You've presented a thoughtful and considerate reply, DerHasisttot. Thank you.

The most basic argument I have presented is the erosion and eventual fading out of a particular population, and this is the crux of what I would like to focus on. The premise can be applied to any element of biodiversity.

The metaphor of an endangered species of duck is still apt.

My assumption was correct in that you, as most people, would find justification for mobilizing efforts in ensuring this particular population is given a chance to exist. For whatever reason, you have deemed this species of duck worth your concern and you do not hesitate to voice your consternation. Another assumption I will make is that the same can be said of any population that contributes to the precious diversity of our world and faces existential challenges. Whether it be a rare beetle, some exotic bush or the giant panda.

I like to think a noble feature of humanity is our desire for fairness and that we should not stand by while something is endangered. We both probably share this in common.

The above considered, I plead that because a particular civilization finds itself below replacement level it is in a perilous state and merits attention. This is a conclusion that, again, assumes an overreaching, unfettered respect for diversity.

Just as you should care for a particular duck, it would not negate your concern for other types of mallards, waterfowl or any other species. Your sense of justice would be shared equally.

You must extend your own desire to protect a unique given species to the right of a nation to maintain its own identifying characteristics. Realize that the desire for prosperity and sustained existence of a nation does not by definition mandate the impingement on another.

If you can not grasp this sympathy you display for a bird and apply it to another context, you are intellectually dishonest.

On the other hand, if like GenjiKilpatrick you harbour a sense that "whites" deserve to be eradicated because of who they are... you're barely human.

Interesting post.

I was a liberal for all my life until I concluded liberalism, as nice as it is, is on the wrong side of history on most of the human sciences (genetics, intelligence research, human biodiversity etc.).

The Monsanto company is a danger to the *health of to the food of the world. Monsanto has been lying to farmers for decades. Their greedy corporation will stop at nothing to twist laws to ensure that they have long lasting passive income at the expense of biodiversity and general health of agriculture. They're trying to do this to Europe too.

http://videosift.com/video/WL-US-bullies-Europe-on-behalf-of-Monsanto

>> ^GeeSussFreeK:

Given your bullet reply I will do likewise...


I) I agree that culture may influence hypotheses that have a strong influence on popular ideas of the day. When considering your example, it was the church that was the main player on the opposing side, and ideas that go against the church doctrine, well... we all know what happens then. Climate change has similar implications, as it is rooted in politics and lifestyle - it may be influenced by culture. However, the supporting hypotheses are not largely influenced by culture because they are largely scientific in nature and do not have a direct influence on laymen. For example, the ecological hypothesis to which I eluded earlier concerning altitude and species' ranges is not debated on CNN or FOX. It's fairly obvious why. MOST (I'd wager 99%) scientific ideas are similar to this latter example.

a) I can agree with your point somewhat.. I agree that most people (including scientists) are subject to culture and view their world through the influence of it. However, just because this may be true, does not invalidate peer review. This is linked to my former point, if strong contrary data were to arise, it would greatly behoove a scientist to publish those data, not bow to the pressure of culture and hide it. Reviewers would be forced to view the evidence as it stands, in its raw naked truth, regardless of culture or influence - the editors, co-editors, and colleagues of the authors would demand it.
To your point about trends in science, I can also agree, yet climate change has more to do with the pressing nature of the matter then to a trend. This contrasts greatly with your example of Einstein and Newtonian theory. Climate change is "trending" at the moment, because we are forced to confront it - much like we were forced to confront the depletion of the ozone layer, we are confronting the loss of biodiversity in rainforests, the endangered species act, etc.

b) Indeed, I agree with you that it would not necessarily be "bad". However, you questioned if climate change would even be environmental in its effect. With the examples I provided, I hoped to show you that, indeed, it would be. Some ranges would increase, some would decrease, of course. However, as you surely know, evolution of unique taxonomic macroorganisms can take millions upon millions of years. It is not the increasing ranges with which we are concerned, it is the decreasing ones. Once they are gone, biodiversity decreases, even though it may increase for others. The health and environmental ramifications of that I surely do not need to explain.

c1) See my first point (I) - same argument, really.

c2) You're right and that is my fault - I misspoke (mistyped?). I meant that nobody has yet developed any strong evidence to the contrary. However, you have also committed a scientific falsity, which is one never "proves" anything in science. Therefore, a naysayer would never have to 'prove' that climate change is not occurring, but merely present his/her evidence of such to the contrary. He/She would then address the current models and present opposing ones (as many have done). The theory would quickly unravel, as many theories have done (e.g. Clemons vs. Gleason over the forest climax / succession model is a classic ecological theoretical battle that occurred in the early to mid 1900s. Clemons' theory was accepted for decades until a new hypothesis emerged from Gleason. The latter eventually racked up more evidence and is not generally accepted by the scientific community. [one more theory we never heard about in the papers, with practically no cultural influence]).

