Poll: Should We let pandas become extinct?

[Hlain]

I looked around for something that might answer that well and found this:
http://www.endangeredspecie.com/Why_Save_.htm

Oh my god, the design alone of that website made me want to strangle a panda...

It all depends on costs and success. That is, if we spend a reasonable amount and the pandas start breeding, it's all good.
But spending boatloads of money, preserving 5 bears who don't want to mate...

 

[Shycte]

We are the dominant species, and I think we can show some responsibility.

Shit, we spend millions of dollars to find old lizard bones but we can't be bothered to save species that exist today?

The role of the dominant species does not come with bigger responsibilities. It's a measure of efficiency, not a rank or a position. By destroying the pandas' habitat, we've enabled other species to fill the niche (including ourselves). THAT is natural selection - a fragile system that cannot self-sustain being spontaneously replaced by a more robust and enduring one. And I totally agree with you that we should be better stewards, but in the end, we're not worried about natural order - we just want green pastures in our front yard and videos of happy pandas in the wild on our TV because it makes us feel all responsible and important. Doesn't make it any more natural than just ending the species.

Besides, how is extinction murder? No individual member of the species is suffering because of it, we're not infringing on their rights. And surely there's no such thing as a "right not to go extinct". That's about as unnatural as it gets.

Also, dinosaurs are more closely related to avians than reptiles. Like, really big birds.

Uno) Yes, but we don't need to be assholes about it. While your logic works and all that, I think it is UTTERLY POINTLESS to talk about natural selection when we as humans have places ourselfs above it. We can decide what species who'll live and who'll not. Besides, exactly what do we gain by destroying the Pandas habiat that couldn't be gotten anywhere else? I feel like people are stepping and, killing everything, crossing their arms and just saying "Well, that natural selection for you, they weren't strong enough to handle our heavy machinery"

Dos) "No individual member of the species is suffering because of it", I might be missunderstanding you, but I'm pretty sure that every single individual of that species will suffer if they go extinct, because it means that they all all. But I might be wrong, maybe death isn't a problem.

Spoiler: Tres

Seriously though, you learn something new every day I guess.

 

[Reed Spacer]

I say go after sloths.

Seriously, why would nature create something that can be outrun by a snail?

 

[Iwana Humpalot]

Nah, we owe it to those fluffy bastards to keep them alive.

 

[ThreeWords]

I object to the phrasing of the question. We shouldn't really be 'letting' them, since what should really be doing is leaving well alone. However, now that we've already screwed them over, the debate becomes similar to "should we leave the life-support plugged in?". They'll pass away either way, it's just a matter of exactly how much time and money we spend on it.

At this point, it would be better to let them go, I feel, since there are better things to spend our effort on that keeping a particular species of bear from falling the very last bit of the way into extinction. And to be fair, they're bears. We're hardly running out of bears.

 

[Chrinik]

Oh, they don´t wanna fuck in the nice cages we put them in. Well fuck that, they might as well go extinct...

Serriously, we ripped them out of where they belong and now we complain they don´t act the way WE want them too?

How much is humanity willing to screw around with nature, how ignorant are you people...

But, keeping in mind that there are THOUSANDS of species dying out as we speak, most of them probably not even discovered, we just care about the giant panda because we put them in zoos and they are fluffy. They don´t need a sex-life, fertilize some friggin eggs with semen and bingo, instant panda-cub.
You know, like they do with EVERY farmanimal that ever existed anywhere?

 

[JoeThree]

I picked "Yes" because they serve us no purpose outside of being cute. Now, to that end, I have no objection to some private individual investing his or her money to keep some as personal pets or exhibits, I just don't think it's something that we as a collective should care about.

 

[DTWolfwood]

Pandas are a slap to Darwin's face (guess anything can exist if there isn't something to eat it or destroy their home)

Wait, what? "Anything can exist if there isn't something to eat it or destroy their home" is a slap to Darwin's face, why?

