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Washington crews destroy first U.S. “murder hornet” nest

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Re: Washington crews destroy first U.S. “murder hornet” nest

#341

Post by ganafagol »

rurp wrote: post #309
api wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is very fault tolerant over evolutionary and geologic time scales. The question is what the very short term effects might be and how it may impact us. As George Carlin said, we need to stop framing these issues as “saving the Earth.” The Earth will be fine. This is about saving ourselves. Same goes for climate change. The Earth has been very warm in the past, even ice free. The Earth will be fine. The question is…

I've always thought of "saving the earth" as referring to the millions of intelligent and sensitive non-human lifeforms that we are currently obliterating. But I agree, the earth will continue to have life regardless of what humans do, it just won't include anything we currently know and cherish at the rate we're going.

I for my part also care about the thousands of species that are going extinct because of our behavior. I don't care tht much about the human species. It's our fault, we deserve to suffer. But the polar bear does not.

Re: Washington crews destroy first U.S. “murder hornet” nest

#342

Post by ganafagol »

tzs wrote: post #242
honkycat wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The classic example is the reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone: https://sites.tufts.edu/tuftsgetsgreen/2018/02/27/wolves-cha...

Wolves in Yellowstone are a "keystone species" [1]. A year ago, there was a fascinating episode of "Nature" on PBS about keystone species. It's available for free online streaming here [2]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keystone_species [2] https://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/the-serengeti-rules-41dfru/2...

The sad thing with this "keystone species" concept is that people see it as "oh but this weird insect that's about to go extinct in south-east asia is not a keystone species, so whatever."

Re: Washington crews destroy first U.S. “murder hornet” nest

#343

Post by ganafagol »

BurningFrog wrote: post #227
vinbreau wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me of an old adage I heard in high school: If you take the frogs out of the environment, you don't have the same environment minus frogs, you have an entirely new ecosystem.

True, but it's also good to remember that the new system isn't "worse" or "better" than the old one. A lot of people seem to think that if you "destroy" an ecosystem it is a step toward a lifeless environment.

In the short term it's reducing the diversity of the ecosystem, yes. And the effect of that tends to pull in quite a bunch of effects that contribute to that effect even more. Only in the long run will there be more diversity again. But by that time we'll all sit in Musk Kingdom on Mars with oxygen masks and radiation suits and legends of ancestors who used to know what a summer breeze at a lake felt like, cause we succeeded to colonize another planet and that was totally worth it!!!11

Re: Washington crews destroy first U.S. “murder hornet” nest

#344

Post by ganafagol »

bmitc wrote: post #325
Sebb767 wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But what is "heal"? There's no such thing as the "right" or "fine" ecosystem. In 100 years, I'm nearly 100% certain that this planet will still exist and something will live on it. His point was that we're killing ourself. An ecosystem and a planet will continue existing, the question is whether humans will exist on it.

I think an appropriate definition of the right ecosystem is the one that would be here without the vast narcissism of humans. Yes, humans are animals, but we have broken out of the natural balance of things and relished in that fact by destroying everything in our wake in the name of so-called progress. I think it’s similar to how we view viruses.

I agree, but when dealing with a narcissist, the only way to make progress may be to play to their narcissism. If that's what it takes, sure, let's do it and pretend that we need to live sustainable livestyles to save humanity.

Re: Washington crews destroy first U.S. “murder hornet” nest

#345

Post by ardy42 »

coliveira wrote: post #183
mhh__ wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As opposed to the Communists draining the Aral sea? It's not about socialism or capitalism here, scarce resources and humans need regulation

Why you assume that non-capitalism is the same as communism? Capitalist ideology and communism are extremes, in my opinion there is a healthy balance between them.

> Why you assume that non-capitalism is the same as communism?

Free market propaganda often sets up a black/white dichotomy between capitalism and communism/central planning, then uses the failures of regimes like the Soviet Union to attempt to train readers to think that any deviation from capitalism will lead to similar disasters.

Re: Washington crews destroy first U.S. “murder hornet” nest

#346

Post by ganafagol »

maxerickson wrote: post #264
HarryHirsch wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's clear you are mixing up vanilla and most every kind of fruit tree. One is a high-value, low-volume speciality crop, the other is the exact opposite. Pollinating a cherry orchard! Dude, you go first!

I'm not saying it would be a good situation to end up in, I'm saying it is economically viable (so we'd still have fruit). Hand pollination of apples is already sometimes done in China.

Dude you need to look up the definition of "economically viable".

You seem to be speaking from an unquantifiably elevated position of privilege.

Re: Washington crews destroy first U.S. “murder hornet” nest

#347

Post by toper-centage »

honkycat wrote: post #156

I always find the anti-environmentalist position that pops up on HN interesting. For a technical audience, they are amazingly unaware of "Systems Thinking". Saying "MEH, there are other pollinators" is lazy thinking. Our ecosystem is a vast web of interconnections. You cannot predict how one HUGELY important species being destroyed will affect the rest of our ecosystem. Furthermore: People use honey bees for honey (…

Nature is full of pollinators. The reason we need to carry around bees to pollinate crops is because we have dedicated vast areas to monocultures where no insect diversity can be established. They become diversity deserts. So a known and tried solution: mixed crops, crop rotation, and insect oasis. We keep paying in environmental health so our food is cheaper and easier to produce. That needs to end.

Re: Washington crews destroy first U.S. “murder hornet” nest

#348

Post by boudin »

honkycat wrote: post #156

I always find the anti-environmentalist position that pops up on HN interesting. For a technical audience, they are amazingly unaware of "Systems Thinking". Saying "MEH, there are other pollinators" is lazy thinking. Our ecosystem is a vast web of interconnections. You cannot predict how one HUGELY important species being destroyed will affect the rest of our ecosystem. Furthermore: People use honey bees for honey (…

Just to add on this, pollinators cannot replace each others. Some plants can only be pollinated by specific species, like red clover and bumblebees in the uk.

Re: Washington crews destroy first U.S. “murder hornet” nest

#349

Post by raducu »

dmix wrote: post #312
hinkley wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honey bees are naturalized here. They are part of the ecosystem, for better or worse. Insect populations have adapted around them. Taking them away now would be a disruption, especially if it were not planned out. For instance, if you were trying to reestablish some some native pollinator, reducing honey bee pressure might be part of that plan. Even possible a critical one. But just killing them and walking away? Tha…

Purely from an economic and argicuktural perspective, is there a way for us to simply raise honey bees in more of a ‘bubble’ that is somehow protected from the giant wasps? I’d imagine from what I’ve read that a significant chunk of bees are already artificially produced and distributed for crops. That plus of course combined with a general ongoing attempt at eradication of the hornets. Or at least significant popula…

Hives are already a protective bubble, if the bees could make it more secure, they would.

We could make lasers driven by ML to identify the hornets and shoot them down as they approach a hive, but that would be really expensive :)

Re: Washington crews destroy first U.S. “murder hornet” nest

#350

Post by copperx »

ganafagol wrote: post #341
rurp wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always thought of "saving the earth" as referring to the millions of intelligent and sensitive non-human lifeforms that we are currently obliterating. But I agree, the earth will continue to have life regardless of what humans do, it just won't include anything we currently know and cherish at the rate we're going.

I for my part also care about the thousands of species that are going extinct because of our behavior. I don't care tht much about the human species. It's our fault, we deserve to suffer. But the polar bear does not.

I agree. But to have an even small glimmer of hope of changing people's behavior, you need to sell the idea to them like successful companies do. Tell them how THEY're going to benefit.

As we have seen in this pandemic, even selling it like that isn't a recipe for success.

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