Doesn't evolution teach us that organisms adapt to enviromental changes? Hence is it a matter of degrees as t

Question

to how much we should care for ecology?

Answer 1

Yes, but it also teaches it takes hundreds if not thousands or millions of years.

Answer 2

Yes, organisms adapt to environmental changes, but this takes time and facility. Whilst I agree that the natural ecosystem should be left alone in principle there are caveats:



1. Mankind has caused extinctions and destroyed ecosystems. Restoration of habitats is vitally important. Similarly reclamation of natural habitats which have been damaged by mankind should be a priority for example bioremediation of polluted sites. Stamets the author of the book referenced below has discovered ways in which Mycellium can be used to decompose toxic wastes and pollutants, catch and reduce silt from stream beds, pathogens from agricultural watersheds and can be used to control insect populations too. However, we are preventing the Mycellium from migrating which I discuss later.

2. Mankind is preventing natural migration, for example by urban development and intensive agriculture. Discuss later.

3. Misplaced sentiment/ideology has prevented traditional practices from protecting woods which have resulted in devastating losses of ecosystems. I will discuss this further.

4. Our attempts to retain diversity are worsening the situation. For example our arrogance is leading to unnecessary loss of diversity through man's actions. To give one example, we excuse ourselves of reducing diversity by having seed libraries, in which thousands of seeds are stored.

However, many of these seeds are considered to be no longer viable. Others, even if they are viable, will not have made the necessary adaptations needed to survive. The only way to do this is allowing the plants to grow naturally, migrate and adapt. By storing seeds in this way and using it as an excuse to allow destruction of habitats then we are 'freezing' those seeds to that moment in time. Arrogance and ignorance.

2. Mushrooms 'Mycellium' are regulating the earth's ecosystems, recycling carbon, nitrogen and other essential elements as they break down plant and animal matter to create new soil. They are essential for the health of our soil and ecosystem. Mycellium are the 'missing' keys to both human and the Earth's health. Trees and other green plants could not grow and reach maturity without symbiotic associations with mycelium, the network of fungal threads in the soil that act as interfaces between plant roots and nutrients. Certain kinds of mycelium grow into the roots of plants, sometimes right into the root cells of plants. They trade sugars made by the plants for nutrients and water brought to the roots by the Mycelium. Some mycorrhiza have specific plant hosts others are generalized, they are not parasitic.

But we are losing them before we can even identify them. We are reducing biodiversity, through man's activity from clear cutting forests to developing land which stops them migrating and adapting. We are destabilizing nutrient cycles, which results in crop failures, loss of diversity and the need for ever more invasive farming techniques/chemicals to be used so contributing to global warming.

The existence/absence of mycellium (fungi) in the soils is vital to the Earth's survival, hence mankind's but we are preventing their migration and adaptation by urban development. Mycellium can take hundreds of years to be re-established, if at all. People are actively trying to help Mycellium 'run' by putting spore prints on their clothes when they go out for a walk. More home orchards need to be planted, city centers need to be greened to encourage new growth. It is OUR actions that are preventing it continuing. We can take our chances on adaptation, but if it does not survive, we do not.

3. In the UK trees and woods need to be managed. Traditionally since circa 1066 woods have been coppiced. This is a sustainable way of removing useful timber without losing the actual tree and preventing the tree getting so old that it dies. Ash trees are a perfect example of this. An uncoppiced Ash Tree would be lucky to reach eighty years as it is extremely susceptible to fungal attack. When coppiced some of the more famous examples can be 900 years old.

Ideally, we could leave all woodland alone and it would renew itself however, this is not possible. In the UK our native trees are on the edge of their climatic range, seed production is extremely sporadic and successful growth from seed to mature tree is rare in nature. Which is why we have forests with trees that are a thousand years old, there have been no replacements; the old existing trees have not been naturally replaced by self seeded saplings.

So even if we do manage to grow trees from seed away from the woods, the character of a plantation will never come close to matching that of an ancient wood.

How has it come to this stage? There has been few naturally seeded/grown trees because of climatic changes, the old trees have not been coppiced and people are sentimental about old trees. They are 'loving' them to death. Without a change of the sentimental but ignorant attitude towards the management of woods, trees and woods will continue to die and so will all the associated flora and fauna. Trees and woods are living things, as such, they have an age limit as all living things do. People managed woods by the traditional methods of coppicing for hundreds of years which artificially extended trees' lives. What we are seeing now is just the natural end of old trees. As there are no naturally grown replacements it will be the end of the woods as we know them in the UK too.

