Why should we protect animals?

Protecting wild animals is to protect ecology, but also to protect human beings. So we should protect animals (wild animals).

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The meaning of species

If protecting individuals is the means, should protecting species and protecting the earth's ecology be the ultimate goal?

But in fact, these two propositions are very suspicious. Although species have a long life span, they will disappear sooner or later. The average life span of each new generation of mammals is only several million years. At least 99.9% species in the history of the earth have become extinct, and most of them have nothing to do with human beings.

As for "protecting the earth", the problem is even bigger. In fact, no species is "indispensable". Some species will be replaced immediately after they disappear, others will spread to other species, and only a few species may cause large-scale collapse of the ecosystem once they are extinct. However, the collapse is not the end of the world. Tens of millions of years later, everything will start all over again. The earth is very fragile, and it is easy to be beaten black and blue. For example, the P/T extinction event that occurred about 250 million years ago killed about 96% of the species in the ocean. But the earth is tenacious, and no matter how bad it is, it can recover. After P/T, 6.5438+million years passed, and the species diversity exceeded the pre-extinction level.

A similar situation has happened many times. A bit like a tumbler, it shakes when pushed, but it won't fall; In the words of ecology, it is "on the geological time scale, the stability of the overall ecosystem of the earth is very weak, but resilience stability is very strong." Frankly speaking, as long as the structure of the solar system remains unchanged, I can't imagine any way to make life on earth irreversible; Even a nuclear bomb cannot guarantee the destruction of all invertebrates.

So what do we emphasize on maintaining the ecosystem map every day? It's like a person who fell countless times while growing up, and will fall countless times in the future. Why does he insist on stopping this now?

Quite simply, the earth can withstand the collapse of the ecosystem, but humans can't. Although the earth is restored as a whole every time, there are countless species buried with it. Don't say that the ecosystem has collapsed, and the fragile human economic system can't cope with the sea level rising by tens of centimeters, which makes the sea level change in the history of the earth reach several hundred meters.

From this, it seems that we can draw a conclusion: we protect the ecology, not for the earth as advertised in the slogan, but for ourselves. Actually, the earth doesn't care how noisy we are. It has enough time to recover. But we can't wait. Even if human beings are not directly buried in the disaster, when the earth recovers, human beings will cease to exist.

If we don't consider the factor of "protecting ourselves", the motivation to protect other wild animals seems to be insufficient. The killing of human beings directly or indirectly led to the extinction of mammoths. Should mankind be blamed for this [2]? But if this is human's fault, whose fault is the extinction of trilobites? Should bony fish be asked to consider the feelings and survival rights of trilobites [3] Whose fault was it that dinosaurs died out because they couldn't stand the impact of asteroids? Dinosaurs themselves or asteroids? One creature can't adapt to asteroid impact, and another creature can't adapt to human appearance. What is the essential difference between the two?

In the view of an alien intelligence, it may be like this: if humans kill all mammoths, it is because mammoths lack the adaptability of cockroaches. If human beings destroy themselves by killing creatures indiscriminately, it is that human beings are too stupid and deserve bad luck. If human beings can continue by protecting other species, it is very smart and far-sighted; But this is not an inevitable result, it is not taken for granted, and it is not moral.

But I am a human being, so I very, very much hope that mankind will take the last road.

The meaning of protection

However, it is really too difficult to judge whether a species exists or not from the value of human beings. After all, our understanding of the world is still very shallow. When it is difficult to discuss in detail, we turn to abstraction. With this common thinking habit, many times we will say: animal protection is not only for the survival of the species itself, but also for conforming to (an elusive) natural law; Violating the laws of nature will have bad consequences, and it should be like this. ...

This paper does not discuss the fallacy of naturalism, but only talks about equating "protection" with "conforming to nature".

Adapting to nature sounds beautiful, but it can't be implemented in practice-the extinction of nature has always existed, including the extinction of great disasters and the extinction of peacetime. So, what if a species that should have been extinct is forcibly rescued? Does this process harm the interests of other species that should be prosperous? There are conflicts of interest between animals. For example, the prosperity of stray cats usually brings serious harm to wild birds. For better or worse, this is obviously a serious "interference" with nature.

So don't disturb them and let them go extinct, okay? The question comes again-who should be extinct? If you don't act, there will be other human activities; The impact of these activity can never be completely offset. The status of giant pandas has not been disputed so far. Their ability to live in wild natural habitats is extremely strong, and no one needs to worry at all. The real problem is that the habitat itself has suffered serious man-made damage. However, habitats will change due to climate change. If human civilization had never existed, would giant pandas be in danger because of the natural climate cycle? Without humans, when will they run out of gasoline? Will there be new species before extinction? Nobody knows.

Therefore, the actual principle of wildlife protection is actually one sentence: "try to maintain the status quo" (including "returning to the previous status quo"). Because this is in the best interests of mankind and the environment remains unchanged, we can develop culture and economy steadily. Does this interrupt a mysterious "natural process"?

If "nature" is defined as everything except human beings, then every behavior of human beings is "interference". Considering that human beings are just a twig on the giant tree of evolution, is it the most fundamental anthropocentrism to separate "human" from "nature" for no reason?

Actual protection

But in reality, the biggest dilemma of wildlife protection is not environmental ethics, but the lack of resources without exception. If the limited funds are equally distributed to various species like Chili noodles, it is likely that nothing will be achieved; The cruel reality forces wild animals to be divided into different grades, and we will give priority to those wild animals with low cost and great significance.

Ecological cornerstone species are definitely more worthy of our efforts. Therefore, there are two exclusive concepts in conservation biology: umbrella species and flagship species.

The so-called "umbrella species" may not have much ecological status, but the living environment they need can cover many other species; As long as someone pays to protect it, they can jointly protect many other species. Of course, such a good deal cannot be let go. Establishing animal reserves around umbrella species has always been an important direction of wildlife protection.

"Flagship species" can even relax the requirements for living environment. Strictly speaking, there is only one basic standard: it can sell cute, attract people's attention and attract donations. It would be better if the standards of umbrella were met at the same time; If there are national symbols, national characteristics and so on, it will be almost perfect. As a result, the giant panda has become the most perfect flagship species so far (WWF takes it as a logo for no reason): it is strange enough, rare enough (as an EN level, it has qualified, although many species are even rarer than it), invincible, relatively easy to keep in captivity, and also qualified for the role of an umbrella.

People often question why they spend so much money to protect giant pandas. Indeed, the giant panda has received relatively more attention, but the propaganda significance of the giant panda itself and its significance to the overall ecological protection of Sichuan and Yunnan do exist. It is impossible to save everyone, but we should always strive to win more people and save more species. This is an objective situation. Only certain species can be given priority and resources can be concentrated in meaningful areas.

Therefore, the discussion on the significance of the first three parts is not empty talk, and we should choose the arrangement of resources accordingly. Some conservationists are so fascinated by the individual animals, the illusory "interests of all animals" or "laws of nature" that they do their best to cheer for some creatures that are not actually endangered. I can't say that they must be wrong, but I can only remind them that these resources could have been used in more valuable areas.