The argument for 'biodiversity' is, I think, badly stated in that it indirectly but effectively relates the existence (importance) of 'all those various life-forms' to what is more or less (selfishly?) 'important to the nature and quality of human life' today, that is, it more or less asserts that importance -'propriety' therein, without questioning either nature or quality and how they affect or should affect biodiversity. Somewhat 'higher order' than that assertion, I think then, is the importance of the configuration space in general and its continuity for successive investigation by this hominid organism evolving within that space and making such observation on biodiversity -which is precisely what the authors are not so much doing as actually reflecting and manifesting -else why is it important to write the editorial?
There is, in other words, and driven by 'genetic imperative' and 'deliberative capability', a 'nature and course of hominid evolution and progression' which identifies the hominid tree (dead branches included) as one of organisms successively driven to
become more knowledgeable about their configuration space -driven, that is, successively and among other things, to being capable of eventually observing 'corruptions of the past' and (eventually) learning to suppress anything that
'corrupts that naturally evolving space and its biodiversity' -another way of saying that the more we learn about our configuration space, the more we want to keep it intact for further discovery -eventually 'least population of least
resource/environment corruption' therein. The whole of this evolutionary process may be identified as (for want of a better word)-
aristocratization':
the evolutionary process by which mankind's speciation and continuing progression has generally been manifest as successively higher-orders of deliberative capability -essentially of 'increasing phenomenology and decreasing noumenalism'.
perryb
November 11, 2005 Science Magazine
Biodiversity Science Evolves
The planet’s biodiversity is increasingly threatened by human activities. We have heard this before, and the global mantra to stop the damage has forged numerous international panels and agreements over the past 15 years. Yet despite these efforts to
ensure biodiversity conservation, we have witnessed extensive population extinctions and massive deforestation and fragmentation of natural habitats, and we may even see the geographic contraction of major ecosystems, such as the tropical rainforest in
its northernmost distribution in the Americas. Our quantification of species extinction is poor, yet we do know that the number of threatened species, including the most charismatic animals, is considerable.
For example, 25% of all the mammals on the planet are endangered. Obviously, there continue to be problems with enforcing conservation in the face of social and economic growth in industrialized and developing countries. This week, DIVERSITAS, the
international program on biodiversity science, is holding its first open science conference in Oaxaca, Mexico, to discuss why the challenge of biodiversity conservation— arguably one of the biggest challenges facing modern society—remains so formidable,
and how the international scientific community can be moved into action to address this problem. The timing of this conference is appropriate: It follows the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, released in May 2005, which provides a comprehensive analysis
of past and future trends in the state of ecosystems and discusses what information is necessary to inform policy decisions on conservation.
Increasingly robust databases on species distribution and analytical tools such as remote-sensing and climate change models have allowed us to make substantial progress toward understanding biodiversity distribution and rates of change. Likewise, we have
begun to explore synergies between the drivers of biodiversity change, and there is a greater understanding of the relationships between biodiversity and ecosystem functioning. However, although compelling, these findings and knowledge are still being
interpreted in isolation from one another, and this has perhaps been one of the major problems in achieving the goals of protecting biodiversity. The biodiversity scientific community is fragmented among types of ecosystems (terrestrial, freshwater, and
marine); types of organisms (such as vertebrates, invertebrates, plants, and microbes); and, perhaps most critically, among disciplines (taxonomy, molecular biology, ecology, and socioeconomic sciences). Consequently, biodiversity science has been
undervalued by the policy sectors.
As an important move toward integration, the DIVERSITAS conference, “Integrating Biodiversity Science for Human Well-Being,” is providing a venue for researchers and students from different disciplines, as well as policy-makers, to assess the current
strengths and weaknesses of biodiversity science and its main future challenges. The scientific challenges are enormous. We need many new technologies: molecular and bioinformatic tools to examine Earth’s biodiversity; a coordinated observation system
and standardized methods to monitor biodiversity; integrated analyses and models of social, ecological, and evolutionary processes to predict future biodiversity changes; and large-scale experimental facilities and new models to understand and predict
the multiple effects of biodiversity changes on ecosystem services and human societies. At the same time, new approaches are needed to optimize the multiple uses of biodiversity in ways that consider tradeoffs and conflicts between conservation and
development options and that incorporate the ethical dimensions of biodiversity conservation. Conservation in human-dominated landscapes as well as protected areas (only 10 to 11% of the land surface) will require that it become a socially and
economically attractive activity that takes into consideration local inhabitants and landowners. This will require new economic approaches to ensure that rural inhabitants are compensated when they opt to conserve their land. The Costa Rican experience
of sustained programs of payment to farmers as compensation for setting aside forest for biodiversity conservation and ecosystem services is a promising example.
For biodiversity science to progress so that it produces socially relevant knowledge—in the sense that it can help society to better understand and capitalize on the value of biodiversity—it must evolve. There is an urgent need to integrate biological
and social disciplines in order to generate reliable recommendations for society and to incorporate biodiversity conservation and use into mainstream policy worldwide. We need unity in diversity.
Rodolfo Dirzo and Michel Loreau
Rodolfo Dirzo is in the Department of Biological Sciences, Stanford University, Stanford, California, and is vice-chair of DIVERSITAS.
Michel Loreau is in the Department of Biology,McGill University, Canada, and is chair of DIVERSITAS.
