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Female African elephants are evolving without tusks due to ivory poaching

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Re: Female African elephants are evolving without tusks due to ivory poaching

#11

Post by mpfundstein »

bogwog wrote: post #6

> Researchers found the number of tuskless female elephants in Mozambique increased by almost double over 30 years. This overlaps with a period of civil conflict, where armed forces slaughtered 90% of the elephant population to produce ivory. This ivory went on to finance the conflict. People suck.

nice generalisation. i for once never thought even remotely about slaughtering a freaking elephant in order to get the tusks. yes lots of people are bad and do bad things , but that does not mean that all people suck.

Re: Female African elephants are evolving without tusks due to ivory poaching

#12

Post by jsnell »

In case anyone is wondering about the size of the effect, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/wildlife-... has the numbers. Before the war, 2-4% of female elephants were tuskless. Now 32% of newly born ones are.

So it's a significant change, but it's not like this property was coming out of nowhere. It started off about as common as humans having green eyes.

Re: Female African elephants are evolving without tusks due to ivory poaching

#13

Post by aaaaaaaaaaab »

nyc111 wrote: post #5

In the Science article they wrote, “Poaching resulted in strong selection that favored tusklessness amid a rapid population decline.” And, “Whole-genome scans implicated two candidate genes with known roles in mammalian tooth development (AMELX and MEP1a), including the formation of enamel, dentin, cementum, and the periodontium.” So, there was a change in the genes, but how do they connect this fact with poaching? I…

Random mutations happen all the time. If there’s selection pressure that favors a given mutation, it will proliferate.

Re: Female African elephants are evolving without tusks due to ivory poaching

#14

Post by officialjunk »

gpt5 wrote: post #2

While sad as a whole, the responsiveness of evolution is beautiful in this case. It also demonstrates that human efforts to stop poaching have not been successful (otherwise this evolution wouldn’t happen), but luckily, nature responds.

but the tusks had a purpose to defend and now they are defenseless.

Re: Female African elephants are evolving without tusks due to ivory poaching

#15

Post by Ansil849 »

For people who are not from the region but are criticizing poaching...maybe you should make sure your own house is clean before throwing stones at others. How many people critiquing this have industrial animal farms in their country, for example?

And just to be clear: I don't mean that vile acts like poaching shouldn't be criticized, I more find the hypocrisy extremely grating, especially when it comes from meat eaters.

And ah yes, the downvotes. Sorry, but if you eat animals and yet critique poaching, then you are a hypocrite who does not give a fuck about animal welfare (because if you did, you wouldn't kill them).

Re: Female African elephants are evolving without tusks due to ivory poaching

#16

Post by estaseuropano »

tombert wrote: post #8

Honest question from someone who knows virtually nothing about chemistry or material science: is there a difference in quality between synthetic and natural ivory? If not, why is poaching even still a viable market?

Superstition. Elephants and tigers are not hunted for inherent qualities of their bodies, but for the belief that consumption of their parts in various ways helps health/virility/...

Re: Female African elephants are evolving without tusks due to ivory poaching

#17

Post by BitwiseFool »

tombert wrote: post #8

Honest question from someone who knows virtually nothing about chemistry or material science: is there a difference in quality between synthetic and natural ivory? If not, why is poaching even still a viable market?

Ultimately, a good number of people will want "the real thing", even if it is virtually identical. There are plenty of people who think lab grown diamonds are illegitimate, despite having the exact same chemical composition as mined diamonds. For the rich and powerful, the Ivory is more important as a status symbol than anything else. Synthetic Ivory is effectively useless as a signal.

Plus, there are people out there who sincerely believe that Ivory works as an ingredient in medicine and they will seek it out.

Re: Female African elephants are evolving without tusks due to ivory poaching

#18

Post by bussierem »

tombert wrote: post #8

Honest question from someone who knows virtually nothing about chemistry or material science: is there a difference in quality between synthetic and natural ivory? If not, why is poaching even still a viable market?

Unfortunately (even ignoring chemistry/matsci), one of the answers to that is simply "natural ivory is becoming a scarce resource". When something is scarce, it becomes sought after, which can result in it even becoming a Veblen Good[1] over time.

[1] https://www.investopedia.com/terms/v/veblen-good.asp

Re: Female African elephants are evolving without tusks due to ivory poaching

#19

Post by asdff »

gpt5 wrote: post #2

While sad as a whole, the responsiveness of evolution is beautiful in this case. It also demonstrates that human efforts to stop poaching have not been successful (otherwise this evolution wouldn’t happen), but luckily, nature responds.

Its important to realize what this "response" actually is. Nature isn't actively doing anything. You have 100 elephants, maybe 5 are typically born without tusks. Suddenly you kill the other 95 for their tusks, leaving behind those 5 to survive and reproduce and next generation, 33 of your 100 elephants are without tusks or something like that. Over time, humans are acting as a predator in the environment, driving a selective pressure that reduces the fitness of the tusk trait relative to the no tusk trait

Re: Female African elephants are evolving without tusks due to ivory poaching

#20

Post by geoffmanning »

nyc111 wrote: post #5

In the Science article they wrote, “Poaching resulted in strong selection that favored tusklessness amid a rapid population decline.” And, “Whole-genome scans implicated two candidate genes with known roles in mammalian tooth development (AMELX and MEP1a), including the formation of enamel, dentin, cementum, and the periodontium.” So, there was a change in the genes, but how do they connect this fact with poaching? I…

Surely? I wouldn't discount the power of intention when applied to the all too common occurrence of deep emotional stress of experiencing the loss of your family in such a violent display.
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