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Elephants without tusks are a response to the selective pressure of poaching

nautil.us

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Re: Elephants without tusks are a response to the selective pressure of poaching

#41

Post by nn3 »

mrfusion wrote: post #39

Offshoot topic I've been wondering. Why aren't deer evolving to stay away from roads?

Complex behaviors are difficult to evolve. There is unlikely to be a "stay away from roads" allele, while a "no tusks" allele was already in the elephant population.

If they live in an area where there are lots of roads everywhere, completely avoiding them may actually be maladaptive, as not every road crossing results in a fatality and they could well be trapped in a small area without it.

If they live in an area without many roads it probably doesn't really matter.

Re: Elephants without tusks are a response to the selective pressure of poaching

#43

Post by oldmanjay »

1457389 wrote: post #38
wildmusings wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> its not like nature is cruel and killed off most species > the environment (or nature if you will), changed too drastically and quickly that most species couldn't adapt fast enough to survive. These are not mutually exclusive. Mass starvation caused by environmental changes is a cruel kill off. I'm not sure what the point you're trying to make is.

I would say you are a little too excited about the drama and morality of a statistical process, and it's occluding your understanding of what's actually going on.

That's a lot of emotional content to infer from a post with such a neutral tone. I'm also struggling to see evidence of occluded understanding.

Re: Elephants without tusks are a response to the selective pressure of poaching

#45

Post by aab0 »

mrfusion wrote: post #39

Offshoot topic I've been wondering. Why aren't deer evolving to stay away from roads?

How would you know if they have been? As the human population shoots up massively, car-miles have increased enormously over the past century, and rural areas become denser, the number of deer-car accidents would skyrocket even if they have successfully been evolving to reduce risk.

Re: Elephants without tusks are a response to the selective pressure of poaching

#46

Post by jfoutz »

adamnemecek wrote: post #40
wtbob wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ivory's a beautiful, extremely useful substance; outlawing it makes as little sense as outlawing alcohol, marijuana or beef. What needs to be done is to create the appropriate legal framework and property rights to give Africans an incentive to ranch elephants. Cattle will never go extinct because people like hamburgers; the idea of elephants going extinct solely because people like ivory is mad. Elephants are going…

> Ivory's a beautiful, extremely useful substance; Beautiful maybe, useful, not really. > outlawing it makes as little sense as outlawing alcohol, Not really, prior to 2008 when the CITES relaxed ivory sale regulation, poaching was minimal. The current poaching crisis is a result of this relaxation. Not every good behaves the same way as alcohol. > What needs to be done is to create the appropriate legal framework an…

I've argued this before, media shaming could be really effective here. Ivory dealers as incompetent villains. Pathetic ivory consumers. It's not an addiction, it's a status symbol. Destroy the status.

Superman vs the kkk was super effective.

Re: Elephants without tusks are a response to the selective pressure of poaching

#47

Post by Swizec »

oldmanjay wrote: post #43
1457389 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say you are a little too excited about the drama and morality of a statistical process, and it's occluding your understanding of what's actually going on.

That's a lot of emotional content to infer from a post with such a neutral tone. I'm also struggling to see evidence of occluded understanding.

I think the idea is that these events aren't catastrophic on an individual lifespan level. They're catastrophic in geological time.

Look at the holocene extinction event. It's been going on for over 10,000 years. It's only noticeable statistically, doesn't affect day-to-day life much if at all. Therefore it's not really cruel because for most species it's as benign as having a little too few babies to maintain the population.

Re: Elephants without tusks are a response to the selective pressure of poaching

#48

Post by dredmorbius »

Something1234 wrote: post #35
eknkc wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be much better to soak some ivory in cyanide or something stronger and get it into market.

Would the cyanide slowly leach out when people touch it or something like that?

Tusks are used in "traditional medicines", among other uses.

Even the threat of poisoned ivory would be a strong disincentive for that market.

Permanently stained tusks have been used to dissuade material use (e.g., statues or figures).

Re: Elephants without tusks are a response to the selective pressure of poaching

#49

Post by optforfon »

adamnemecek wrote: post #40
wtbob wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ivory's a beautiful, extremely useful substance; outlawing it makes as little sense as outlawing alcohol, marijuana or beef. What needs to be done is to create the appropriate legal framework and property rights to give Africans an incentive to ranch elephants. Cattle will never go extinct because people like hamburgers; the idea of elephants going extinct solely because people like ivory is mad. Elephants are going…

> Ivory's a beautiful, extremely useful substance; Beautiful maybe, useful, not really. > outlawing it makes as little sense as outlawing alcohol, Not really, prior to 2008 when the CITES relaxed ivory sale regulation, poaching was minimal. The current poaching crisis is a result of this relaxation. Not every good behaves the same way as alcohol. > What needs to be done is to create the appropriate legal framework an…

I saw plenty of domesticated elephants in Thailand (and I assume all of South East Asia). Are African elephant some how different when it comes to this?

Re: Elephants without tusks are a response to the selective pressure of poaching

#50

Post by adamnemecek »

optforfon wrote: post #49
adamnemecek wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ivory's a beautiful, extremely useful substance; Beautiful maybe, useful, not really. > outlawing it makes as little sense as outlawing alcohol, Not really, prior to 2008 when the CITES relaxed ivory sale regulation, poaching was minimal. The current poaching crisis is a result of this relaxation. Not every good behaves the same way as alcohol. > What needs to be done is to create the appropriate legal framework an…

I saw plenty of domesticated elephants in Thailand (and I assume all of South East Asia). Are African elephant some how different when it comes to this?

Those were tamed. Domesticated means selectively bred. Those animals that you saw might have seemed tame, but they are actually pretty dangerous.
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