Extinct

Well, who watched the Extinct series on ITV last week? It was basically a series of shows featuring, let's face it, Z list celebrities championing the top ten (IIRC) most endangered species on the planet and pleading for the public to vote for their favourite, the winner receiving funding for preservation schemes and the like. The first show was the only one I watched right the way through. It was during this show that for the first time I was forced to ask myself the question, what's the point in saving these animals? The Bengal tiger, the Giant Panda, the Macaw and all the rest of the featured animals weren't put on this earth for our enjoyment, no matter how aesthetically pleasing they may be.

Nature produces all these different species (us included) then forces struggle upon them to see who will survive. Every living thing is a product of Nature's eternal quest to produce the best creature she can produce. Once upon a time dinosaurs ruled the roost but struggle was forced upon them and unfortunately they weren't up to the task and so they were wiped out. Today, we're the dinosaurs. We rule the roost. But for how long? Isn't it naive of us to strut around like we own the place, like our existence on this earth is secure, like we have the luxury to help preserve other living beings? Shouldn't we be concentrating our efforts on preserving our existence? Isn't that the whole point of us being here? To struggle and always strive for betterment?

It just strikes me that we could have been the pandas or the tigers but through no great master plan but sheer randomness we aren't. But one day we will most certainly suffer the same struggle they are suffering. At the minute we are the superior beings of this world, but if we don't concentrate all our efforts on continuing our existence, we may well end up being replaced by a superior species.

Don't get me wrong, I love animals and have had dogs and cats as pets and would never want any animal to come to harm, but diverting our resources to continue the existence of other species instead of our own is surely the complete opposite of what we should be doing, is it not?


BTW Merry Christmas to one and all

We're somewhat more advanced than the dinosaurs were...

These species are dying out because of us. There's nothing natural about us taking away their natural habitat.

We have placed ourselves outside of the 'natural' order of things as far as survival of the fittest is concerned. We can pretty much only be brought back into the fold by disease, natural disasters and/or what we do to ourselves.

The point - in my opinion - is saving the species we've pushed to the brink extinction. The dinosaurs wouldn't have thought about saving any species they may have been wiping out because they didn't have higher brain functions, or the capacity to destroy habitats quite like we can.

:P

i didnt watch it cos ITV do everything fooking awfully

The irony of all this, is of course, our own advanced state.

Because we (as a human population) are more advanced, we live longer, and so, consume more natural resources each than we did before. We're also trying to help other humans (in 3rd world countries for example) just as much (OK, probably more so) than endangered animals. Yet more humans, using more resources.

The point will eventually come, when there aren't enough resources to sustain the population.

Yes, everything has it's role in the environment, and without some animals, us humans wouldn't be here. So yes, we should continue to try & save those that we ourselves have caused to be in such dire straights. But it's all just a matter of delaying the inevitable IMO.

Our time will come, mark my words. (and happy christmas )

[Luckypants]

Originally Posted by private Fraser

Doomed! We all doomed, I tell ye!

[northwind]

Originally Posted by UlsterSV

It just strikes me that we could have been the pandas or the tigers but through no great master plan but sheer randomness we aren't. But one day we will most certainly suffer the same struggle they are suffering. At the minute we are the superior beings of this world, but if we don't concentrate all our efforts on continuing our existence, we may well end up being replaced by a superior species.

The pandas are not much of a threat to us. However, a world without pandas is a sadder one, so you can make a good argument for preservation of diversity purely through selfishness.

Also, if we should ever become second top of the rung instead of top- when the dolphins get fed up of us and unleash their robot army, or whatever- I think it'd possibly be advantageous to be able to say "But look, we didn't wipe out the pandas!" If we have a thousand year legacy of wiping out every species we can't eat, wear, ride or ****, I suspect things might not go too well with the new landlords.

Thing is, even if we annihilate all the non-useful species and convert all of the planet's surface to either bioregeneration or food use, we're still going to run out of space. Just that when we do we'll be in a more thoroughly artificial, and therefore inherently more unstable and fragile, environment. So since it's inevitable that we'll fill up all the available space anyway, why not fill up just a bit less of it? We're not individually going to be enriched by having an extra however many million people stretching the world to capacity, and could be massively disadvantaged.

Everything is connected. You wipe out enough species and we'll start seeing a bigger net effect.

Jimbo is right. The webs of inter-specific dependencies that are not clear.

Ulster, you are sort of mistaken about the idea that dinosaurs werent up to the task, and were wiped out because of this. "Dinosaurs" ( and Archosaurs) were in charge here for hundreds of millions of years.
In terms of evolution, that's forever. That's stable as anything gets, that is more or less perfect fitness.

They werent killed the way that say the American Cheetah was killed, a "normal" extinction, habitat changes, the species goes into crisis, bottlenecks, and fails. It was basically a massive bomb going off, and blowing everything up. That doesnt really count. Shooting someone in the face and taking their money, and selling them something and letting them die of old age is not the same thing, you know what I mean?

So, (most) dinosaurs just got killed one day. And then mammals sort of scammed their way into an important and empty niche. Mammals weren't cleverer, they were just there at the right time. They didnt do a normal gradual natural selection deal and squeeze dinos out. They would have never been able to, unless an external agent came in and removed most of them for us.

And the word superior is a risky one. Biologists would not really use this word, because it has a diferent meaning than you might think.

Say we go extinct, say we kill loads of things, flood the planet and go extinct.
The dominant life form on the planet might be colonies of blue green alga. They are hardly superior to us, they are just better able to take advantage of a shattered flooded planet than we are. They are able to fit the environment better. They are fitter. The idea of superiority (as defined normally) doesn't exist in nature.

As a matter of principle, any TV show advertising one of those fooking 090 numbers in my house gets the remote quick sharp

Sick of them, all of them.

Pete

[Stu]

In total contrast to Ulster's point I just think it's a shame that the number voting in Extinct must have been a tiny fraction (I imagine) of that voting in X factor before & after it, which is hardly as worthy a cause.