Feral animals and scientific ideology

[Guest guest]

In other words, Wilson is a Teutonic Naturist to an extreme

degree, whose philosophies and practices are not all that far

removed from those of various other Teutonic Naturists who believed

in purging " impure " elements.There is another way to describe a person who

excessively

studies a micro ecology and then tries to extrapolate his findings to

the universe: having his head so far up where the sun doesn't shine

that he thinks the world is dark.

 

This argument is mixing science with philosophy. That case, again, is a

matter of imposing human values and

philosophy over natural selection. To nature, philosophers are

incubators of parasites and distributors of fertilizer, the same as

the rest of us, except possibly more full of greenhouse gases.

 

(The effect of philosophical orientation on science has been profound in

many institutions and in Harvard University, in the 1970s putative

conservatives like Edward Wilson clashed with Marxists like Stephen Jay

Gould and Richard Lewontin on interpretation of scientific results in

biology. At around the same time, Wilson spearheaded the importance of

ecology in the face of fierce opposition from molecular biologists like

James Dewey Watson. Incidentally, these debates had an Indian observer in

the form of Dr Madhav Gadgil, who worked with Edward Wilson at Harvard and

now works at the Indian Institute of Ecological Sciences in Bangalore. A lot

of respect that is earned by the biodiversity conservation movement today is

largely due to Wilson's efforts and his book 'The Diversity of Life' is

considered to be one of the most important texts on the subject of

conservation. His achievements, inspite of his controversial views, have

been colossal. *Wilson's book Sociobiology: The New Synthesis was rated as

the most important book on animal behaviour ever published by the Animal

Behaviour Society in 1989. To say that a person of his academic and

intellectual stature 'thinks the world is dark' is underestimating his

abilities both as a scientist and as an activist. He certainly did not

receive his doctorate from a university like Harvard in zoology if he was

not an expert in studying animals. *Edward Wilson has vehemently denied any

extraneous philosophical influence in his scientific work. He has written

about this in his autobiography entitled 'Naturalist' and also in an essay

entitled 'Stalking the Wild Taboo'(

http://www.lrainc.com/swtaboo/taboos/wilson01.html). Defaunation as an

experiment is distasteful, but Wilson has done other important things than

just carrying out that experiment)

 

 

 

Nature solves this problem through evolution: the thriving

species thrives. The rare species either retreats to the portion of

habitat it can hold, adapts to the challenge of change, or goes

extinct.If it goes extinct, something else moves into the vacant

habitat niche. Sometimes the something else will be an increasingly

specialized adaptation from the thriving species.Of note here is that

successful evolution relatively seldom

proceeds from adaptation by rare species, who are usually also

highly specialized species. Evolution is usually a matter of

successful, abundant species finding opportunities to become more

successful through more effective adaptation to wherever they are.

 

(Here I have a question. If it is natural selection through adaptation

for successful species to thrive and it is acceptable to let endangered

species in isolated habitats go extinct due to the depredations of thriving

species, then in the case of " island like habitats " like national parks,

should humans as a thriving species and their accompanying domestic animals

like cows, dogs, goats, etc move in and displace the endangered species

living in the forest? This is one issue that is taking centre stage in the

human animal conflict issue in India after the passage of the Tribal Bill.

If yes, why yes? If not, why not? )