1. What are the negative effects that air pollution may have to New York city’s residents and which areas in New York have the greatest air pollution?
2. How has the lack of sanitation and cleanliness in certain parts of New York city affected the spread, rate and variety of diseases and infections?
3. Which areas in New York city have the best and worst quality of tap water and what factors in those areas contributes to that quality?
1. How closely is obesity related to poverty and neighborhood conditions?
2. Is the number of pests increasing in New York City subway stations? What are the effects of such pests?
3. Are there any recent invasive species in New York City? What are the impacts?
1. How effective has New York been in preventing smoking adults and the effects of secondhand smoke?
2. What other methods of pest control can the city use besides pesticides?
3. How can we avoid the potential health effects of smoke and air pollutants?
1. How has the use of pesticides effected wildlife in NYC?
2. How does the water quality differ in each borough and what is the cause of any difference?
3. If the state starts to use geo-fracking, what are the potential consequences to health of plants and animals in the area?
1. Investigate the quality of NYC drinking water
2. The relationship between living conditions and birth defects
3. The relationship between living conditions and cancer rates.
1. How has air pollution in NYC affected the health of its residents?
2. How/has NYC drinking water affected its residents? What health issues have resulted from this?
3. How has the NYC rodent population affected the biodiversity of this city?
Which NY areas have the most amount of air pollution?
Which NY areas produce the most amount of waste, and what types of waste?
How has the increasing rodent population in NY altered the biodiversity in the state?
What effects do emissions and pollution have on the biodiversity and life of plants and flora in an urban environment?
Do pests such as cockroaches and mice have any positive effects on the urban ecosystem?
Does the New York City environment have any effects on cancer?
1. Has pollution in the surrounding NYC rivers changed in the past years? and if so how has it affected the marine life?
2. Will future Shale Fracking affect NYC drinking water?
3. Has the new restaurant grading system really helped prevent foodborne illnesses in NYC?
1. How does the environment affect birth defects? How large of a role does the environment play on birth defects?
2. How do pests(i.e. rodents, bed bugs) affect the environment and humans? Where are they found most in the city/New York? How are they dealt with and are the methods used affecting the environment negatively?
3. How do pets affect human health and the environment?
1. Is proximity to parks related to healthy behavior? If so, what healthy behaviors have such a relationship and what are the relationships?
2. How is housing quality related to the prevalence of pests and health issues?
3. Is there a relationship between biodiversity and prevalence of pests and, if so, what is the relationship?
Do you think your rambunctious garden is possible globally, or just in first world countries?
If there were to be a global initiative to manage the conservationist movements you’ve suggested, who do you think should manage it? (e.g. governments, private sector, separate international board)
Have you had any thoughts about using new movements in technology in helping the environment?
1. What are some of the effects of CO2 emissions on biodiversity in urban parks throughout NYC?
2. How safe is NYC tap water (drinking water quality)?
3. What are the different types of rodents present in the NYC subway system and how have these species adapted to this urban environment?
1. What ecological factors contribute to birth defects and complications in NYC?
2. How are ecosystems affected by the quality of drinking water?
3. How does species diversity differ amongst the 5 boroughs?
How diverse are the different parks of New York?
How does air pollution correlate to disease in the city?
Does higher rodent populations correlate with certain diseases?
1. How are the biodiversity in New York City? Is there a specific species that only dwell in one particular region of a borough? Why?
2. Is there any change of pollinators in New York City? Was there any extinct species? How does current species carry out pollinating in New York City?
3. How does pollution in New York City affect species and people?
1. How have the modes of transportation used by New Yorkers shifted in recent years? (Car, train, bike, carpool, etc.)
2. Does the amount of parkland in each borough affect the borough’s air quality?
1. What kind of environmental factors affect the number of children born with Down Syndrome to mothers under the age of 35?
2. How do holes and cracks in buildings affect the types of pests that live in the city?
3. What effects do exterminators have on the ecosystems that exist in the city?
1. What kind of environmental factors contribute most to different birth outcomes? Are differences across neighborhoods related to differences in environmental quality?
2. What indicators of housing quality are most related to poorer health among residents? Is it the architectural structure, maintenance deficiencies, cracks and holes, or etc. ?
3. How are the presence of parks in neighborhoods related, if at all, to pests in and air quality of the area?
1. How do the levels of nitrate in the drinking water affect young children in various areas of New York?
2. How does the rate at which pesticides are used decrease the amount of insects in an area of New York and how does it affect human health?
3. In what ways does housing quality affect the health of people?
1. Do varying flora diversity levels have an effect on air quality in the different regions of NYC?
2. Do gas emissions affect the biodiversity of NYC?
3. Are there differences in the levels of skin cancer between NYC and suburban NY?
1) How do pesticides effect biodiversity/ species diversity in NYC?
2) How do different urban living conditions affect human development/health?
3) How do pest infestations affect human populations and their health?
1. How does deteriorating buildings and houses affect the health of individuals living in a neighborhood?
2. How does poor living conditions (exposure to toxic chemicals, lead hazards) contribute to birth defects for babies born in New York City?
3. How does the amount of parks and the accessibility of parks affect the health of residents throughout New York City?
1. How is New York City’s environment affected by the use of pesticides to kill insects?
2. Does the pollution present in New York City’s atmosphere have any detrimental affects on children?
3. How do bed bugs affect New York City and how do they represent the cleanliness of the area?
1. Where are bed bugs most common and what causes them to more common in some areas and not others? How do they affect human health? About two years ago, there were bed bugs reported in many place in New York. Had the number of bed bugs been increasing up to that point? Is the number increasing or decreasing now?