We know human biodiversity plays a significant role in diversity of performance, particularly at elite levels where most people are using similar techniques.

It's unscientific to dismiss without evidence the default expectation that West Africans' sprinting excellence and East Africans' long distance excellence is influenced by normal biodiversity.

Human Meddling in the process of natural selection disgusts me to no end.

Natural selection is a hard thing.

I feel that if an animal cannot live long enough to reproduce, humans included, then it obviously does not pass on it's genes ergo; it does not pass the test of nature.

My opinion of selective breeders is, they disgust me on both a guttural and rational level. These hoity toity rich white people base their whole breeding on outdated and unscientific opinion on how a dog should look

I see a strong working dog as the peek of its breed. I see a show dog as a farce of nature.

Pure breeding is not something to be liked. Biodiversity and Genetic Diversity is something that nature naturally seeks, and it is proven time and again that breeding with a small gene pool with no diversity will ultimately lead to extinction.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_selection

I also find the Eugenicist argument about Pure Bred people completely warped.

My knowledge of biology is only as a hobby, and maybe a slight obsession. It was my favorite class in High School, and would probably have been in college had I majored in it.

On a more sentimental note an old German Shepard or Deutscher Schäferhund of mine died of complication that resulted from Hip Displasia. Here is a quote from the wikipedia on German Shepards:

In 1899, Von Stephanitz was attending a dog show when he was shown a dog named Hektor Linksrhein. Hektor was the product of many generations of selective breeding and completely fulfilled what Von Stephanitz believed a working dog should be. He was pleased with the strength of the dog and was so taken by the animal's intelligence and loyalty, that he purchased it immediately.

A genetic disease that is so common in German Shepherds that one could, speculatively argue that it is the cause of selective breeding. After watching the dog degrade into dragging it's own hind legs around for weeks, and then shitting on herself regularly, because she couldn't lift herself up to shit properly, it was time to euthanize the dog. I can't help but wonder what the breed would look like if it had a bit of diversity.

It is wondrous to think what the world would be like if humans had no developed the current human brain, and still only had the reptile brain.

For a unique understanding of evolution and natural selection read some of these:


The Selfish Gene. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 1976. ISBN 0-19-286092-5.
he Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution. Free Press (United States), Transworld (United Kingdom and Commonwealth). 2009. ISBN 0-593-06173-X.
The Blind Watchmaker. New York: W. W. Norton & Company. 1986. ISBN 0-393-31570-3.


The Blind Watchmaker was the most complicated read in my opinion.

Cenk kinda falls apart with the "why global warming is bad" thing, but mostly it's concerns about negative effects on the amount of: farmland, access to drinkable water, biodiversity in ecologies everywhere, sea levels, and the overall stability of weather itself.

Incidentally, I'm sure Doocy wasn't joking about how lame the Republican claims of "global cooling" were when it was pretty much short-sleeve weather through November and well into December this year.

We'll be waaaay past the point of no return if it ever fails to get cold in winter, especially in the northern midwest.

*eco

The point is that the words on the page were scientific based facts.

Noooooo - the only scientific evidence is that Earth has climate cycles of warming and cooling and that the Earth is currently in a warming cycle. There is no 'scientific evidence' that human activity is causing any of that cycle to take place either positively or negatively. There is more C02 in the atmosphere, but there is no evidence that the C02 is what 'caused' the warming. There is compelling evidence that C02 is an aftereffect of the cycle, not an indicator of it. And historically, there have been periods of time in earth's history when there was far more C02 in the atmosphere. It did not cause 'harm'. The periods of more C02 and warmth have been times when the Earth was the most lush and had the greatest biodiversity. There is no evidence that human C02 emissions have caused the current warm blip. All that exists is inference, and vague correlations which any statistician would call either negligible or non-existent. The AMG movement is political - not scientific - but they need scientists to hype the masses so they pay them massive amounts of money to ignore evidence, make hasty generalizations, and sensational claims. Follow the money, man. Follow the money. This is one of the biggest scams in all of History since indulgences.

