Time to get fired up about Environmental Ethics!!

iFlipIt's difficult to believe that somehow that garbage was published. Any "scientific" work that cites the Bible should simply be tossed. Obviously eliminating predators is stupid. Managing predator populations is an important conservation principle. Eliminating them is just...retarded.

Where would the line on predators be drawn? Most birds eat insects. Insects often eat other insects. Even sheep and cows will eat a very large number of insects while foraging on grass.

I'm all for engaging in a good conservation argument but this doesn't even seem worth thinking about.

ReturnToMonkeyIf any predator needs to be erased it's humans. But that's unethical to think about I guess. One of the biggest impacts humans have had on the animal kingdom is killing predators, wiping out habitats, and polluting important resources like soil and water. Nature is violent and gruesome, that's how it's been since the big bang, probably the most violent event ever. But it resulted in the creation of life, made life flourish, and now look how many complex organisms there are. It's certainly something to be admired. That author brings in God and suffering and things like that to back up his argument... But isn't the whole point of religion to make us understand suffering? That it's worth it to keep battling through and embrace the suffering because what comes next is way better? I hate to bring religion into this as it really should not play a part, but it seems like the backbone of what this guy is saying is based heavily upon religion and his personal idealized version of the world where it is more like heaven.

CrunnchyVanManalso if we are thinking in the author's logic wouldn't it make it just as unethical to eliminate predators because we are putting undue suffering on animals just living their life?

ReturnToMonkeyOh yes good point

shilesthis is fucking stupid. look at what happened when wolves were removed from yellowstone, it basically destroyed not only their ecosystems but also caused irreversible erosion.

Bended_ToenailSomeone should give me a tldr because I'm too lazy to read that whole thing

CrunnchyVanManSome dude wrote an opinion article on why elimination of carnivorous predators would be good because it cuts down on the suffering of animals and the whole thing is stupid and pointless because it fucks with the balance of nature

CrunnchyVanManhttps://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/19/the-meat-eaters/


I am writing a response to this dude's argument for my class and his argument pissed me off so I wanna see your opinions on this, Basically dude wants to exterminate predators for the sake of eliminating the suffering for the species they naturally prey on ...I think this is wack as fuck because nature has such a delicate balance and eliminating one species will surely cause some sort of ecological collapse from overpopulation of a species such as deer or other herbivores. deer will absolutely decimate an area if left unchecked. now imagine if most species did not have a natural predator... who are humans to play god and tamper with the food chain and the millions of year old balance that nature has.

telll me what you think, maybe battle it out in a civil enough way, lets hear it!

CrunnchyVanManhttps://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/19/the-meat-eaters/


I am writing a response to this dude's argument for my class and his argument pissed me off so I wanna see your opinions on this, Basically dude wants to exterminate predators for the sake of eliminating the suffering for the species they naturally prey on ...I think this is wack as fuck because nature has such a delicate balance and eliminating one species will surely cause some sort of ecological collapse from overpopulation of a species such as deer or other herbivores. deer will absolutely decimate an area if left unchecked. now imagine if most species did not have a natural predator... who are humans to play god and tamper with the food chain and the millions of year old balance that nature has.

telll me what you think, maybe battle it out in a civil enough way, lets hear it!

Monsieur_PatateI think you're missing the author's point, you're taking it too literally. It's a philosophical essay, it's nothing more than a fairytale "what if" take.

From his last paragraph: "... provided that this could occur without ecological upheaval involving more harm than would be prevented by the end of predation."

The guy isn't that naive, he is just saying that, from a philosophical standpoint, "it sure would be nice if all species could co-exist and survive without having to eat one another".

I mean.. yeah sure, I think most of us would agree that it'd be nice if the lion wouldn't have to tear that cute little antelope to pieces. But at the same time we all understand that this is how it has to be because of the very fragile balance of our ecosystem, and intervening to prevent that antelope's suffering would inevitably create, in the author's own words "ecological upheaval involving more harm".

It's a cute, yet dumb, thought, as everyone pointed it out in this thread, it's just not realistic.

CaseyYou should look at Western WA where they eliminated the wolf about a 100 years ago. The vacuum allowed coyotes, who were never native to this area to come in and take over. You can’t eradicate coyotes they are so adaptive they can live in a fucking trash heap and multiply endlessly.

I am not a biologist but it seems to me you could probably fill a library with research about the importance of apex predators to an overall ecosystem