Ethics of species proctection

[mith]

Should pandas be protected? I think they're an evolutionary dead end. They fail to adapt to changing conditions. Should humans continue preservation efforts?

[2810712]

Is it really that the pandas are unfit to live further without the help of man? Don't they really have zero role in maintaining eco.-balance?
I M really surprised !!!! I think the cause of the reduction in panda population is human activities . If they need our help we shud help them or not depends upon our intention behind doing so - some wud like to save them for the sake of humanity [ mentalbenefits ]
- some wud think of benefits [ physical benefits]
I think , we shud save them.
hrushikesh

[mith]

Well the problem is pandas don't like to reproduce. They don't have large amounts of babies. And their adaptation to eat bamboo is well...limited. It's like the species wants to die.

[2810712]

Do they have role in maintaining ecobalance ? If yes we need to save them.
hrushikesh

[mith]

There's only about 100 of them left, if there's any serious ecobalancing role they play we should have seen it by now.

[2810712]

If they are useless from physical benefit pt. of view then I think , we shud save them
untill they harm us in direct or indirect way .............................. What do U think?
This really requires participation of everybody in this poll ...
hrushikesh

[biostudent84]

Well the problem is pandas don't like to reproduce. They don't have large amounts of babies. And their adaptation to eat bamboo is well...limited. It's like the species wants to die.

Having a specific diet like the pandas do is the result of evolving among a large quantity of this foodstuff. It never was forced to eat anything else, so it evolved the ability to digest the one foodstuff VERY efficiently.

Look at humans, we eat a very diverse diet...yet because of this diversity, our digestive system is very inefficient. Humans can eat as much as 20lbs every week, yet they do not gain 20lbs every week, do they?

[mith]

That's what I mean by dead end. When a creature evolves, in order to survive, we need to take in the consideration of how versatile it would be(i.e. how many redundant functions it can do) vs. how specialized and efficient it is. For the pandas, they threw their whole evolutionary weight against bamboo; yes they are good at eating and digesting, but what now? In contrast look as us humans. We have thrown our bets in favor of larger brains and technology. The reason we succeed is brain power is adaptable to changing conditions. I think that is the reason why we control the world.

[biostudent84]

You're missing the point. In a highly complex ecosystem, low diet diversity is an ADVANTAGE. If you only eat bamboo, and your neighbor only eats leaves, then you're not going to get into fights over food rights. Low diet diversity allows more species to live in the same area than normal.

What humans have done is taken this foodsource away in our effort to "control the world." Humans are causing extinction of many animals in persuit of our own comfort. If it were for survival, then it would be understandable...but building million dollar shopping malls is NOT for survival.

[2810712]

[quote="biostudent84"]You're missing the point. In a highly complex ecosystem, low diet diversity is an ADVANTAGE. If you only eat bamboo, and your neighbor only eats leaves, then you're not going to get into fights over food rights. Low diet diversity allows more species to live in the same area than normal. I also agree with ur this opinion. One may say that the organism able to eat variety of foods will also be able to live on a single type of food in order to avoid the competition, but the efficiency to digest would be lower than those organisms adapted for eating that specefic food only.So, the organisms adapted for eating that specefic food R at advantage as they avoid competition without reduction in the efficiency of food utilization. But , the population of these food specific species willn't be able to increase that much because
1. the capacity of an area to accomodate these organisms is limited
2.and the availablity of the other areas wich fulfil their food requirement is also lower
i.e. the organisms eating diverse foods can live in more places than these food specific organisms . So, even if we wouldn't have cut the bamboo forests , the panda-population wouldn't have increased that much.
So, from this pt. of view the organisms eating diverse foods are at advantage.
What do U think..........

hrushikesh

This is not opinion. It is basic ecology theory. In the Panda's specific niche, it was advantageous for them to only eat one foodstuff...at least until humans messed everything up.

[mith]

I don't know about shopping malls but I heard that the reason for the decline was something related to the bamboo flowering and not producing shoots??

[2810712]

This means that this was due to a natural reason & not due to human activity; how frequent R such changes , if they R frequent then the species like panda R really not at advantage.
But, can we really say that these changes R totally natural ? or these R due to mutations
caused by any pollutants .. .. . if this is true then they may become frequent as pollution continues .. THIS WILL LEAD TO EXTINCTION OF MANY SUCH [ like panda ] SPECIES & DISTURB ECOBALANCE AS NET EFFECT..................[ .in quite far future ]


hrushikesh