
Protect the last of the wild - aviziva
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-07183-6
======
japhyr
I live in southeast Alaska, where we have a relatively healthy population of
coastal brown bears. When we go into the woods, there is always a chance a
bear could be nearby.

Your first encounter with a brown bear in the wild can be unnerving. It's a
really different feeling to see an animal that could easily kill you in the
woods, without a wall or a fence between you and that animal. It's really
humbling, and makes the woods feel entirely different than most other woods
I've ever been in.

It's not that hard to be safe. You make noise when you're in brushy areas, and
you stay aware of your surroundings as long as you're in bear country. If
you're camping, there are well-established routines that keep bears from
messing with your camping area. You keep in mind where bears are in their
annual cycles; are they relatively well-fed, or are they hungry and looking
anywhere they can for food?

I like the balance of doing technical work with the experience of walking in
the woods with bears. The projects I work on are important, but they're not
life-safety-critical. If one of my servers goes down, no one's going to die.
Having interacted with brown bears at close range, a server going down is a
relatively low-stress event.

I wish there were more wild areas left. The woods in the lower 48 feel empty
after living in forests that still have the top predators alive and healthy.

~~~
oldstrangers
Was out in the wilderness on Vancouver Island, a place with the highest
concentration of cougars in North America. You're right, it is a vastly
different experience walking around an area like that knowing you're just a
fragile voyeur in another animal's environment (especially something as silent
and murderous as a big cat).

~~~
lisper
I live on the San Francisco peninsula. A mountain lion killed a deer in our
back yard once, and then the buzzards came and cleaned it up. Not that I wish
to dispute the premise of the OP in the slightest, but you can still find
wildness in some unexpected places.

------
fractallyte
I'd argue that humanity certainly _requires_ huge tracts of wilderness for its
long term survival. So far, we've successfully transformed diverse ecosystems
into vast, but basic, mono-cultural 'deserts'.

But - is it sustainable? In the century since the Haber process was
introduced, the world has started to buckle at the seams from the results:
huge population growth, with accompanying pollution (nitrates, pesticides,
algal blooms, etc.) and degradation of biomes. What are the effects on our
biochemistry? Plastic pollution is only now being noticed. Pthalates and
numerous other estrogen mimickers are silently at work. Antibiotic resistance
is increasing.

I think it's too early to conclude that we can indeed survive this. The
outlook for the rest of this century is not positive...

A 'wilderness' is a vast library of alternative biotech. Until humanity
understands the effects of its impact on Earth's ecosystems and itself, it
would be wise to remember this.

~~~
dharma1
Could not agree more with this. Evolution on Earth has had a very long time to
develop super advanced nanotechnology, which we understand and utilise very
poorly and are destroying forever - for what? More beef on the plate, palm oil
for products no one needs and a bit of money for one generation?

Beyond being critical to the survival of deeply linked ecosystems, and
ultimately ourselves, it's just really stupid to destroy products of millions
of years of R&D before we've even begun to unlock their potential. The amount
of energy and computation that has gone into that evolution is super valuable
and a couple of generations are trading it for profits lasting a blink of an
eye.

In general, I find it super strange that multi-generational
thinking/optimisation isn't more deeply ingrained in our behaviour as a
species.

~~~
galangalalgol
Natural selection is a greedy algorithm. Being forward thinking or altruistic
rarely produces more surviving progeny over the short term.

~~~
dharma1
I guess in the case of humans we have partly outpaced natural selection -
nature hasn't had time to optimise for the reality we are creating, it's too
slow. Short term impulses which have worked great (until now) still govern our
behaviour.

It's not altruism to try to avert long term disaster beyond your own life
span. It's in your own interest to ensure your progeny survives - even several
generations in the future they still carry your genes. But I don't know if
inbuilt mechanisms for this exist in evolution.

I'd like to think self-inflicted extinction isn't a likely outcome of
evolution - but maybe it is once a certain species dominates.

