The last HN thread about wolves turned into a flamewar between wolf fans and realists.
We need the wolf
11–20 of 93 posts
Re: We need the wolf
#12We should rewild 50% of the world and ban humans from entering without a permit. Permits should only be given to those with legitimate professional requirements.
Luckily, most of the globe is still wild. We have barely started colonizing the oceans after all.
It would be interesting to rewild much of the land mass as well. However, politics is often against that. Eg see those heartfelt efforts to rescue dying towns in the Appalachians or the Great Plains in the US. Or the general subsidies for suburban / exurban living (like eg the whole structure of USPS).
Re: We need the wolf
#13We should rewild 50% of the world and ban humans from entering without a permit. Permits should only be given to those with legitimate professional requirements.
Not that I disagree with the sentiment, but curious to know if you have thought how, practically, you'd enforce something like this?
Re: We need the wolf
#14We should rewild 50% of the world and ban humans from entering without a permit. Permits should only be given to those with legitimate professional requirements.
Luckily, most of the globe is still wild. We have barely started colonizing the oceans after all. It would be interesting to rewild much of the land mass as well. However, politics is often against that. Eg see those heartfelt efforts to rescue dying towns in the Appalachians or the Great Plains in the US. Or the general subsidies for suburban / exurban living (like eg the whole structure of USPS).
We have colonized the oceans. Large trawler fleets are fishing many species to the brink of collapse.
Re: We need the wolf
#15thought it was something about Pulp Fiction ^^
Re: We need the wolf
#16I started reading this article, got about four paragraphs in and realized it was really fluffy and extremely long and then stopped. Concision is extremely undervalued. If anyone was braver than I and has a TLDR, I and other readers would love to hear it.
Re: We need the wolf
#17> Perhaps predators are needed to bring nature back into balance. I don't really think this theme was sustained through the article, but it just starts off in the wrong spot. Nature isn't balanced in any meaningful sense. It lurches from one equilibrium to another in a haphazard way [0]. Equilibriums only appear because all the many unequilibriums die out, so by evolution everything rapidly reaches equilibrium. Also…
The equilibrium with lower biodiversity is more fragile and less beneficial for us[0]. Having said that, we are _not_ nature . We make conscious decisions and so we should hold ourselves in a higher standard (both from a practical and moral perspective). [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodiversity#Human_health Re-reading my comment I realize it sounds like low-key creationism BS which was not my intention.
Yes to your link, no to “humans / conscious decision-making are not nature.” Moreover, morality is itself a naturally emergent phenomenon of evolution. Charles Darwin even proposed this, and we have found it to hold true again and again.
Re: We need the wolf
#18We should rewild 50% of the world and ban humans from entering without a permit. Permits should only be given to those with legitimate professional requirements.
Luckily, most of the globe is still wild. We have barely started colonizing the oceans after all. It would be interesting to rewild much of the land mass as well. However, politics is often against that. Eg see those heartfelt efforts to rescue dying towns in the Appalachians or the Great Plains in the US. Or the general subsidies for suburban / exurban living (like eg the whole structure of USPS).
Rewild means no evidence of human activity... including our trash
Re: We need the wolf
#19We should rewild 50% of the world and ban humans from entering without a permit. Permits should only be given to those with legitimate professional requirements.
Not that I disagree with the sentiment, but curious to know if you have thought how, practically, you'd enforce something like this?
Urban densification including urban farming in skyscrapers. Desalination would need to go mainstream too. Of course many will be upset they can't live in a pile on 4 acres. I also have little confidence this would be a popular move given the outrageous individualist fundamentalism we've managed to create in society but I am convinced it is essential to avoiding systemic collapse.
Re: We need the wolf
#20> Perhaps predators are needed to bring nature back into balance. I don't really think this theme was sustained through the article, but it just starts off in the wrong spot. Nature isn't balanced in any meaningful sense. It lurches from one equilibrium to another in a haphazard way [0]. Equilibriums only appear because all the many unequilibriums die out, so by evolution everything rapidly reaches equilibrium. Also…
The equilibrium with lower biodiversity is more fragile and less beneficial for us[0]. Having said that, we are _not_ nature . We make conscious decisions and so we should hold ourselves in a higher standard (both from a practical and moral perspective). [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodiversity#Human_health Re-reading my comment I realize it sounds like low-key creationism BS which was not my intention.
Humans certainly are nature. In a very real sense, every part of us is "natural", and we are emergent properties of the natural world. Figs do not grow on thistles.