future ideology

[lairdb]

MantaRey once bubbled...
whoa whoa whoa..way off on that one. sharks have not failed to evolve, they haven't changed for over 200 million years because they are ultra efficient, the best senses on almost any animal. in evolutionary terms: they're perfect. like dolphins and perhaps surpassing them: they have problem solving and anticipation intelligence. the hightest type of intel for any animal.

they just didn't evolve to protect themselves against harpoons and powerheads. humans use technology, they cheat. jump in the water and try to claw one to death, oh wait we evolved out our claws because we have to use something else...how about biting them to death, oh yeah no more canines either. lol.

and it's not just the asians doing the killing. really the best way to help protect animals is to try to buy only domesticated and farmed animals. if you like fish: trout, cod, and salmon are farmed. just check the label. by taking out their food source, you're helping them starve to death.

thanks for the input, looks like we all agree that people will become more earth conscience. hopefully it's not too late.

Well... I really was just popping off about a serious subject... but as long as we're at it:

"Efficient" is situational. Sharks have been very efficient, one of the most efficient in theri environment. They're not any more [insert "bwa-ha-ha" manifest destiny type evil laugh]; intelligence represents a substantial efficiency edge.

(Before anyone proposes the "let's stick hungry-you and hungry-shark in a tank and see who wins" experiment, remember that this is evolutionary biology, and must deal with populations. The better experiment would be 1 billion hungry tool using humans and 1 billion hungry sharks. My money's on the apes-with-sticks.)

(This is all without getting into... (Haldane? Morse? Can't remember)'s explanation of why extraneous traits don't dissapear evolutionarily: that it's not about being most-efficient, but about being least-inefficient.)

--Laird

 

[Phish-phood]

I am scared to see the way our environment is going - not just the seas and oceans but the land aswell.

We humans think that we have evolved to a point where we are superior to every other being on this planet but lets just stop and look at where that so called intelligence and superiority has gotten us.

There is a very good article in a recent Scientific American about how we are now fishing down the food chain because of overfishing mainly due to our own superior technology which allows us to build these massive trawlers which take everything.

We have eradicated one of the Worlds biggest viral killers in Smallpox, yeah us but has anyone ever stopped to think that we don't actually know for sure where the virus orginated from and whats to stop it coming back. Plus as a biological weapon it has amazing capacity now that we have an almost entirely naive world population it would sweep accross the world with devestating effects.

How many times have we seen people think they can control the forces of nature and harness it's power only to be in devestation a generation down the line because it didn't work. Look at the Aral sea region in Kazakhstan, villages that once were fishing villages are now miles from any sea because it has dried up due to damning the rivvers which supply it. It is on a fast track towards becoming a dead sea due to the saline content as a direct result of the actions of humans.

Nature is about survuval of the fittest but it is a very fine balance and well survival of the fittest can only be ensured if there is something to survive on and the way we superior humans are going there will be nothing left for us to survive on!

Rant over

 

[saying]

Phish-phood once bubbled...
Nature is about survuval of the fittest but it is a very fine balance and well survival of the fittest can only be ensured if there is something to survive on and the way we superior humans are going there will be nothing left for us to survive on!

I am, actually, quite heartened every time I hear about global warming, overfishing, strip mining, clear cutting, etc. etc. etc. by the thought that we will, one day soon I think, breed ourselves right into extinction.

Yes, we are destroying the world... our world. But the Earth will live on, strugging off all memories of human existance in time, and the biodiversity that has thrived here for a couple of billion years will continue, just in a slightly different direction.

 

[DrSteve]

I had a friend who was a professional fisherman - had his own boat on the SE coast of England. Here are some quotes:
1. We need quotas
2. We can never overfish the sea, we don't need quotas
3. You should see the cod I pull out with tumours all over them
4. Nah polution is no problem, cod are prone to tumours

Not quite sure what planet he is on. For my part I've never been in a position to catch anything but if I do I'll eat what I take, and if it can't be eaten I won't take it.

 

[TX65]

In Houston and other Texas cities, we have a grocery store called Whole Foods that sells organic, enviromentaly light this and that. You probably have similar ones in your city. A lot of "green" people shop there, but here is how out of touch they can be.

Go into the seafood department and you will see Marlin, Shark, Swordfish all laid out for the environmentaly aware to buy. First time I saw this, I wrote out a comment card telling them to stop selling Marlin which has no value to eat other then being trendy.

People's choice of what they want to eat is a major contributor to the problems of overfishing. Lets face it, go into an upper end restaurant and what do you see on the menu.. Swordfish, Mahi Mahi, Tuna Steaks and Salmon. Of course, people want the wild salmon, not farm raised.

I dont know if you remember the blackened redfish craze 15 or so years ago. That craze of trendiness nearly wiped out the redfish population in the Gulf of Mexico. Fortunately, Texas declared the redfish a game fish and now all you see on a menu is farm raised.

If you look at the most popular seafood- Shrimp, you will see things gone amuck. Yes, there are now Shrimp farms, but you still see the boats netting a fundamental foodsource for young fish. As bad as it is to take the top of the chain, taking the bottom of chain affects the entire chain. Used to be you could get shrimp as big as a bratwurt,now what restraurants sell is barely worthy of being bait.

