Do you really care about endangered species?

Question

I do and I try to make choices that will have the least environmental impact. It seems this is an uphill battle and it really does not matter what one person does.

Answer 1

I care a great deal about endangered species. In fact, my life's work is somewhat devoted to helping save them from extinction. Although most species eventually face extinction, the rates of species extinction in recent times have increased dramatically, and can be attributed to the folly of mankind. This issue will gain more prominence as the biodiversity of this wonderful planet decreases to the point where enough people across the globe begin to feel the economic and social impacts on their own lives.

Answer 2

I care about the endangered species. I also think that it is sad that there are a lot of people out there that don't care. Of course, it may not be that they don't care. It could be due to ignorance as well as how they were brought up.

It is an uphill battle and it DOES matter what one person does. If you didn't do something, even just a little bit, then you would be saying that you don't care. You can always lead by example. This world could use a few more leaders that led by example. Show people that you care by how you do things to have the least possible environmental impact and take time to explain your reasons.

Answer 3

The pessimistic, defeatist attitude is to say that it really does not matter what one person does when it comes to endangered species or anything else related to our planet. What can one person do? Plenty. As you suggest, one can strive, every single day, to have the least environmental impact. One can also argue that we have some sort of environmental impact every couple of seconds because we are exhaling carbon dioxide, for example. No true environmentalist or conservationist is going to suggest that we should eliminate ourselves to keep this from happening. The global environment is about BALANCE, and infinitesimal changes made by individuals may not have immediate or even lasting impact, but taken in the aggregate, the effects can be overwhelming. Carbon dioxide is what plants need to survive, so one can focus on planting trees to make up the CO2 that humans exhale. Environmental protection is not about ending life as we know it, but sustaining and renewing what we have. In the case of the specific issue of endangered species, who are we, as one of thousands of species who make Earth their home, to say which species are worth saving and which are not?

Answer 4

Yes I do...and I also make choices on a daily basis to lessen my environmental impact. I also work as a wildlife biologist and I help study endangered birds and am out there literally saving them. Believe me....one person can do a lot. I love the saying "think globally...act locally". I think it is very true. Keep up the good work....someone has got to do it.

Answer 5

I believe there's a very delicate balance between our ecology and how it relates to our existence between man, plants, and all other animals. How do we know that there's not a rare species of spider in the Amazon rainforest whose venom might be a cure for cancer? How can we be sure that if oil companies keep disrupting caribou migratory paths with pipelines and oil drillings they might force the caribou to become extinct? And although we might not think anything of that down here in the states, it could also force the extinction of several native Eskimo tribes. So should those people and their culture become extinct just because WE needed more $3.00-a-gallon fuel for our $60,000 SUVs? Eventually, we will upset the ecological balance to a point where homosapiens will be an endangered species. But, that's not for us to worry about; let our grandchildren, great-grandchildren and great-great grandchildren deal with all that stuff. We're pretty damned comfortable right now tossing our trash in landfills, polluting our air, and poisoning our waters.
-RKO-

Answer 6

I applaud your eco-sensible, caring attitude and your actions to save endangered species. However I deplore the insensitive uninformed, poor responses posted so far in response to your Question.

Humans who show no concern for the environmental effects of their conduct and/or who make no effort to change their lifestyles to behave in a more eco-sensible manner to help minimize species and habitat extinction are just plain ignorant and arrogant (Bush43 Qualities) about the significance and meaning of those horrible events.

Every life form and every habitat is a unique event in the living processes in the ecological, interlocking, evoution of life and the environment of the planet. Whenever a lfe form becomes extinct or a habitat disappears because of humankind's activities, we lose an irreplaceable piece of that web of life that now sustains us in ways we don't understand or appreciate yet. On top of that, we lose something irreplaceable by man that was provided by natural evolution over millions of years that one day in the future could or might save us from species extinction from a variety of causes. The diversity of living species and living habitats are not only a sustaining the food web but a system with its own built-in checks and balances necessary to maintain the balances necessary between competing life forms, both old and new. This feature of evolution keeps living things evolving in relation to changes in the environment which is itself partly the creation of those living things and it helps to keep any one existing life form or new life form from appearing and suddenly totally obliterating all other life forms and their habitats. The workings of the biosystems that constitute the web of life that sustains us are still poorly understood by scientists and prudence and a moral conscience dictates we care more about the consequences of our lifestyles and our technological abilities to destroy life and habitats on the planet.

Only fools,idiots, and environmental abusers would irrationally disagree with what I have just said.

Answer 7

Not really. I care a little and would be willing to take some simple measures to save some species. But it just is not a high priority for me. I think the majority of the public probably shares that view.

Answer 8

Throughout the history of planet earth there are extinct species that there are currently alive. There will always be endangered species on this planet no matter how we try to intervine.

Answer 9

95 percent of the species that ever lived are gone... extinct... we didn't kill the all. That's what nature does. Saving endangered species is another arrogant idea. Species will go and others will come out...

Answer 10

What about the bird flu virus, the malaria parasite, the liver fluke, the intestinal round worm? Should they also be saved from extinction? or only the warm fuzzies and the organisms that are benificial to the warm fuzzies?