[Taxacom] Biodiversity and Species Value

[Stephen Thorpe]

Doug:

I thought I had already answered this objection in my reply to Michael Heads (copied to both you and Taxacom)? Let me try again:

Yes, taxonomic ranks are partly/largely/wholly arbitrary, and certainly somewhat inconsistent across groups

nevertheless, I think your priorities are screwed up if you would attach no greater importance to the horseshoe crab (actually not just one species, but let's pretend) IF it became critically endangered, than you would just some species of Hawaiian Drosophila while the others were doing just fine...

another good point here is that not only are taxonomic ranks arbitrary/subjective, but so are species distinctions (in practice, anyway), so your way opens up the possibility for this scenario: the horseshoe crab becomes critically endangered, but some taxonomist puts some arguably distinct species of Hawaiian Drosophila on the list first. While you are trying to save the latter (which some other taxonomists don't even recognise as distinct), the horsehoe crab becomes extinct ...

Stephen




________________________________
From: Doug Yanega <dyanega at ucr.edu>
To: TAXACOM at MAILMAN.NHM.KU.EDU
Sent: Fri, 11 June, 2010 11:23:42 AM
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Biodiversity and Species Value

Stephen Thorpe wrote:

>sounds like you think all species are of equal "value", but surely 
>one species of a megadiverse genus is far less important than a 
>monotypic family? Why conserve just species? Why not all taxa? The 
>higher the taxon, the more important it is. So a family going 
>extinct is far more of a tragedy than just some species ...

Define "family" in a manner that is 100% objective and replicable 
across all kingdoms. Higher taxa are artificial and abstract. The 
Horsehoe Crab is unique and the sole member of a REALLY high level 
taxon, but is at no risk of extinction. When its distribution shrinks 
to a matter of acres, *then* you can claim it's a conservation 
priority - the same priority as any other species with a similar 
distribution, facing a similar risk. Conversely, there are hundreds 
of species of Drosophila endemic to Hawaii, and most of them are at 
risk of extinction due to very limited distributions. Oh, but they 
happen to be members of a megadiverse genus, so I guess you claim 
they are not worth protecting? So, by that logic, all I need to do to 
protect them is declare that every species of Hawaiian Drosophila is 
now in its own family, correct? That's got to be one of the worst 
criteria imaginable. You can find dozens of cases of insect families 
known 50 years ago that are presently ranked no higher than tribes, 
and even MORE examples of the reverse. Does that mean that the former 
are, at the stroke of a taxonomist's pen, no longer worthy of 
conservation, while the latter suddenly *are*? Extinction does not 
discriminate based on taxonomic rank, and neither should we. Extinct 
is extinct.

Peace,
-- 

Doug Yanega        Dept. of Entomology        Entomology Research Museum
Univ. of California, Riverside, CA 92521-0314        skype: dyanega
phone: (951) 827-4315 (standard disclaimer: opinions are mine, not UCR's)
              http://cache.ucr.edu/~heraty/yanega.html
  "There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness
        is the true method" - Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chap. 82

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