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Wildlife is reclaiming Yosemite National Park

latimes.com

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Re: Wildlife is reclaiming Yosemite National Park

#101

Post by Florin_Andrei »

hentrep wrote: post #5

As noted in the article, the headline is misleading. The population obviously hasn't quadrupled since Yosemite closed to visitors on March 20th. It is remarkable though to see how quickly wildlife is willing to re-enter areas that have historically been overrun with humans!

They define "population" as the number of bears living in that area. That could easily quadruple if bears move there from surrounding areas, which is to be expected if humans are out of the equation.

This is no different from the human population of cities - it goes up or down not just due to births and deaths, but also due to individuals moving in or out.

Re: Wildlife is reclaiming Yosemite National Park

#102

Post by Wowfunhappy »

jrockway wrote: post #67
pathseeker wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just advocate for a carbon tax and be done with it. Don't arbitrarily decide which industries get to stay and which ones have to go. You ban air travel and suddenly people cover a big chunk of the difference with mass driving, causing significantly more deaths and increased CO2. (Remember: Southwest's most popular route is Dallas Houston which is drive-able)

A train between Houston and Dallas would be practical: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Central_Railway I think the biggest blocker on high speed rail is being able to get places once you arrive, without a car. The Northeast Corridor works because you can get anywhere in New York, Boston, and DC with public transportation once you arrive. A lot of cities with intercity train service don't really have that option,…

> Sure, you can tax carbon, especially passenger automobiles... but you will cause a much larger recession than Coronavirus as people suddenly can't afford to go to work anymore.

What you do is give the proceeds of the carbon tax back to the populace, as Canada is doing. There may be some hardship, but it should mostly work out—on the whole, the rich create more carbon than the poor, so wealth will be redistributed to the more vulnerable.

That last quality is also likely why conservatives don't like these plans, but until they provide an alternative I don't see what else to do. ("Do nothing because climate change doesn't exist" is not an alternative.)

Re: Wildlife is reclaiming Yosemite National Park

#103

Post by anigbrowl »

iLemming wrote: post #44

How do we know they're not migrating away from fires that are raging now uncontrolled in the valley?

Because we have satellite coverage and people outside the park would be able to see smoke plumes, so if there were huge fires raging we'd know about it.

Re: Wildlife is reclaiming Yosemite National Park

#104

Post by jedberg »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #94
0xB31B1B wrote: post #10

I hope this inspires our generation. I hope we remember that the way things were recently aren’t they way have to be, or the way things naturally are. We need more pollution controls, clean power, and less driving. I also think we need to reduce how many people visit certain places as the harsh reality is that impact is clearly related to visits. It will mean a shared sacrifice but a healthier planet. Hopefully limit…

> We need more pollution controls, clean power, and less driving. I don't know about the less driving part. Less driving implies higher density living and massive reliance on public transport. I think the higher density and massive reliance on public transport have been one of the big reasons why New York City has the highest number of COVID-19 cases in the US and a much higher mortality rate than the rest of the cou…

I think the outbreak in NYC is somewhat cultural. There are asian cities far more dense than NYC, and have much better control of the outbreak. They also have cultural norms that include wearing masks and gloves and more hand washing after using public facilities, and fewer handshakes and touching in general.

Re: Wildlife is reclaiming Yosemite National Park

#105

Post by jshevek »

aklemm wrote: post #36
0xB31B1B wrote: post #10

I hope this inspires our generation. I hope we remember that the way things were recently aren’t they way have to be, or the way things naturally are. We need more pollution controls, clean power, and less driving. I also think we need to reduce how many people visit certain places as the harsh reality is that impact is clearly related to visits. It will mean a shared sacrifice but a healthier planet. Hopefully limit…

Ultimately we need fewer people in order to preserve the natural world. We can start by disincentivizing and de-emphasizing growth.

I wouldn't say we "need" it, but it sure would be helpful.