I think there have been major social upheavals every 30 years or so in human society ever since the industrial revolution (1864 - Civil War, 1900 - Gilded Age, 1930 - Great Depression/WWII, 1960 - Civil Rights/Vietnam, 1980 - Ronald Reagan/Monetarist revolution, 2000's Iraq/Great Recession). I think we're seeing another upheaval now, I just hope it won't get quite so bad as some of the others in my list -- I hope we're going to end up comparing the 2010's more to the 1960's than the 1930's or 1860's. I suspect I'll live through one more major upheaval, assuming my lifespan ends up being somewhat average, and assuming the rate of social change isn't accelerating.

There's a part of me that thinks Kurzweil is right about a Singularity coming -- that the rate of technological advancement will speed up exponentially, and exceed our wildest expectations. I think there's a nonzero chance I'll live long enough to see the start of such a thing, but I think it could just as easily be a century or two away, and not decades.

I do think environmental issues are going to become a massive, unmistakable concern sooner rather than later. I don't think it will be the end of humanity or anything like that, but I suspect we're going to have to either rapidly retool our economy once people snap out of denial, or have a big economic crash coupled with major crop shortages and famine, and then rapidly retool our economy. I would even argue that environmental issues have played a nontrivial role in the current economic hardship, and that the time has come to really start enacting plans for moving away from fossil fuels, and start looking into more medium-to-long term issues like biodiversity and fresh water supply.

As for the freak globe-spanning natural disasters, there's no way to know about those. They could as easily happen tomorrow as they could a couple million years from now. Hopefully those will wait until post-Singularity when we'll be better equipped to deal with something like that...

Ok, Glenn, let's say we don't conserve the otters... hmm... What's that, otters consume large amounts of sea urchins?

Oh, look, now the sea urchin population is skyrocketing... hmm... I wonder why that is... What's that, sea urchins consume massive amounts of kelp?

Oh, look, now the kelp beds are disappearing... hmm... I wonder why that is... What's that, the kelp beds help maintain large marine biodiversity, including large fish stocks?

Oh, look, now fishermen are out of work and marine mammal populations are declining...

My conclusion: DON'T RANT ABOUT SHIT YOU KNOW NOTHING ABOUT.

It was a very good speech. And there were both converted choir members and the non-converted in that audience (delegates were chosen from among non-profit groups and government officials).
Let's not forget that this Rio conference led to the Biodiversity Convention. http://www.cbd.int/convention/guide.shtml
Biodiversity loss will be the end of us (unless we all want to eventually rely on algae).

Upvote for celebrating human biodiversity.

eh... biodiversity seems a little narrow, and could confuse potential members... besides, whoever starts it, if anyone starts it, should pick the title

Biodiversity would be a good name for one:

Biodiversity is the variation of taxonomic life forms within a given ecosystem, biome or for the entire Earth. Biodiversity is often a measure of the health of biological systems to indicate the degree to which the aggregate of historical species are viable versus extinct. - The Wikipedia

Uhhhh... lemme jump in here to say this about that-bamdrews pulpit there refers to one of my favorite topics, Wobal Glorming- If you think that paying an inordinant amount of attention to any one aspect of the homosapien dance will profit the world...well, look at poor old Paul McCartney and the bozo HE married.

Look man, plain and simple,mother earth belches more toxic waste than any of us will ever!!!! Does this not compute???

Otherwise, there is no doubt that we fuck up biodiversity every time we turn around-But....here we are, at the beginning of a new day and we can all still breathe, Jesus has not come back, we did not destroy the planet with nukaler bombs-Enjoy the day, god, its gorgeous here....as in , WHAT THE F...K CAN BE DONE ABOUT IT WITHOUT DOING AWAY WITH ALL OUR TOYS AND EMBRACING THE POLITICS OF NOMADIC HEARDERS AND FARMERS???

Sorry folks, I do tend to carry myself away.

for all you dreamers, there is always the Unabomber's Manifesto......