Birds Are Vanishing from North America • Hacker News Board

Re: Birds Are Vanishing from North America

#41

Post by AnimalMuppet » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 7:14 PM UTC

jjuhl wrote: post #25

glogla wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Overpopulation rhetoric is eugenics.

No it's not. There are too many humans on the planet. Reducing the number would lead to a more sustainable situation. That's just basic logic.

"Reducing" (by means unspecified) sounds uncomfortably close to mass killing.

Worse, the logic of the "climate action now" position is that we can't wait for 2050. That will be too late. Well, if you want to reduce the population by 2050, what concrete steps do you propose? (I know, you didn't say 2050. I think "action now" is inherent in the logic of your position, though.)

Re: Birds Are Vanishing from North America

#42

Post by Kiro » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 7:16 PM UTC

lostconfused wrote: post #38

technothrasher wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> or we die out and the planet recovers on its own. That makes it sound like there's some kind of natural 'ideal state' for the planet to recover to. Without us, the planet would just go on changing, without anything to judge the current environment at any point as good or bad to any particular standard. Saving the environment is simply saving ourselves. Nothing more, nothing less.

"Ideal state" is inserted by your own bias. There are plenty of changes made by humans to the planetary system and some of them will be undone once humans are not around to maintain those changes.

So what? What's the higher purpose?

Re: Birds Are Vanishing from North America

#43

Post by blablabla123 » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 7:17 PM UTC

monktastic1 wrote: post #36

This apparently isn't a popular opinion, but: this world is precious. I would even go so far as to say miraculous . Until we wake up to this fact, we will continue to ennui ourselves and this world into oblivion. It's hard to prove (or even study), but I believe this is the root cause of all the other tragedies. It is not something we will merely engineer our way out of. We don't like religion (or in many cases, even…

I think the modern, post-religious intellectual discourse has not even space for metaphysics. Anything in this direction is considered mumbo jumbo. :-) Materialism probably hasn't reached its peak yet.

Re: Birds Are Vanishing from North America

#44

Post by pastor_elm » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 7:17 PM UTC

tylerpachal wrote: post #7

(serious) Is there any hope? Its just one problem after another (probably because everything is linked). What are the chances that we will get our act together or be able to engineer ourselves out of all of these problems?

>What are the chances that we will get our act together or be able to engineer ourselves out of all of these problems?

Engineering is what got us into this problem. Foolish to hope it can get us out.

Re: Birds Are Vanishing from North America

#45

Post by dec0dedab0de » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 7:20 PM UTC

bsmitty5000 wrote: post #2

This article doesn't mention the declining insect population at all but I would think it's clear that a quickly declining food source would be a major cause of population decline. I wonder if there's a similar decline in other animals that rely on insects, eg bats. Although, interestingly, the article does mention neonicotinoids as a direct reason for the decline in population. It's hard to imagine humans taking the…

...we die out and the planet recovers on its own.

I like to think that the point of humanity is to destroy as many genetic lines as possible, before going extinct ourselves. A trial by fire that weeds out all but the most resilient. Eventually evolving into new, even better intelligence.

Re: Birds Are Vanishing from North America

#46

Post by chrisbro » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 7:20 PM UTC

jsonmez wrote: post #31

LOL NY Times... LOL, sure, sure guys I believe you now...

Could always just read the underlying study, but I'm guessing you don't care too much about what it's saying, just who's saying it? https://www.birds.cornell.edu/home/wp-content/uploads/2019/0...

Re: Birds Are Vanishing from North America

#47

Post by pvaldes » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 7:20 PM UTC

fjabre wrote: post #4

Anytime someone brings up Monsanto they are downvoted because without pesticides humans cannot feed themselves apparently. And herbicides are for plants only so of course they have no effect on insects. /s

> herbicides are for plants only so of course they have no effect on insects

Is pretty obvious that herbicides kill insects indirectly. They are killing its sources of food (wildflowers and weeds). They have a deep impact over insects.

Re: Birds Are Vanishing from North America

#48

Post by amatecha » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 7:21 PM UTC

technothrasher wrote: post #16

bsmitty5000 wrote: post #2

This article doesn't mention the declining insect population at all but I would think it's clear that a quickly declining food source would be a major cause of population decline. I wonder if there's a similar decline in other animals that rely on insects, eg bats. Although, interestingly, the article does mention neonicotinoids as a direct reason for the decline in population. It's hard to imagine humans taking the…

> or we die out and the planet recovers on its own. That makes it sound like there's some kind of natural 'ideal state' for the planet to recover to. Without us, the planet would just go on changing, without anything to judge the current environment at any point as good or bad to any particular standard. Saving the environment is simply saving ourselves. Nothing more, nothing less.

I would never use the phrase "ideal state", but rather "natural state". Though, even that is not quite accurate as humans are naturally-occurring too, but the things we do (and do to the planet) are not quite so "natural".

While thinking that "the planet is worse off because of humans" is a judgement, I think it's not unreasonable to assert that innocent life forms all over the world suffer by our actions (more than they probably would have if we weren't here), and they are powerless to prevent that. I think this is what people are intuitively feeling a sense of when they say things like "or we die out and the planet recovers on its own".

Re: Birds Are Vanishing from North America

#49

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 7:21 PM UTC

spodek wrote: post #5

We're swimming in environmental problems. We can come up with makeshift solutions to many, but for solving them all, and not to suggest it's the only solution, but a part of anything comprehensive, is there any environmental problem that a smaller human population doesn't alleviate?

[deleted]

Re: Birds Are Vanishing from North America

#50

Post by SolaceQuantum » Thu, Sep 19, 2019, 7:23 PM UTC

bsmitty5000 wrote: post #2

This article doesn't mention the declining insect population at all but I would think it's clear that a quickly declining food source would be a major cause of population decline. I wonder if there's a similar decline in other animals that rely on insects, eg bats. Although, interestingly, the article does mention neonicotinoids as a direct reason for the decline in population. It's hard to imagine humans taking the…

"I wonder if there's a similar decline in other animals that rely on insects, eg bats"

Bats have had a massive population dip in several areas in the americas, up to and including to the point where places bats hibernate to have been forbidden in an effort to stop the spread of a fungus ('White Nose Syndrome') that causes the bat to wake during hibernation, speeding its metabolism and causing it to starve itself. Several species have gone from common to endangered/critically endangered because of this. There's ongoing research as to how bats became more vulnerable to this existant disease- is it higher temps? Toxins?