Page 313 - Environment: The Science Behind the Stories

Yet despite our expanding ethical convictions and despite
biodiversity’s many benefits, the future of biodiversity
remains far from secure. The search for solutions to today’s
biodiversity crisis is urgent, dynamic, and exciting, and scien-
tists are actively developing innovative strategies to maintain
Earth’s diversity of life.

Conservation Biology:
The Search for Solutions

Today, more and more scientists and citizens perceive a need
to stop the loss of biodiversity. In his 1994 autobiography,
Naturalist, E.O. Wilson wrote:

When the [20th] century began, people still thought of the
planet as infinite in its bounty. [Yet] in one lifetime, explod-
Figure 11.17 An Indonesian girl peers into a flower of ing human populations have reduced wildernesses to threat-
Rafflesia arnoldii, the largest flower in the world. The concept ened nature reserves. Ecosystems and species are vanishing
of biophilia holds that human beings have an instinctive love and at the fastest rate in 65 million years. Troubled by what we
fascination for nature and a deep-seated desire to affiliate with have wrought, we have begun to turn in our role from local
other living things. conqueror to global steward.

Conservation biology responds
share an instinctive love for nature and feel an emotional
bond with other living things (Figure 11.17). Wilson and oth- to biodiversity loss
ers cite as evidence of biophilia our affinity for parks and The urge to act as responsible stewards of natural systems,
wildlife, our love for pets, the high value of real estate with and to use science as a tool in this endeavor, sparked the
a view of natural landscapes, and our interest in hiking, rise of conservation biology, a scientific discipline devoted
bird-watching, fishing, hunting, backpacking, and similar to understanding the factors, forces, and processes that
outdoor pursuits. influence the loss, protection, and restoration of biologi-
In a 2005 book, writer Richard Louv adds that as today’s cal diversity. It arose as biologists became increasingly
children are increasingly deprived of outdoor experiences and alarmed at the degradation of the natural systems they had
direct contact with wild organisms, they suffer what he calls spent their lives studying. Conservation biologists choose
“nature-deficit disorder.” Louv argues that this alienation questions and pursue research with the aim of developing
from biodiversity and nature damages childhood development solutions to such problems as habitat degradation and spe-
and may lie behind many of the emotional and physical prob- cies loss (Figure 11.18). Conservation biology is thus an
lems young people in developed nations face today. applied and goal-oriented science, with implicit values and
ethical standards.
Do we have ethical obligations toward
other species? Conservation biologists work
at multiple levels
Aside from all of biodiversity’s pragmatic benefits, many peo-
ple feel that living organisms have an inherent right to exist. Conservation biologists integrate an understanding of evolu-
In this view, biodiversity conservation is justified on ethical tion and extinction with ecology and the dynamic nature of
grounds alone. environmental systems. They use field data, lab data, theory,
We human beings are part of nature, and like any other and experiments to study our impacts on other organisms.
animal we need to use resources and consume other organ- They also design, test, and implement ways to alleviate
isms to survive. In that sense, there is nothing immoral about human impact. These researchers address the challenges fac-
our doing so. However, we also have conscious reasoning ing biological diversity at all levels, from genes to species to
ability and are able to control our actions and make deliberate ecosystems.
decisions. Our ethical sense has developed from this intelli- At the genetic level, conservation geneticists study
gence and ability to choose. As our society’s sphere of ethical genetic attributes of organisms to infer the status of their
consideration has widened over time, and as more of us take populations. If two populations of a species are geneti-
up biocentric or ecocentric worldviews (p. 155), more of us cally distinct, they may have different ecological needs
have come to feel that other organisms have intrinsic value and may require different types of management. Moreo-
312 and an inherent right to exist. ver, as a population dwindles, genetic variation is lost

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