It is not exactly known if this rate is fast or slow, because | from our perspective we can't really estimate the length of | previous mass extinction events. After all, the closest one was | 66M years ago, and with fossil evidence gradual decrease of | biodiversity over the course of 1M years wouldn't look much | different if said decrease would take just 1 year. | zacharycohn wrote: | If you ever want to bawl your eyes out, listen to the second half | of Episode 20 of the podcast The Anthropocene Reviewed: "QWERTY | Keyboard and the Kaua`i `o`o Bird." | | Absolutely destroyed me, and I tear up everytime I just _think_ | about this episode. | purple_ferret wrote: | It's interesting something so similar looking to the Pileated | Woodpecker went extinct so easily. | | Annihilated by preference | genghisjahn wrote: | Also of note, we're still discovering MANY new species: | https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/22202733/2020-new-spe... | | I'm not in any way saying that we should not be concerned about | species going extinct. I remember Dr. Malcolm's line about | extinction from Jurassic Park. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2021-09-30 23:00 UTC)