Hi Chris, I was not aware that there was much consensus regarding 'landscape
ecologists' views on the level of management required or desired in any
given ecosystem. It should be possible that humans could manage an
ecosystem, but history has proven that ecosystems manage people; however
there are few - if any - examples where civilizations have been successful
in managing ecosystems for the sole benefit of ecosystems, exclusive and
inclusive of humans. We apparently killed off the last Neanderthal's less
than 40,000 years ago. Why now are we as a species going to change?
Prior to the last ice age which ended about 14,000 years ago there were no
humans in either North America nor in South America. There was a recent
finding of some human remains in Chile that could be in excess of 1 million
years. There are possibly some remains that date as long ago as 40,000 years
ago in South America. Europeans were especially ruthless in Chile and killed
of almost all the indigenous population there with rifles....
Recently in Nature magazine, a scientist reported that coincident with the
arrival of humans in North America, about 12 thousand years ago, there was a
rapid loss of species, and I don't recall how many species dissappeared but
it was substantial. But this rate of extinction was much less than has
occurred as a result of humans over the last one hundred years worldwide.
Biologist relate that when a species dissappears, based on records that go
back millions of years ago, they term this phenomenon as 'species
replacement'. In these cases, such as in the Mesozoic era, there were only
six species that survived in the terrestrial ecosystems of the world. What
the paleontologists indicate is that all species living today descended from
only six species.
Thus if that is an accurate protrayal of natural selection, eg. species can
select for themselves, manipulate their environments, then the theory that
you are presenting is based on a theory called 'orthogenesis'. Your theory
is similar to 'orthogenesis' which means that species have some innate
ability or conscious characteristic that enables them to survive as species.
Lamark, Teilhard de Chardin [Phenomenon of Man] and others are believers in
'orthogenesis'. This theory has no scientific support any longer. The theory
of 'orthoselection' essentially means that species do not select themselves
what desireable survival traits [morphological or behavioural] are needed to
survive as species. The belief that species - and not just man - can select
the right behaviours and morphological adaptations are required to survive
has never been proved. This would mean for instance that humans from
northern Europe could live in a tropical country and continue to be fair
skinned and blue eyed which out any natural selection for the brown skin and
full head of hair that many indigenous populations have in the tropics. For
instance, babies born of Amerindians are born with a full head of dark brown
hair. Babies born to northern Europeans are most often born without hair;
they are born bald and they take up to two years to develop a good head of
hair. These babies would get sun burned very quickly in the sunshine of the
long summer drought season of the Sierran Andes, especially at an elevation
of 4500 meters on Lago Titicaca. The indigenous people here spend many hours
in the direct sun tending herds of livestock, and working in the fields. No
one spends two years inside a house...protecting the child's head from the
sunlight.
Prior to Europeans arriving at Easter Island there was probably a living
landscape there and there was probably a ecosystem with lots of trees. After
humans arrived there, the cutting of trees was necessary to provide things
like boats so that these Easter Islanders would be able to survive since
there was not enough plant food on the island and virtually no animal
protein on the island to allow for a human population to survive. In the
1700's the population of humans that lived there all died off because they
ran out of wood to make boats so that they could fish.
On some other islands in the Pacific there were small populations that
existed on coral reefs. These reefs are subject to the effects of changes in
the level of the ocean. At some time during the last ice age there were many
more coral islands where people lived. The effect of the ice age(s) is to
lower the sea level by up to 200 meters as was observed in the Caribean Sea.
The effect of the current GHG induced climate change is to increase the
level of the oceans because of melting ice, and also to kill vast amounts of
coral. For instance in the Indian Ocean approximately 90% of the coral is
now dead. The loss of this ecosystem is directly attributable to the
increased emission of GHG's as a result of deforestation and the burning of
fossil fuels. The predictions are very worrisome for some south Pacific
Islanders who live on coral atolls that are only 7 feet above the high tide.
At the equator there are virtually no hurricanes or storms, so living on
these islands has been going on for a very long time, with perhaps
continuous occupation for up to 40,000 years. The indigenous population of
Australia has lived there for 40,000 years.
When scientists analyze the successful and the not so successful cultures
that have inhabited the earth over the last 14,000 years or so, it appears
to be the rule that 'orthoselection' is dominant in what determines which
cultures survive and which do not. There are no living examples of any
civilizations surviving in the Americas. The last civilization to be
discovered by 'western man' was the Incan civilization. It was pratically
wiped out in less than 100 years. The Spanish and the catholic church did
almost everything that it could to destroy every trace of this very much
advanced cilization. The only place in the Americas where indigenous people
still live their traditional lifestyle is in the rainforest of the Amazon.
And many of these people still do not want any part of western man's profane
culture. In fact a tribe was recently rediscovered in Brazil which was
thought to have gone extinct at the turn of the century. This tribe reported
through interpreters that it still did not want any contact; however that
may now be impossible.
In Peru for instance there are about 95 distinct languages. Only about 20 of
these languages are still spoken. Some of the remaining languages only have
a small number of living speakers left [Survival International]. Of all the
civilizations in the world that western man has known and studied, perhaps
the only one that could be considered truely sustainable was the Incan
civilization and it's hydrologic advances [vast network of stone irrigation
works, many still functioning since they were constructed over 3000 years
ago.] and earthquake system of terraces and stone works.
There were many more people living in Babylon and Mesopotamia 3000 years ago
than there are now. The old Persian civilization was wiped out by
deforestation and a failure to protect the highly erodible soils that fed
the Euphrates from transporting silt to the vast underground network of
irrigation canals. The civilization collapsed due to an inability to keep
the irrigation ditches clear of silt. A similar phenomenon occurred in the
Yucatan with the Mayan civilization. There the irrigation networks silted up
due to conversion of rainforests to agriculture.
