Tiger, tiger, dimming fast
“TIGER, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night…”
William Blake’s oft-quoted poem ’The Tiger’ was published in 1789, when the tigers were mysterious and the population was uncounted.
In 1920s a hunt could still kill over 100 tigers a day. BUT NOW TIGERS ARE DISAPPEARING.
The world’s tiger population may have halved in the last 25 years. And at least one of the remaining five sub-species is in danger of becoming extinct, World Wildlife Fund conservation experts said recently. [more]
that’s not all
A third of all amphibians, a fifth of mammals and an eighth of all birds are now threatened with extinction. It is thought 90% of the large predatory fish in the oceans have gone since the beginning of industrial trawling. Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, the most comprehensive audit to date of the health of our planet.
Life on Earth is disappearing faster and faster.
And will continue to do so unless urgent action is taken. There are now 41,415 species on the IUCN Red List and 16,306 of them are threatened with extinction, up from 16,118 last year. The total number of extinct species has reached 785 and a further 65 are only found in captivity or in cultivation.
unimaginable scale
Every 20 minutes, another distinct species of plant or animal becomes extinct.
Not much longer than it takes to read this article!
But this sort of scale of destruction is difficult to imagine. Much easier to empathise with one mammal species on the verge of extinction.
It’s happened before - in geological pre-history - when mass extinctions have greatly reduced the biodiversity. Between 70 to 90 percent of all species disappeared.
mass extinction
Previous mass extinctions have been caused by volcanic eruptions, meteorites colliding with the earth, and a changing climate. After each one, it took more than 10 million years for biological prosperity to recover.
Today, the extinction rate is now 1,000 to 10,000 times faster than the previous rate.
why should we care?
Plants and animals provide services for us. Humans are the most numerous mammal on the planet and every day we need the oxygen, food, and shelter other species provide.
We also want the medicine, toys and pleasant views they provide.
And we need the carbon dioxide they provide. Too much oxygen in the atmosphere and we would all burn - the whole planet - by spontaneous combustion.
And we also need their abilities to recycle nutrients, pollinate flowers, purify water and air. Without these “support systems”, all life on Earth would soon collapse.
To invent machines to do all this is unimaginable - and how would we power them?
spice of life
Biodiversity helps prepare for evolution. And that form of adaptation may be crucial if we (humans) want to survive. But evolution responds to the environment, and we are creating that environment. Global warming and pollution will force new species capable of surviving (or even thriving on) the antibiotics, sex hormones and poisons we leave around.
Diseases that no longer respond to antibiotics are a prime example. A good way to force a mutation to study bacterial genetics is to put it into a jar of antibiotics. Then you know the only ones that grow must be resistant, so they have a new gene somewhere. Great - new knowledge at the price of a new killer.
once it’s gone…
Once a species is gone, it is gone forever.
In a pioneering effort to halt species extinction in the Brazilian Amazon, the state of Para is launching the Zero Extinction Program, the first of its kind in Brazil.
But already, 65 species can only be found in zoos or botanical gardens.
Opinion
Is that how humans might end up?
Never mind ethics - what about survival?
William Blake’s poem asked about the Being that created the tiger, exploring the beauty versus brutality issue recognisable in the form of God/Universe or Devil…
Equally, we could ponder the destruction of the tiger - do we see it as done by humans or by nature?
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