
Malaysia's last known Sumatran rhino dies - vanilla-almond
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-50531208
======
matthewmarkus
It needs to be noted that the Sumatran rhino has been on the decline for
thousands of years now:

[https://news.mongabay.com/2017/12/dna-analysis-shows-
sumatra...](https://news.mongabay.com/2017/12/dna-analysis-shows-sumatran-
rhinos-peaked-in-ice-age-never-recovered/)

While humans have no doubt accelerated their demise, the overall problem stems
from "rising sea levels that submerged the land bridges connecting the islands
of Borneo, Java, and Sumatra to the Malay Peninsula and mainland Asia,
subsequently fragmenting suitable habitats for the rhino."

Finally, Sumatran rhino populations are so small, remote, and fragmented that
poaching is less of a concern for this species than issues like land use.

~~~
lisper
Important context from that article:

Payne also noted that the findings reinforced the importance of supporting
efforts to prevent the species from going extinct.

“Animal species do come and go over periods that can be most conveniently
measured in units of tens of thousands of years,” he said, but added, “To say
that we should just let some species go extinct because it is ‘natural’ is
nonsense.”

~~~
corndoge
Why is it nonsense? It is natural.

~~~
lisper
It is nonsense that we should accept any negative outcomes simply because they
are natural. If we accepted this form of argument, we'd still have people
dying from smallpox and polio, both of which are "natural". The _whole point_
of technological civilization is to be the masters of our own fates and not to
meekly accept whatever happens to be "natural".

~~~
briefcomment
Ok, but why do we need to do anything to keep certain animal species around?
It might be nice to have Sumatran rhinos around so you could see something new
and cool, but there are hundreds of thousands of cool species to see. I would
guess that the Sumatran rhino does not hold a crucial position in any
ecosystem. It's certainly not the same to us as having people die out because
of smallpox etc. People mean much more to us than animals. If we have the
money, the means, and the time to preserve the Sumatran rhino, then let's save
it. If we have better things to do, let's do that instead.

~~~
andrewksl
I guess if you try to quantify a species’ value by looking at its utility,
either to the ecosystem or for our amusement, you may arrive at the conclusion
that some species are not worth saving. Reasonable even if a little cold.

I tend to take the view that life — all life — is extremely rare in the
universe, and that alone is enough to warrant as much action as realistically
possible to preserve it. A species might never be useful for anything, but it
is the unique product of countless generations before it; a story of
complexity and beauty that, it could be argued, dwarfs any of humanity’s
greatest achievements.

~~~
cmdshiftf4
>I guess if you try to quantify a species’ value by looking at its utility,
either to the ecosystem or for our amusement, you may arrive at the conclusion
that some species are not worth saving.

If you included our own species in that evaluation you may reasonably conclude
that ours is not worth saving, above all others.

What would one reasonably label a species that hyper-populates, spreads itself
spatially, destroys the other species and their habitations in the spaces it
expands to, consumes at a rate far above utility, hordes whatever resources it
can gather and spends its efforts calculating how to increase these efforts?

Unless the intelligence we evolved with is used to benefit the rest of life
which flourished with our own, then it is hard to call it a virtue, or even
deem us any more worthwhile, or worth preserving, more than any other life
form.

~~~
aplacelikethis
Unless all species naturally end up at that stage and the only way to the next
stage of evolution is to rise above it.

Or if every animal life is net more pain than enjoyment.

Or if it's the only way to have any lifeform exist into perpetuity. Then we're
net beneficial to all other life on the planet as long as any of it survives
along with us; disregarding that we're perpetuating a boatload of genes just
by continuing to exist.

Any individual animal has a survival instinct. We have a survival instinct
that encompasses much larger groups than that of any animal.

~~~
andrewksl
It’s a survival instinct when there’s two mouths to feed, and one meal to do
it.

When there’s enough for everyone and more, and we take enough resources for 50
because then we get it faster, cheaper, and shinier... well, I wouldn’t
personally describe that as survival instinct.