I am not sure and I cannot speculate, but the earth's ecosystems as a whole
are too fragile and too sensitive to the frequent disturbance regime that
humans 'en masse' enact when they embark on the 'civilizing' phase of their
development. Something has to 'control' the civilization over time otherwise
the civilization will destroy itself through exploitation of the water and
the soil. The only consistent and continuous examples of when humans have
'managed' their ecosystems to the benefit of the ecosystems and themselves
as a species, is of course with the 'neolithic' hunter and gathering
societies. These societies have for thousands of years lived in 'harmony'
with the Nature, and did not cause significant declines in species nor in
the productivity of their habitat. These neolithic peoples are no capable of
the modern 'vagueness of expression' that characterizes modern 'objectivist'
science [S. K. Langer, paraphrased. Mind: an Essay on Human Feeling].
All the elements agreed, there is no substantial proof that 'othogenesis' is
possible for humans. Every time there is a civilization, there is
waste...the exception appears to be with the Incan civilization which was
dominated by the altiplano where it can snow almost any time of the year,
and where catastrophic earthquakes that result in large scale destruction
control the ability of humans to dominate their landscape. [the last
catastrophic event was the earthquake that killed 70,000 persons in Valle
Hauscaran in 1970 when large mud flows completed destroyed several towns. It
should be mentioned that in Cusco only about 2% of the colonial buildings of
the Spanish still are standing].
Additional support for this observation is situated in Tibet which was the
longest living theocracy in the history of the modern era. The only other
long living theocracy was of course ancient Eqypt which lasted many millenia
and then dissappeared 2500 years ago. The ancient Greek civilization lasted
about 400 - 500 years. The Roman civilization did not last much longer. And
now that western man has dominated all but Antarctica, there are virtually
no remnants left of those original undisturbed ecosystems in the
Medditerean, the birth place of western civilization [only about 2% of the
forest is left after 2000 years since the Romans began deforesting the oak
forests]. What the cutting down of the oaks failed to achieve, the goats
finished whatever was left off. On average about 20 meters of soil was
washed to the sea since the first oaks were cut down for ships and fuel and
building products.
If there was a better example than the Meditterean and Babylon, it may be in
China. What is left of the original forests and ecosystems there? I think
that China now has less than five percent of its' forests left in any state
bordering on natural. They recently banned logging in the country, following
Thailand, Burma, et cetera. The only country that has any substantial
primary forests left in Asia is Bhutan which has at least 40% of it's forest
intact. This is partly because of the Bhuddist respect of life, and also
because it was never colonized by Europeans. In this country it is unlawful
to kill animals. If a person choses to eat meat, the only way possible is to
wait for an animal to die, and if a person wished to eat a fish, well they
have to find a dead one on the shore.
There are examples of 'emergence' in the topos of culture, but none of these
examples are modern. There are some examples of 'emergence' in the west such
as the Hudderites, the old world Mennonites, and within the contemplative
communities of the Catholic church. These examples speak for themselves, but
if it is possible to drive and own/rent an RV which uses over 1 gallon per 6
six miles, and if this option is available to half the population of North
Americans, which it practically is, then there is no hope of 'convergence'
nor of 'emergence' with Nature but rather there is every expectation of a
correction, a type of 'orthoselection' that we have not seen the likes of
yet in modern history....
You know that with modern GPS there is no excuse any longer for another Exon
Valdez tragedy to ever occur again. But if accidents were 100% preventable,
there still would be the effects of war that are often orders of magnitude
worse in impact the ecosystems that they occur in than the effects of large
populations of humans could have on them in solitude....
If there is one chance that 'orthogenesis' could work, then it would have to
be through a combination of 'environmental' selection anyway. Right now with
so much cheap energy, and a complete lack of corporate and government will,
there is really not much to hope for. The best thing is to 'de-populate'
regions of the earth through voluntary means [just stop having too many
children] and provide more and better education to those that need it. These
two things: unversal rights to health and education will probably solve the
majority of the problems. But that is not happening....everywhere.
Thus saith Jeremiah
> It includes a number of perspectives
> including the inclusion of people (with issues of social equity, humans as
> integral to landscapes, etc - with more corollaries, including that
> sans-human reserves are but one of many approaches, and that humans do not
> necessarily "harm"), adaptive management, a systems perspective, the
> importance of values moving away from the purely utilitarian, etc. etc.
> Also ideas of what constitutes a desirable landscape outcome - whatever
you
> want to call it - "health", "integrity", etc.
>
> I would call this an ecocentric approach (though one where humans are
> integral to these landscapes, rather than outsiders), from an ethical
> perspective - but perhaps I am wrong. Its primary perspective of
management
> (the ethical framework of action) is the landscape/ecosystem level. This
> does not preclude obligations to either species or individuals - or issues
> of social equity of local communities (which often seems to be presented
as
> a mutually exclusive goal from some preservationists). Individual
> management actions (read "ethical actions") are almost always focused at a
> heirarchical level below the landscape - removing a tree, or animal;
digging
> a hole, etc., etc. The ecosystem approach suggests (I think) that the
> obligation at these levels remain, though any ethical consideration should
> also be mindful of the wider whole, and should not "harm" the wider whole.
>
> Point of exchange: In this way the ethical obligations are also
heirachical.
> Aside from the problem of what constitutes "harm", are there any other
> problems with it? Can we have nested heirarchies of concerns in the same
> way that a landscape or ecosystem has nested heirarchies of issues? Is a
> duty focus on the individual necessarily at odds with a greater concern to
> the landscape?
>
> Have others considered the ideas expressed within landscape ecology from
an
> ethical perspective? I think it represents a profound shift in our ideas
of
> what *is* nature - and therefore of critical importance to environmental
> ethics.
>
> Chris Perley
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