~~~
yeswecould
All of the things that humans have done, which you are referring to - can be
traced back to one thing - cheap energy - in the form of OIL.

~~~
dharma1
It is curious how carbon based life that existed in the past (dead plants and
animals in the form of oil) is the catalyst for carbon based life wiping
itself out in the future.

I wonder if this ultimately also happens on other planets with carbon based
life (if they exist) - a short period of hyper growth once life learns how to
unlock energy from the past, followed by extinction.

------
omosubi
I've been thinking about this quote a lot recently - "Canada, the most
affluent of countries, operates on a depletion economy which leaves
destruction in its wake. Your people are driven by a terrible sense of
deficiency. When the last tree is cut, the last fish is caught, and the last
river is polluted; when to breathe the air is sickening, you will realize, too
late, that wealth is not in bank accounts and that you can’t eat money." It's
attributed to a canadian Aboriginal but could apply to any industrialized or
semi industrialized country. Hopefully we save ourselves before it's too late

~~~
claydavisss
Canada has a terrible environmental record that completely undermines its
progressive reputation. The tar sands project may be the single most egregious
resources undertaking in history.

But other so-called progressive industrialized nations aren't much better.
Norway is also wealthy primarily due to the extraction of fossil fuels.

~~~
myth_drannon
Hopefully with the oil prices so low and keep getting lower, the tar sands is
a dead project

~~~
gnosis89
Low prices means higher consumption, which will do the opposite of kill off
that project.

------
arminiusreturns
Having grown up with a national forest as my literal backyard, its amusing and
sad to hear so much nonsense spewed in this thread. Yes, we need to protect
the wild, and inculcate respect for it in those that live in and visit it. My
issue is with the naivety of proposed "solutions".

One of the best examples I can give, though I have many, is this: my
grandfather was a logger and firefighter in this forest in the 70s. During my
lifetime though, the PhD environmentalists came to dominate the forest
service, and as logging waned they stopped listening to the old timers about
how to take care of the forest. My grandfather would try to tell them they
needed to let loggers thin the forest out, and to do more control burns and
let them burn longer.

As a kid I dismissed his ramblings, thinking; "they have PhDs! they know
better than us!"... and then after I left home, after the pine beetle
infestation, poof: two fires within a few years of each other that burned over
500,000 acres of that national forest I grew up in... and it is still
recovering to this day, and doesnt look the same. Old trails I used to walk
dont exist anymore. Mud slides from the fire have covered up old fishing
spots. Etc.

City slickers love to wax poetic about the forest, and then show up and
destroy it, and want to send in their environmentalists to fix it their way,
while those of us who live in those forests are greater stewards than they
ever have been. Then after the forest service or BLM phds have fucked things
up, they get sent off to some other poor areas forest, where they arent native
and dont listen to the natives.

Another example for this thread: many are claiming cattle ruin forest. on the
contrary, cattle have become an important part of keeping the forest healthy,
including ranchers taking care of forest land the forest service doesnt have
the resources to fix...

Just thought some people might want to hear a slightly different perspective
on this issue. Now of course Im talking about smaller localized forests
compared to the giant ecosystems the article covers, but I think those
microcosms should serve as a warning for anyone wanting to tackle those larger
ecosystems in a similar manner. Namely, listen to locals who know the forest
better than you do.

~~~
sparrc
Cattle are good for forests? I'm sorry but you're going to have to backup that
statement.

~~~
jandrewrogers
I can't speak for what the OP meant, but at least out West cattle fill a
critical role in the wilderness ecosystem vacated by bison. If you remove the
cattle, you would need to find a suitable replacement with similar grazing
patterns.

As a well known example, pronghorn antelope benefit significantly from
coexisting with cattle/bison populations, due to reduced predation and
increased food supply (they have complementary feeding patterns). Grazers
create ideal habitat for pronghorn, so pronghorn populations tend to track
grazer populations. These days, that is cattle.

~~~
arminiusreturns
I am talking about out west. I hadn't thought of the bison angle, but thats a
good point. (I'm a geek, not a rancher, so my knowledge on these things is
anecdotal from listening to the old timers)

------
peterlk
This is a difficult issue. On the one hand, it is arrogant to sit in
comfortable chairs imported to areas that live in excess and tell others to
live with less so that we may appreciate their wilderness from afar; or
ephemerally while we are on vacation. On the other hand, I am reminded of this
letter/video which sums up an important ethos:
[https://vimeo.com/newmanfilm/wildernessletter](https://vimeo.com/newmanfilm/wildernessletter).
We should protect the wilderness because it inspires us to be better.

Humanity doesn't need wilderness to survive and grow (we need food and water).
But we do need it to remind ourselves where we came from and how complexity
can be beautiful. So what do we do?