A major step in helping marine life is to ask yourself some simple questions

1. Is what I am about to eat a prolific fish (fast breeder and growth rate)?

2. Is what I am about to eat captured with minimal bycatch?

3. Maybe the final question would be to ask yourself, can I find something tasty that is farm raised?

Lets see, we now have redfish, shrimp, salmon, catfish, crawfish, tiliapi and probably many more that are available farm raised. I have also heard of experiments to farm raise lobster, but they still are trying to figure out how to keep them from eating eachother.

Personally, I will only eat farm raised unless I catch it, grab it or spear it myself. Even then, I only take enough for a dinner or two,,no more.

I am not an enviromentalist, I am a conservationist that takes the time to ask where something comes from and are there reasonable and effective alternatives available. Next step for me, a steel frame house with minimal use of wood - best of all the termites and mold wont eat it.

 

[Longhorn]

Current global population is around 6 billion (I think). The best estimates on how many people the world can support is around 10 billion. That includes transforming the vast majority of space to habitat (ours) and food production. Population growth is still on the rise and may approach the magic 10 billion mark. If you think we have environmental issues now, wait 100 years.

On the bright side, raptor populations were decimated in the 70’s. Bans on harmful pesticides and others chemicals have allowed those populations to rebound. Now that the problem with fish populations has been identified, there may be solutions forthcoming. Let’s hope.

http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/science/07/17/coolsc.coral/index.html

 

[lairdb]

Longhorn once bubbled...
Current global population is around 6 billion (I think). The best estimates on how many people the world can support is around 10 billion. That includes transforming the vast majority of space to habitat (ours) and food production. Population growth is still on the rise and may approach the magic 10 billion mark. If you think we have environmental issues now, wait 100 years.

On the bright side, raptor populations were decimated in the 70’s. Bans on harmful pesticides and others chemicals have allowed those populations to rebound. Now that the problem with fish populations has been identified, there may be solutions forthcoming. Let’s hope.

http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/science/07/17/coolsc.coral/index.html

(Oy, not Erlich et al. again. Aren't those myths dead yet?)

Global land devoted to food production has declined 7% since 1980, while food production from that land has increased 20%. That's globally; focusing solely on the U.S. (as a representative industrialized nation), land devoted to food production has been roughly level since 1910, while food produced from that land has grown by over 400%. Better productivity, aided by better understanding and better technology.

Not that food production is likely to be a problem; population growth rates fall dramatically as societies become less agriculturally focused; even the alarmist organizations project world population stabilizing at about 12.5 billion around 2150; to feed that population food production capacity needs to grow only 1.6% per year, notably less than the rate of increase every year for the past 30.

Generally accepted projections indicate that if the population were to focus on sustainable food production as a meaningful challenge, about 1/8th of the Earth's land mass would support 40 billion people.

If you're interested, there's a geat article on all this (from which I cribbed most of my statistics above) in Regulation, volume 17 issue 1. Other sources: World Bank, Worldwatch, Freedom House, U.S. Census Bureau, CIA World Factbook.

--Laird

(If you're desperate to worry about *something*, IMO the top two species-threatening events are a successful virus or an Earth-impacting object larger than 10E4 km diameter.)

 

[Longhorn]

Excellent points. The 400% increase in farming productivity is part of the problem facing marine ecosystems. Nitrogen used to be a limiting nutrient. The widespread use of fertilizer used to achieve the 400% increase in agricultural productivity has changed that. Nitrogen is no longer a limiting nutrient. Current farming practices have changed, globally, the fundamental natural system. An ironic point is, the biggest cash crop in many areas is grass (and not the good smoking kind). Here in Texas I think the largest used of fertilizer and water goes to cultivating St. Augustine grass on folks front yards.

Nutrient runoff feeding algal blooms, waste water and sediment runoff have had a negative impact on near shore environments. Added to this, the near shore environments are currently the fastest growing. Add these two together and it’s no wonder the coral reefs, and other environments, are getting hammered.

P.S. This is all off the top of my head and some of the facts may be wrong. But I think they are all basically correct.

 

[lairdb]

Longhorn once bubbled...
Excellent points. The 400% increase in farming productivity is part of the problem facing marine ecosystems. Nitrogen used to be a limiting nutrient. The widespread use of fertilizer used to achieve the 400% increase in agricultural productivity has changed that. Nitrogen is no longer a limiting nutrient. Current farming practices have changed, globally, the fundamental natural system. An ironic point is, the biggest cash crop in many areas is grass (and not the good smoking kind). Here in Texas I think the largest used of fertilizer and water goes to cultivating St. Augustine grass on folks front yards.

Nutrient runoff feeding algal blooms, waste water and sediment runoff have had a negative impact on near shore environments. Added to this, the near shore environments are currently the fastest growing. Add these two together and it’s no wonder the coral reefs, and other environments, are getting hammered.

P.S. This is all off the top of my head and some of the facts may be wrong. But I think they are all basically correct.

Good remarks. Just to be an iconoclast, though: your use of the phrase "negative impacts" -- impacts certainly, but some question if they're negative.

Negative to sightseeing divers? Sure. On the other hand, the algae population is way up. Maybe that's a good thing. Algae is more likely edible and farmable than coral. Hmmm.

--Laird

 

[DrSteve]

And it also tastes better than dead people