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Trial wipes out over 80% of Australian disease-spreading mosquito

csiro.au

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Re: Trial wipes out over 80% of Australian disease-spreading mosquito

#21

Post by eatbitseveryday »

AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #9
emilsedgh wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you actually have arguments to object this from a moral standpoint or it's just a snarky comment? Because I would really love to hear some moral objections to the matter.

While I'm all for wiping out the race of mosquitoes, I think it's arrogant on our behalf to assume that we can just remove a species completely from an ecosystem without consequences. If we're really lucky, the consequences will be minimal: spiders and other predators will simply find something else to eat. But if mosquitoes had some heretofore undiscovered critical purpose for the environment, we might have seriousl…

> While I'm all for wiping out the race of mosquitoes, I think it's arrogant on our behalf to assume that we can just remove a species completely from an ecosystem without consequences.

You are mistaken. Not wiping out all mosquitos, just the specific aedes aegypti species from the aedes genus.

Re: Trial wipes out over 80% of Australian disease-spreading mosquito

#22

Post by craftyguy »

crusso wrote: post #10
ksec wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>they serve no irreplaceable environmental purposes How are we sure of this?

We don't have to wipe out all mosquitos in one shot. There are many different species, not all of which transmit the deadly diseases of concern. We can start with less populous species that share their ecological niche with other species that can replace them in the food chain - observe the impact of removing that one species then move on to others as warranted by the results. Answer #2: It's worth the risk. Kill the…

> It's worth the risk

Not really. Mosquitoes, both adults and larvae, serve as an important food source for many animals that humans eventually depend on for food. Many types of juvenile fish eat their larvae, for example, juvenile fish that eventually grow up and become a major source of protein for some groups of people.

Re: Trial wipes out over 80% of Australian disease-spreading mosquito

#23

Post by AdmiralAsshat »

msla wrote: post #19
AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I'm all for wiping out the race of mosquitoes, I think it's arrogant on our behalf to assume that we can just remove a species completely from an ecosystem without consequences. If we're really lucky, the consequences will be minimal: spiders and other predators will simply find something else to eat. But if mosquitoes had some heretofore undiscovered critical purpose for the environment, we might have seriousl…

You could make the same hand-wavy "what-if" arguments about removing smallpox from the ecosystem. Or polio. Or malaria.

All of your examples are diseases, not creatures. I don't think they're comparable.

Re: Trial wipes out over 80% of Australian disease-spreading mosquito

#24

Post by noonespecial »

crusso wrote: post #10
ksec wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>they serve no irreplaceable environmental purposes How are we sure of this?

We don't have to wipe out all mosquitos in one shot. There are many different species, not all of which transmit the deadly diseases of concern. We can start with less populous species that share their ecological niche with other species that can replace them in the food chain - observe the impact of removing that one species then move on to others as warranted by the results. Answer #2: It's worth the risk. Kill the…

I like 2. Bad things might happen, but probably not worse than malaria.

We had some missteps applying technology last century but the time has come to stop being paralyzed by fear and start carefully, optimistically fixing some of this stuff.

Re: Trial wipes out over 80% of Australian disease-spreading mosquito

#25

Post by [deleted] »

crusso wrote: post #10
ksec wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>they serve no irreplaceable environmental purposes How are we sure of this?

We don't have to wipe out all mosquitos in one shot. There are many different species, not all of which transmit the deadly diseases of concern. We can start with less populous species that share their ecological niche with other species that can replace them in the food chain - observe the impact of removing that one species then move on to others as warranted by the results. Answer #2: It's worth the risk. Kill the…

[deleted]

Re: Trial wipes out over 80% of Australian disease-spreading mosquito

#26

Post by JackCh »

jonny_eh wrote: post #12
ksec wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>they serve no irreplaceable environmental purposes How are we sure of this?

Yes, pretty sure: https://www.nature.com/news/2010/100721/full/466432a.html

> "Yet in many cases, scientists acknowledge that the ecological scar left by a missing mosquito would heal quickly as the niche was filled by other organisms."

More concerning than the ecological scar left behind by the eradication of some species of mosquito is the precedent that would be set. Once you've deliberately eradicated one pest species, people will incorporate the knowledge of that action into their image of how the world works and the sort of things we're willing to do. The next time somebody proposes that a species be eradicated, there will almost certainly be less debate.

I've heard people defend the deliberate eradication of mosquitoes by pointing out how we've already deliberately eradicated viruses like smallpox. This demonstrates my concern. What will the eradication of mosquitoes be used to justify? It's already the case in the modern era that angry mobs of idiots need to be restrained from emotional outbursts against animals (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Australian_shark_cull). Having scientists justify the extermination of mosquitoes will only make it harder to get these angry mobs to back down.

I don't really doubt that human-feeding mosquito species could be eradicated without much harm to the environment, but these social concerns remain unaddressed.

Re: Trial wipes out over 80% of Australian disease-spreading mosquito

#28

Post by njarboe »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #16
jonny_eh wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But if mosquitoes had some heretofore undiscovered critical purpose for the environment But what if mosquitoes are actually bad for the environment? By not removing them we can be screwing things up!

The 'environment' is often in balance. Any abrupt change can cause oscillations and crashes. May as well ask "By not removing this brick from the wall, I may be screwing the wall up!"

The 'environment' is really never in balance. Predator/prey oscillations and crashes are the norm even without humans around. Maybe some ecosystems have been around long enough to have some properties of complex adaptive systems where the parts interact to keep extreme oscillations from occurring, but knowing how an ecosystem will respond to a single species disappearing is really unknowable until it happens.

Re: Trial wipes out over 80% of Australian disease-spreading mosquito

#29

Post by cbhl »

konschubert wrote: post #11
bmcusick wrote: post #7

> In an international partnership between CSIRO, Verily and James Cook University, scientists used specialised technology to release millions of sterilised male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes This is so stupid. A population will recover from this in a single generation, because the second you stop releasing sterile males, the remaining males (no matter how few) can repopulate the species. If you want to make a species of m…

Or a gene drive that renders male offspring sterile.

Sterilizing with Wolbachia is "natural" and thus reduces time-to-market versus a GMO-based solution.

The Verily folks are well aware of gene drives and CRISPR, but they're working to get a useful profitable product out to market, so they'll have more money to support that sort of R&D.

Re: Trial wipes out over 80% of Australian disease-spreading mosquito

#30

Post by sesteel »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #16
jonny_eh wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But if mosquitoes had some heretofore undiscovered critical purpose for the environment But what if mosquitoes are actually bad for the environment? By not removing them we can be screwing things up!

The 'environment' is often in balance. Any abrupt change can cause oscillations and crashes. May as well ask "By not removing this brick from the wall, I may be screwing the wall up!"

Agreed; I hate mosquitoes but I worry about change amplification. How will this ripple up the food chain? I wish this article also addressed the concerns, if any, by those studying the affects.
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