------
ghastmaster
When referring to a species no longer existing in a region, it is usually
referred to as being extirpated. The title taken literally, claims Malaysia
has announced the species extinct, when in fact, it is not. It has been
extirpated.

~~~
hhas01
It’s the BBC News site, not a top-tier zoology journal. Given the one thing
rarer than the Sumatran rhino is popular press readers who know what
“extirpated” is, “Extinct in $location” is entirely appropriate phraseology.
#KnowYourAudience

~~~
ghastmaster
The title originally posted on hacker news was reflective of my original
comment. BBC did not use the term extinct in their headline, but in the bold
preface of the article. I appreciate and expect esoteric language in hacker
news. I suspect the audience here does as well.

------
techer
“No more than 100 Sumatran rhinos remain in the wild (some estimates put the
number as low as 30), scattered on the islands of Sumatra, Indonesia.”

Have to be hopeful.

------
DodgyEggplant
Sadly, startups innovations did not find (or even tried) a way to save animals
and wild life. If Disney would contribute 1% of all income they got from
animals based movies? If Docker would contribute 1% to save whales?

~~~
JustSomeNobody
That 1% should go to wealthy investors because they’re the only ones who can
then use that money to make the world a better place.

Edit: slash es.

~~~
krastanov
You really need an "/s", otherwise nobody will get you are joking.

~~~
JustSomeNobody
So it seems.

------
holoduke
Wonder if at one point our DNA skills become so strong that we can recreate
every extinct animal where we have DNA from.

~~~
phaedryx
Maybe start a zoo, or maybe I'll call it a "park", for kids?

~~~
dpcan
And hire 1 IT guy.

~~~
dudul
Who will install the coolest Unix System to manage the network.

------
dpflan
"Its death was a natural one, and the immediate cause has been categorised as
shock," Sabah State Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister Christine Liew
is quoted as saying.

The cause of the death is categorized as "shock", it is hard to not feel the
potential for self-reflective sadness here whereby the cause of shock could be
dramatically extrapolated to be shock for the violence of humanity and
whatever their desires were that warranted killing these rhinoceroses and not
protecting and coexisting with them.

------
josteink
I saw a BBC documentary last night with David Attenborough, saying it may soon
be extinct.

That was fast :(

------
Abishek_Muthian
The usage of term 'Extinct' in the content is confusing. There are no more
Sumatran Rhino in Malaysia, there are about 100 expected to live in the
islands of Indonesia.

~~~
briefcomment
The use of the "extinct" in this context seems disingenuous then. Probably
explainable by the likely fact that "extinct" in a headline will attract
clicks.

~~~
briefcomment
To whoever downvoted the above, I don't think we view a town becoming a ghost
town as an "extinction". As long as the species still exists, it seems
inaccurate to use the term extinct. "Dwindling", "near extinction",
"increasingly endangered" all seem more accurate in this context. Only reason
I call this disingenuous is that it was probably a "cynical" decision to
decrease accuracy in return for clicks.

------
Lio
Not really sure what to say about this sad event except that folk medicine is
utter bollocks and those who peddle it are charlatans and frauds.

~~~
jmclnx
True, but at this point are the main issues I believe are. Land use, people
need to farm and live somewhere. Poor people need to feed their kids, and
poaching is rather lucrative for them when their children is starving. Issues
it seems the world will never fix, thus wildlife suffers :(

~~~
folli
What's your point? That this is okay?

~~~
irrational
The rest of the world see the standard of living of Europeans and North
Americans and want the exact same standard of living. If this means they have
to do the same thing that the Western world had to do to reach those levels,
then so be it. Go through an industrial revolution with polluting factories
and industries. Subjugate nature and move all wild animals into zoos. Have a
few world wars. Create terrible working conditions that require the need for
unions. Overthrow government after government until one that is good enough to
allow personal freedoms comes along. Etc.

~~~
rayiner
Damn skippy.