~~~
jarmitage
> Humanity doesn't need wilderness to survive and grow

Can you back this up? I agree with the comment by fractallyte that wilderness
is a necessity for long-term survival of humans. Also guaranteeing food and
water without wilderness has never been attempted before...

~~~
grondilu
It seems to me that the opposite assessment requires more justification. Ever
since Neolithic, mankind has been domesticating most if not all species it
consumed. And we've been deforesting like crazy. We're not hunter gatherers
anymore, so our progress has consisted relying less and less on wilderness and
more on controlled, artificial environments.

I'm not saying that we don't need wilderness for deeper reasons (say
psychological, or in terms on keeping biodiversity for future-proofing our
biological pool of domesticated species...). But such hypothetical reliance on
wilderness surely seems less obvious than our independence from it.

~~~
mac01021
Absolutely not definitive, but the biosphere 2 experiments provide a data
point.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosphere_2](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosphere_2)

~~~
grondilu
We were talking about wilderness. Biosphere 2 is about way more than that, as
it was a completely sealed environment (it had to produce its own oxygen, for
a start).

------
zackmorris
If you look on the map, there's a small patch of wilderness in the lower 48
(direct link):

[https://media.nature.com/w800/magazine-
assets/d41586-018-071...](https://media.nature.com/w800/magazine-
assets/d41586-018-07183-6/d41586-018-07183-6_16233416.jpg)

That's most likely the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness here in
Idaho, as well as the various national forests surrounding it:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Church–River_of_No_Retur...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Church–River_of_No_Return_Wilderness)

There is almost no wilderness left, and what remains is only there because
people spent lifetimes working to defend it. I highly encourage anyone who
reads this to make a stand in your personal discussions to always choose
protecting wild lands over financial gain.

I see the recent attacks on things like the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase
national monuments to be sabotage, undermining the decades-long efforts of
conservationists:

[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/04/us/trump-bears-
ears.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/04/us/trump-bears-ears.html)

As a native Idahoan I respect opposing arguments but recent trends have gone
too far. I heard discussions while growing up that when the national debt
reached a certain level, the US government would begin selling off its public
lands. So look at who stands to benefit from that and other debts, and you'll
see a giant circle of corruption. Meta-level critical thinking is needed now
more than ever in these times.

------
ivanhoe
Problem here is that developed world has destroyed it's wilderness long time
ago, used that land to produce food and resources, but now we demand that
others don't do the same. Why don't we instead create a wilderness by giving
up on our local agriculture land? Nature takes back the land very quickly and
if you limit hunting and repopulate the animals you'll quickly have a full-
blown wilderness back. It doesn't have to be Amazon or some place in Africa,
Europe once was covered in forests end-to-end too.

~~~
gerbilly
> Problem here is that developed world has destroyed it's wilderness long time
> ago, used that land to produce food and resources, but now we demand that
> others don't do the same.

So why not pay those countries to leave their wilderness wild?

It would be like saying: "You know, we really screwed up, and you guys are the
only ones who have some of this precious wilderness left. We'd like to pay you
to preserve it."

~~~
stupidbird
It would be nice, but many countries struggle to even get funding approved to
help other people who are starving. Nationalism is a huge barrier.

------
caprorso
So how do you incentivize/coerce governments and companies to conserve natural
resources, not dump toxins into the air, land and water, and generally limit
the negative influences on our health and environment?

"A world given over entirely to the engine of industry becomes a world no
longer fit for creatures, human or otherwise; it becomes a world without
hope." \- Tim Winton

------
briga
What these reports often seem to ignore is that there is still biodiversity
within our cities--sometimes a lot of it. If the default assumption is "city
bad, wilderness good", we're never going to make any progress, because short
of an apocalyptic event cities are here to stay. What we should be focused on
is making the cities we live in more sustainable and integrated with their
ecosystems. Green roofs, urban parks, sustainable transportation networks,
clean energy--there are plenty of avenues being explored today that are
connecting our cities with nature. Cities should be a part of nature rather
than apart from nature.

~~~
ip26
Thinking just of recognizable animals, typical cities have, what, rats, cats,
starlings, house sparrows, rock doves, gulls, and not terribly much more. We
can do better, but in general cities are _not_ biodiversity hotspots.

------
myth_drannon
Interesting that the article comes a week after Brazilians elected an extreme
right-wing president that promised to open up all the Amazon's nature reserves
for mining and farming. I expect the next 4 years will be very sad for Amazon
forests.

At HN we are discussing roguelike game development while the world around us
is systematically destroyed and what will be left is us experiencing nature
through a Nethack game.