How does the existence of an animal without predators invalidate that those with predators only survive if they are fit to do so?

If they are fit to do so than so they should exist. However, can something not exist which precludes an environment that is hazardous to them? if there are no hazards, they can exist, is it not logical to think that? It doesn't invalidate them.

Pandas are a niche animal. If their niche is taken away, they shouldn't exist anymore. So their continued existence is whats strange not that they existed at all (probably should have been more clear, but this is the internet, if you don't clarify everything with a 12 page thesis statement some one is going to find fault in what you type regardless.)

In hindsight, i should have said slap to Darwin's Theories rather than slap to Darwin himself as he would most certainly approve of humans doing everything in their power to ensure the survival of a specie.

p.s. you probably should refrain from out of context partial quoting in the future.

 

[Seneschal]

sneeeep

Uno) Yes, but we don't need to be assholes about it. While your logic works and all that, I think it is UTTERLY POINTLESS to talk about natural selection when we as humans have places ourselfs above it. We can decide what species who'll live and who'll not. Besides, exactly what do we gain by destroying the Pandas habiat that couldn't be gotten anywhere else? I feel like people are stepping and, killing everything, crossing their arms and just saying "Well, that natural selection for you, they weren't strong enough to handle our heavy machinery"

Dos) "No individual member of the species is suffering because of it", I might be missunderstanding you, but I'm pretty sure that every single individual of that species will suffer if they go extinct, because it means that they all all. But I might be wrong, maybe death isn't a problem.

Spoiler: Tres

Seriously though, you learn something new every day I guess.

Oh, sorry, I wasn't trying to be an asshole. I'm just saying that we're judging environmental damage by our own standards like we're some high-and-mighty objective authority on it, when we're actually just trying to save pandas because they're iconic and appealing. If some other species, maybe multitudes of insect species, found a home in the panda-ridden environments, are we now to evict them because the cute cuddly neutered bear needs an abnormally large territory to live in? The panda just seems more of a PR stunt than a true environmental emergency.

And no, I don't think extinction is a big threat to anything, not as far as natural order is concerned. It has happened billions of times with no ill intent to species orders of magnitude more influential and important than the panda. Do we judge cretaceous synapsids for brutally outmatching dinosaurs after the K-T event? After all, dinosaurs were cool and iconic.

 

[bushwhacker2k]

Cutting Costs: "Should we axe this species to save money?"

It's like someone going into a bar and saying: "Raise your hand if you are a convicted rapist."

This is so rhetorical I don't know what else to say...

But, obviously, IMO, no, we should not kill it, that would kind of defeat the purpose of protecting endangered species in the first place.

Besides from preserving the ecosystem (or preventing bad consequence)

What exactly is the purpose of protecting endangered species?

A legitimate question, how rare

I looked around for something that might answer that well and found this:

http://www.endangeredspecie.com/Why_Save_.htm

Sorry but none of that source is applicable to pandas, apart from aesthetic, but I don't consider "they look nice" to even come close to a sufficient reason.

So I've taken the kantian response, let's go utilitarian(JS Mill version). Let's spend all the money that would have saved pandas on saving people. Bam,

No sufficient reason has been given so far for this specific circumstance.

I'm considering animals' necessity to live on a species by species basis.

I'm not really surprised that wasn't good for you...

Well, say for example a vast highly-evolved race of space-traveling beings took notice of Earth and realized humans were leading themselves to destruction but because humans had nothing to contribute to their society, they decide not to do anything and let us bring our own eventual downfall.

If that doesn't affect your argument in any way, then I've got nothing else to say.

 

[Custard_Angel]

It's one of the cutest animals I've ever seen.

Definitely not allowing them to become extinct.

I forbid it.

 

[Woodsey]

Much as I think humans are one massive collective parasitic organism and pity the animals they wiped out just to fufill their own desires, yes.

Yeah well, someone had to stop the mice.

OT: It seems a bit of a futile effort. From my understanding they won't fuck each other, and even though they eat bamboo, they're not actually supposed to.