This is because many trees in the UK are so old now, generally oaks, that people have formed an attachment to them as they stand. Any ancient woodland left is now protected by legislation. They can only die now. They are probably too old to resume coppicing so they are all approaching the end of their natural life and will die out. Only recently we have stopped managing woodlands in the traditional way.

So basically we have got ourselves into a bit of a situation, most trees in this country can not be replaced for a number of reasons, for example: oaks are afflicted by American Oak Mildew which they have little or no resistance to and it is thought to modify their ability to grow in a Woodland situation, ie being able to cope with shade and dry conditions. This tends to affect their viability.

These woods have not adapted to environmental changes, they can not be replaced and they have not self seeded because of climate change. Evolution teaches us that organisms adapt to environmental changes or DIE out.

How much should we care for ecology? As far as the Mycellium is concerned; How much should we care for Mankind's existence? If it dies out, then we do too.

Answer 3

Organisms can't "want" to adapt. It takes millions of years.

Answer 4

evolution do we come from a monkey?? were we made by god?? who made the monkey?? an explossion??

Answer 5

good point. the way i see it, man IS nature. Our litter and the fumes from our exhausts, all nature. Now, we have to wonder, what kind of nature do we want?

Answer 6

No no no... you've got it wrong.  Adaptation occurs through natural selection and mutation.  Changes that are more beneficial are more likely to be successful and hence, those carrying them are more likely to reproduce.  Those without adaptable mutations... are less likely to reproduce and those changes are less likely to enter the gene pool.

Sometimes the environment changes and some mutations which were neutral or not detrimental enough to be evolved out of the genome become advantages... and sometimes changes to the environment promote changes to the genome indirectly...

However, in the history of the planet we've seen this happen mostly with adaptation being successful through minor changes... with some notable exceptions being the survival of mammals through the extinction events of the dinosaurs.

But the dinosaurs are a perfect example of the flip side:  If the environment changes drastically, even if not immediately, what occurs is extinction, not adaptation.

So yes, you and I and everyone else should care about ecology.

If you want another example.. people make beer all of the time.  Yeast haven't adapted to survive in lethal quantities of alcohol yet.

We're yeast... pollution is our alcohol, our waste.  Think about it.

Answer 7

who wants to adapt to a barren, poisoned, waterless, stinking environment?

adapt the mindset of this question to evolve into a caring, careful, observant participant w/ the beauty of nature.

Answer 8

Yes, in a way that is true.

Other species have exhausted their environment and gone extinct or have population explosions followed by mass die-offs.

It all depends on whether you think we deserve to be around for the next few millennia and care about the quality of life for those still alive.

As a race, human beings are breeding themselves into extinction. We are displacing and destroying many other life forms some of which will affect our own survival.

If (as is pretty unlikely) we manage this peacefully, the world will be a rather nasty place to live in. Some big 3rd world cities give us an idea of what it wil be like.

A far more likely outcome is another series of huge wars, (probably over resources or space) that will thin us out a bit.

Evolution doesn't care about us. We will be just another mass extinction. A rather more interesting one than those comet strikes, but essentially the same.  

Not a very appealing future for humans, but we have got to take some credit for enabling a whole new phase of life on earth to evolve!

Answer 9

Yes organisms do adapt to changes in the environment. But this generally happens through natural selection, over several generations. (Woolly mammouths for example didn't all suddenly become woolly; there were several generations with more and more hair on them being better adapted to the colder & colder environment).

The problem is that man creates environmental changes that happen much more quickly than "in nature". The organisms can't adapt quickly enough and so can die out.

Answer 10

in a way you are right but when we are causing a change (deforestisation) that the process of adaption can not ceep up with at any rate we should care and do something

Answer 11

I totally agree, other species are much better at adapting than we are. The press and gov etc go mental when a species is close to extinction but many species have gone extinct in the past before we came along, perhaps thats just the way it's supposed to be. Let mother nature do what she's gotta do.

Answer 12

Well our children will just have to adapt to breathing carbon monoxide and diesel fumes then.