Ehhhh… I mean it would likely eventually lead to an ecological collapse. There is no such thing as a truly natural ecosystem in North America.
Even before Europeans cut down virtually all old growth Forrest, native Americans spent thousands of years reshaping the forest ecology to suit their needs. Resulting in large game like deer to have very few predators or competition to manage their population growth.
Deer need to be hunted to manage their own population from diseases stemming from over population. They also need to be hunted so they don’t strip the forest floor from low lying vegetation that other animals depend on for food and habitat.
And no, reintroducing wolves would not take care of the problem, not at least for the vast majority of north America. It would help, but wolves weren’t exactly out competing humans when it came to hunting big game in NA.
In an ideal world I think we could resolve this with sterilizations and such - in fact I think if humans survive and flourish, we will reshape earth’s ecology completely to eliminate almost all suffering. But we’re sadly really really far away from this world. I think even in the future (100s or 1000s of years), hunting for population control can be allowed as long as there is a scientifically proven need for it and it is done humanely; in fact we can probably allow hunting to continue as it is right now, it’s an unnoticeable drop in the bucket (relevant xkcd).
Just banning animal farming would already eliminate so much unnecessary suffering that it’s a worthwhile thing on its own.
an ideal world I think we could resolve this with sterilizations and such - in fact I think if humans survive and flourish, we will reshape earth’s ecology completely to eliminate almost all suffering.
Right, but that wasn’t the question at hand. My response was solely based on the proposed question of what if we passed a law that prohibited the killing of any animal.
Just banning animal farming would already eliminate so much unnecessary suffering that it’s a worthwhile thing on its own.
Yeah, I’d be down for banning the commercial meat industry, but that wasn’t the question. Just from an ecological perspective, farmed meat is going to kill us all in the long run.
I just don’t think that reflectively banning all harm to animals is as simple as this question presupposes.
I think passing a law that prohibited killing animals is a good step, though.
In fact the article talks about how we already have this law, there’s just a huge list of exemptions making it practically useless. If we remove most of those exemptions and only keep the ones that are required for scientifically & ethically valid reasons (be it population control or self-defense) it would make a huge positive difference to almost all aspects of life on earth.
Ehhhh… I mean it would likely eventually lead to an ecological collapse. There is no such thing as a truly natural ecosystem in North America.
Even before Europeans cut down virtually all old growth Forrest, native Americans spent thousands of years reshaping the forest ecology to suit their needs. Resulting in large game like deer to have very few predators or competition to manage their population growth.
Deer need to be hunted to manage their own population from diseases stemming from over population. They also need to be hunted so they don’t strip the forest floor from low lying vegetation that other animals depend on for food and habitat.
And no, reintroducing wolves would not take care of the problem, not at least for the vast majority of north America. It would help, but wolves weren’t exactly out competing humans when it came to hunting big game in NA.
In an ideal world I think we could resolve this with sterilizations and such - in fact I think if humans survive and flourish, we will reshape earth’s ecology completely to eliminate almost all suffering. But we’re sadly really really far away from this world. I think even in the future (100s or 1000s of years), hunting for population control can be allowed as long as there is a scientifically proven need for it and it is done humanely; in fact we can probably allow hunting to continue as it is right now, it’s an unnoticeable drop in the bucket (relevant xkcd).
Just banning animal farming would already eliminate so much unnecessary suffering that it’s a worthwhile thing on its own.
Right, but that wasn’t the question at hand. My response was solely based on the proposed question of what if we passed a law that prohibited the killing of any animal.
Yeah, I’d be down for banning the commercial meat industry, but that wasn’t the question. Just from an ecological perspective, farmed meat is going to kill us all in the long run.
I just don’t think that reflectively banning all harm to animals is as simple as this question presupposes.
I think passing a law that prohibited killing animals is a good step, though.
In fact the article talks about how we already have this law, there’s just a huge list of exemptions making it practically useless. If we remove most of those exemptions and only keep the ones that are required for scientifically & ethically valid reasons (be it population control or self-defense) it would make a huge positive difference to almost all aspects of life on earth.