There comes a point where nature has to take its course - its unfortunate, but its happened to plenty of species before. Having said that, I don't think the ones that are being looked after now should simply be dumped back into the wild again.

 

[Gammaj4]

Hei Bei disapproves.

 

[flare09]

Creatures go extinct. They have been long before humans, and they will still be going extinct long after humans are gone themselves.

There is no point in trying to preserve things that can't stand on their own. Especially when they don't exactly provide much for anything else on this planet.

 

[Andothul]

Quite honestly Panda's ridiculous diet has doomed them to extinction eventually.

Humans just sped up the process.

 

[Baldry]

Nope. They're cute, that's my only logical reason to keep them around!

 

[Someone Depressing]

You know what people SHOULD SAY?

Fuck it.

It's the Panda's fault they're going extinct, it's their fault they don't fucking know how to have sex. Not our's.

Let the stupid, fat, boring, un-reasonable bastards die in peace.

 

[Jim-a-Lim]

Duty of care to animals. I think that it's an essential human quality.

 

[Sanglyon]

Spoiler

Pandas are a slap to Darwin's face (guess anything can exist if there isn't something to eat it or destroy their home)

Wait, what? "Anything can exist if there isn't something to eat it or destroy their home" is a slap to Darwin's face, why?

How does the existence of an animal without predators invalidate that those with predators only survive if they are fit to do so?

If they are fit to do so than so they should exist. However, can something not exist which precludes an environment that is hazardous to them? if there are no hazards, they can exist, is it not logical to think that? It doesn't invalidate them.

Pandas are a niche animal. If their niche is taken away, they shouldn't exist anymore. So their continued existence is whats strange not that they existed at all (probably should have been more clear, but this is the internet, if you don't clarify everything with a 12 page thesis statement some one is going to find fault in what you type regardless.)

In hindsight, i should have said slap to Darwin's Theories rather than slap to Darwin himself as he would most certainly approve of humans doing everything in their power to ensure the survival of a specie.

p.s. you probably should refrain from out of context partial quoting in the future.

Mmmh, I think this is just a misunderstanding. I didn't use partial quoting to change the meaning of your post, only save space.

I took that "a slap to Darwin" for "a rebuttal/proof against to Darwin", but it seems it was more in the sense of "an anormality". Sorry, cultural differences at work.

that'll teach me to hastily comment on this forum while at work. >_>

 

[DTWolfwood]

Spoiler

Pandas are a slap to Darwin's face (guess anything can exist if there isn't something to eat it or destroy their home)

Wait, what? "Anything can exist if there isn't something to eat it or destroy their home" is a slap to Darwin's face, why?

How does the existence of an animal without predators invalidate that those with predators only survive if they are fit to do so?

If they are fit to do so than so they should exist. However, can something not exist which precludes an environment that is hazardous to them? if there are no hazards, they can exist, is it not logical to think that? It doesn't invalidate them.

Pandas are a niche animal. If their niche is taken away, they shouldn't exist anymore. So their continued existence is whats strange not that they existed at all (probably should have been more clear, but this is the internet, if you don't clarify everything with a 12 page thesis statement some one is going to find fault in what you type regardless.)

In hindsight, i should have said slap to Darwin's Theories rather than slap to Darwin himself as he would most certainly approve of humans doing everything in their power to ensure the survival of a specie.

p.s. you probably should refrain from out of context partial quoting in the future.

Mmmh, I think this is just a misunderstanding. I didn't use partial quoting to change the meaning of your post, only save space.

I took that "a slap to Darwin" for "a rebuttal/proof against to Darwin", but it seems it was more in the sense of "an anormality". Sorry, cultural differences at work.

that'll teach me to hastily comment on this forum while at work. >_>

lol join the club i use this here forums to waste time at work it looks like im working hard with all the typing im doing XD

A nation would lose its national symbol. So there is no way China is gonna let that animal go bye bye anyhow.