Re: Wildlife is reclaiming Yosemite National Park

#106

Post by volak »

Fauntleroy wrote: post #99
volak wrote: post #85

A month without humans, bears are moving through survey zones more frequently. The problem highlighted here is our methods for setting up survey zones is terrible and is severely UNDERCOUNTING the population. Even more troubling is systems of surveillance like these provide the inputs for the climate change models we've depended on and which have predicted we'll all be extinct in 50 years. I swear by the end of Covid…

That's an amazing amount of speculation and extrapolation from a tiny data point. How exactly do bear sightings relate to temperature readings?

Sure I'll take a shot at being a modeler -

You take temp readings from various wildlife zones around the world, and calculate how many less bears you see for each degree increase in temperature. Then extrapolate that to humans by a simple equation designed to compare bear survivability to humans.

Obviously the models need to be able to understand how temp readings equate to survivability. Population counts from various sites would obviously fit that need

Re: Wildlife is reclaiming Yosemite National Park

#107

Post by anigbrowl »

bsimpson wrote: post #43

> This month is typically a busy month in Yosemite: Of the almost 4.6 million tourists that visited the valley in 2019, about 308,000 came during April. "This month is typically a busy one: less than 1/12th of the number of annual visitors." ️

People tend not to go camping in winter.

Re: Wildlife is reclaiming Yosemite National Park

#108

Post by baddox »

TheRealPomax wrote: post #84
dang wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you say that the population of a city has doubled, it mostly means that people moved there, not that they were born there. The headline is fine. All: Obviously the bears weren't born in the last month. Please assume basic intelligence in your fellow readers. Edit: Ok you guys, I surrender. There is no fighting the dreaded title fever. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu... .

The population of a city is based on humans, which take 15 to 20 years before they have young. Wildlife typically takes "some crazy short period of time" like a year, and so when we say the population has double, tripled, etc. most people will (reasonably) understand that to mean that's because of reproduction, not because of migration. So if the cause is migration, the headline kind of needs that, as we're talking a…

> most people will (reasonably) understand that to mean that's because of reproduction

Subjective claims are fine, maybe you misunderstood the headline (although by definition anyone complaining about the wording actually didn't misunderstand it). But that's an empirical claim that could be tested. And my suspicions are that almost no one in the target audience would think for one second that the bears have reproduced enough in less than one year to quadruple in population.

Re: Wildlife is reclaiming Yosemite National Park

#109

Post by jrockway »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #102
jrockway wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A train between Houston and Dallas would be practical: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Central_Railway I think the biggest blocker on high speed rail is being able to get places once you arrive, without a car. The Northeast Corridor works because you can get anywhere in New York, Boston, and DC with public transportation once you arrive. A lot of cities with intercity train service don't really have that option,…

> Sure, you can tax carbon, especially passenger automobiles... but you will cause a much larger recession than Coronavirus as people suddenly can't afford to go to work anymore. What you do is give the proceeds of the carbon tax back to the populace, as Canada is doing. There may be some hardship, but it should mostly work out—on the whole, the rich create more carbon than the poor, so wealth will be redistributed t…

I am not sure that works as well as you think it does. People don't live far away from work and commute 2 hours a day because they're rich. They do it because they can't afford to live near their workplace. I can walk to work, but pay $2700 a month in rent. Most people do not have that luxury.

(OK, the Bay Area is different. Well-off people do commute two hours a day because there simply isn't any housing near where they work. I stayed in some corporate apartment in downtown Mountain View once and could bike to the office... but the apartment was going for something like $3500 a month for one bedroom. Just incredible.)

Re: Wildlife is reclaiming Yosemite National Park

#110

Post by tjr225 »

s5300 wrote: post #27
spking wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Me too. This is the reason I absolutely don't want to see airlines or airframe manufacturers bailed out. That industry needs to shrink. If that means fewer flights available and higher prices in the future, that's a net positive for the planet as people will have to be more selective about travel. https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/programs/climate_law_ins...

"If that means fewer flights available and higher prices in the future, that's a net positive for the planet as people will have to be more selective about travel." I've lurked near daily on HN for over five years - and this is the unfortunate comment I finally feel the need to make an account to reply to. I presume you're living in the U.S. based on your comment. I too live in the U.S., with severely debilitating he…

Travel could easily be subsidized for those with a special need such as yourself. The GP is still correct.
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