I have been on this doomsday thing for a few weeks. Studying possible scenarios scientists see happening in the next 100 or so years. Also studying previous extinction events.

Almost every species becomes extinct eventually. Dinosaurs, mammoths, ancient sharks, etc. It is a natural process of life. There may actually be a ticking DNA timebomb in every species. Humans even have it. Eventually we may be gone from the face of the Earth.

So it got me thinking. Some people, myself included, take extinction seriously. Then it dawned on me, be it natural or caused by man, all things disappear eventually. Granted we do have to preserve eco-systems and natural resources even if it is for the selfish reason of our own survival. Extinction of all species is almost a guarantee though. So is preserving a single species really that important? Eco-systems eventually adapt. This applies to invasives as well. While havoc may be caused for a matter of time by an extinction or a massive invasion, eventually a new normalcy comes about.

You have to separate background extinction rates, the typical, day-to-day rate, from elevated mass extinction events. The background rate might be an animal species going extinct every 100 years or so based on the fossil record. This will be balanced with the appearance of another species at about the same rate. Over long periods of time (~500 million years) the biodiversity of the planet has increased as ecosystems have become more complex, opening more possible niches for more species. Today we're experiencing elevated extinction rates so bad that it's being referred to as the sixth great extinction event, in a league with events such as the end of the Cretaceous (dinosaurs) and the end of the Permian (95% of all marine species). Any one species disappearing is not an inherent evil. But entire ecosystems are being degraded, whether it's the molluscan fauna of the Coosa River in Alabama or some of the floral hotspots such as the western Cape in South Africa or multiple hot spots in the tropical Andes. So yeah, individual species are important; I've decided to worry about a few such as the flame chub or the stippled studfish, but those are almost arbitrary decisions. You have to worry about something that you might be able to have some influence over. I'm all for buying land in tropical America and protecting it, but in North America we have plenty of species at risk that need attention. Like the man said, if you don't hug those trees today, they're gone tomorrow (and thanks for playing).

You're right, everything goes extinct eventually. The problem that I see is that there are far too many species going extinct at once. Will someone (human or not) look back someday and wonder what caused the mass extinctions happening now? Maybe it will be obvious. Maybe we aren't at the "mass extinction" point now, maybe we'll turn things around.

A diverse ecosystem is a healthy one. If we can't stop trashing habitats, ours won't be so healthy. How long before it can no longer support humans? I hope we don't find out.

I don't see any point in spending bazillions of dollars saving a species that doesn't have any habitat left. What's the point? It's too late.

Maybe 'god' is still learning like all life is.

"So is preserving a single species really that important?"

Define important?
Lots of people do just fine living in the city seeing nothing more natural than a squirrel. In the Big Picture, is it "Important" that there be wild places or wild things?
Long as cows and pigs and chickens live and corn and grass can grow, humans will survive just fine.
Long as technology allows humans to filter and purify or even create drinking water, we don't really need natural rivers or lakes.
Long as we can see animals on cable or at the zoo, does it matter if they live in the woods where no one sees them?
If a little fish few people even know exist were to quietly pass from this world, who would suffer?

Back when I had time and didn't know any better, I argued this point to the extreme on the herp forums. The people putting forth the arguments I posted above could not be moved. The human-centric philosophy seems to thrive best in a closed mind.

My answer is; it may not really matter in the big picture but some kinds of quality of life can not be expressed in dollars and cents.
I personally would not want to live in a world that did not have wild things, even economically useless ones.

Thanks Mike, you present the biophilia idea which is important too. What quality of life do we as humans want, probably need? It's the basis of the Wilderness Act in this country, that people should have a chance to leave human society and just face "solitude". Most of us on this list already have a clue at least, I'll leave it at that.

There is short term thinking (our lifetimes) and long term thinking (1 million years from now). And then there is the biblical viewpoint (who knows when?). I tend to favor the latter two, while mourning the loss for myself (the former).

As mikez stated, is it important in the sense that the world won't be able to go on without it? Probably not. Is it important in the sense that we've lost something that we'll never be able to recover? Absolutely.

why do humans place such importance on our own existance? are we that important, our quality of life, what we can enjoy in the future, what we may or may not see in the future?

Imagine a world in which the greatest works of art -- masterpieces by DaVinci, Goya, Van Gogh, Picasso, Pollock, and others -- are fading and crumbling into oblivion and few people are alarmed or worried about it. Imagine too that the museums housing these great works of art are themselves falling to ruin, or being torn down to make way for more office buildings, parking lots and shopping centers. Every time a museum is destroyed, countless paintings, statues and sculptures are destroyed with it. A handful of art scholars are scrambling to prevent further destruction and save what remains. One scholar even went so far as to chain himself to a museum column to stop the wrecking ball. Such protests, however, are routinely dismissed as extremist if not downright whacko. Public and political outcry about the irreplaceable loss of our artistic heritage is virtually nil. Hey, it’s just art, most people think (if they’re giving the issue any thought at all). Why save a useless old painting by some dead guy when we got plenty of living artists in the world, most of them starving? Who’s saving them, huh? Eventually all of the art in the world is gone (except for Elvis-on-velvet paintings, which continue to proliferate). If a child wants to see what DaVinci’s “Last Supper” looked like, or Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers,” he or she can always look up a photo in an encyclopedia. (Assuming, of course, that books and libraries haven’t befallen the same fate.)

You don’t have to be an art lover to realize that such a nightmare scenario would never take place. Simply because great works of art are highly valued by most human cultures. We place art on the proverbial pedestal and erect large edifices in which to display, preserve, and admire it. Wealthy art connoisseurs routinely spend millions to acquire a single painting for their collection. While not-so-wealthy connoisseurs may easily spend a hundred bucks to get a reproduction of that painting framed to hang over their sofas, or think nothing of buying an $8 ticket, waiting in line for three hours, and catching a 30 second glimpse of Monet’s “Flowers” when the Monet exhibition rolls into town. And should a famous work of art begin to crumble, a cry goes out to save this priceless treasure for future generations to enjoy. We rally around the cause with the force of a moral imperative. Socialites attend thousand-dollar-a-plate fundraisers to benefit art restoration. Development directors solicit corporations and philanthropists to see whose name gets to officially sponsor the new exhibit, or the new climate-controlled wing where it’s on display. Museum staffers crank up their membership drive: Join now to help save our artistic and cultural heritage before it’s too late, and get this free tote bag when you do.

Art -- and the need to preserve our artistic past -- are unquestioned priorities of modern society. Indeed, the sheer moral imperative with which we attempt to preserve our cultural heritage -- whether it’s works of art, historical places and artifacts, or religious customs -- demonstrate that humans place a higher value on the products of our own making than on the products of the natural world.

But I ask you, Which is the greater masterpiece? A work of art that took one human a few days, maybe a few weeks, to create? Or a species of plant or animal that took nature millions of years to create?

I often wonder what a different world this would be if but one tenth of the money, energy, and passion that goes into preserving and displaying great works of art went to conserving the great works of nature instead.

Chris Scharpf

That's a fantastic analogy. I think that, as humans, thinking ourselves more important than all other living things is a good evolutionary strategy, as long as it's not carried too far. I also think we've gone too far in many ways.

Imagine a world in which the greatest works of art -- masterpieces by DaVinci, Goya, Van Gogh, Picasso, Pollock, and others -- are fading and crumbling into oblivion and few people are alarmed or worried about it. Imagine too that the museums housing these great works of art are themselves falling to ruin, or being torn down to make way for more office buildings, parking lots and shopping centers. Every time a museum is destroyed, countless paintings, statues and sculptures are destroyed with it. A handful of art scholars are scrambling to prevent further destruction and save what remains. One scholar even went so far as to chain himself to a museum column to stop the wrecking ball. Such protests, however, are routinely dismissed as extremist if not downright whacko. Public and political outcry about the irreplaceable loss of our artistic heritage is virtually nil. Hey, it’s just art, most people think (if they’re giving the issue any thought at all). Why save a useless old painting by some dead guy when we got plenty of living artists in the world, most of them starving? Who’s saving them, huh? Eventually all of the art in the world is gone (except for Elvis-on-velvet paintings, which continue to proliferate). If a child wants to see what DaVinci’s “Last Supper” looked like, or Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers,” he or she can always look up a photo in an encyclopedia. (Assuming, of course, that books and libraries haven’t befallen the same fate.)

You don’t have to be an art lover to realize that such a nightmare scenario would never take place. Simply because great works of art are highly valued by most human cultures. We place art on the proverbial pedestal and erect large edifices in which to display, preserve, and admire it. Wealthy art connoisseurs routinely spend millions to acquire a single painting for their collection. While not-so-wealthy connoisseurs may easily spend a hundred bucks to get a reproduction of that painting framed to hang over their sofas, or think nothing of buying an $8 ticket, waiting in line for three hours, and catching a 30 second glimpse of Monet’s “Flowers” when the Monet exhibition rolls into town. And should a famous work of art begin to crumble, a cry goes out to save this priceless treasure for future generations to enjoy. We rally around the cause with the force of a moral imperative. Socialites attend thousand-dollar-a-plate fundraisers to benefit art restoration. Development directors solicit corporations and philanthropists to see whose name gets to officially sponsor the new exhibit, or the new climate-controlled wing where it’s on display. Museum staffers crank up their membership drive: Join now to help save our artistic and cultural heritage before it’s too late, and get this free tote bag when you do.

Art -- and the need to preserve our artistic past -- are unquestioned priorities of modern society. Indeed, the sheer moral imperative with which we attempt to preserve our cultural heritage -- whether it’s works of art, historical places and artifacts, or religious customs -- demonstrate that humans place a higher value on the products of our own making than on the products of the natural world.

But I ask you, Which is the greater masterpiece? A work of art that took one human a few days, maybe a few weeks, to create? Or a species of plant or animal that took nature millions of years to create?

I often wonder what a different world this would be if but one tenth of the money, energy, and passion that goes into preserving and displaying great works of art went to conserving the great works of nature instead.

Chris Scharpf

I think it was William T. Hornady that used a very similar argument once for the preservation of the North American Buffalo. It is a great analogy...

It all speaks to a huge need for the education of most people, who just honestly have never had reason to think about or deal with any of these issues. Most people like nature as an abstract ideal but know next to nothing about it, much less the pattern of the current mass extinction event.