2. Where in the city is pesticide use the greatest? How does the use of pesticides differ in various parts of the city? What is the effect of pesticide use on human health?
3. How do birth outcomes differ geographically? What role does the environment play in birth outcomes?
1. How did bed bugs contaminate NYC and what are its effects on the NYC public?
2. What effect does the NYC environment play on children’s birth defects?
3. How does the use of pesticide affect the NYC environment?
How are smoking rates different from city and suburban area?
Compare different species in Central Park and Highline Park (for example growth, and diversity)
Which New York City area has the greatest air pollution, and how does it affect people’s health?
1. How are New Yorkers affected by changes in transportation and mass transportation capacity?
2. What neighborhood conditions encourage/discourage obesity for young adults?
3. What neighborhoods have the most dilapidated/deteriorating buildings, and what effects do these buildings have on a neighborhood?
1. How polluted are the rivers in the tri-state area? How are their ecosystems different or similar?
2. Is there a difference in the quality of drinking water throughout the five boroughs? If so, what health issues have risen?
3. How can species in different regions of New York City (parks in different boroughs) be compared? What are some of the reasons for similarities and differences among these regions?
1. Does proximity to biodiversity have an effect on cancer rates or birth defects?
2. Does the high concentration of gas emissions in New York have an effect on the type of plants that thrive in New York City? Do some plants build up resistance to emissions?
3. Is there a correlation between population density in New York City and the level of biodiversity in the area? What differences in health factors are most prevalent between the areas with a lot of biodiversity and not as much?
1. What is the effect of variations in flora diversity levels on air quality in different regions of New York City?
2. What are the differences in skin cancer rates in NYC vs. suburbs due to high rises in urban areas?
3. What are the effects of gas emissions on biodiversity in urban areas?
How polluted are the rivers in New York City and how have they affected the marine population?
How much biodiversity do New York City parks have and how has it been affected by invasive species?
Does New York City have a lot of air pollution?
1. How doe the quality of NYC drinking water affect urban ecosystems in NYC?
2. Which environmental factors contribute to heart attacks in NYC? How?
3. How does urban ecology and human behaviors impact the amount of birth defects in NYC?
1) How is land conserved in New York City? What are the factors that conservationists and ecologists take into consideration when deciding what plots of land to conserve? Is it based largely on the biodiversity of the land? What species are more likely to be protected?
2) With the recent sightings of coyotes in New York City, why are coyotes settling in certain areas in NYC and not others. Is the probability of coyotes migrating to other densely populated parts of NYC high or low? How long will it take for coyotes to become an integral part of its new ecosystem ?
3) What types of diseases do invasive species bring with them? Or do the species get diseases after coming into a new ecosystem? Do these diseases pose a threat to animals, humans or both?
1. Is there any trend that indicates that New York City’s energy is getting cleaner? If so, how is New York City getting cleaner energy? If not, what steps should New York City take to get cleaner energy?
2. Why are pests, such as cockroaches and mice, more common in certain areas of New York City? Is the overall number of pests increasing or decreasing in New York City?
3. What are some recent invasive species in New York City? How have these species affected humans or other species in the area?
1. In the tri-state area, what are some of the effects on the plant species based on the progression of the pollinator species? Have they grown or declined?
2. What is the ecological progression among the species between Westchester, New York City, Long Island, and New Jersey? What are some of the triggers for this?
3. What are some of the trends among the bodies of water around the tri-state area that can be observed within species, climate, and soil?
1. What are the similarities and differences between the Hudson River and the East River? How are they connected?
2. Is there a change in the population of pollinators in New York City over time? If so, what caused it?
3. How do the number and types of species differ between the five boroughs? What caused this difference?
How have beekeeping policies affected biodiversity and flora patterns? How have bees themselves coped with the urban environment?
How has air traffic affected the migratory patterns of birds over New York City? To what extent is the disruption as significant as it is publicized?
What is the effect of high-rises on wildlife compared to smaller, low-story structures? To what extent do they significantly affect terrestrial species?
1. How does the rate of lung cancer differ in the different neighborhoods of New York City? What are the possible causes for these rates to differ? What are some environmental factors that cause lung cancer?
2. How do the concentrations of cockroaches differ around NYC? Why is there a greater presence of cockroaches in certain areas? How do cockroaches have an effect on human health?
3. How does the quality of drinking water differ in the neighborhoods of NYC? What are the reasons behind these differences in water quality? How do certain water contaminants affect human health?
In chapter 10, the final chapter of the Rambunctious Garden, Emma Marris outlines seven major goals of conservation. The purpose is to point out that no single goal provides a solution; we need to give up the idea of pristine wilderness and work around these major goals outlined by her. Every piece of land is different; therefore we must apply a combination of various different methods to each situation.
Goal One: Protect the Rights of other Species. The first goal emphasizes deep ecology, i.e. looking after all living species because they have intrinsic value. We shouldn’t be concerned about conservation only because that species benefits humans at the end. However, the problem comes in when dealing with rights of one animal over another. The idea of intrinsic value differs based on perspectives therefore results in some problems when dealing with invasive species.
Goal Two: Protecting the Charismatic Megafauna. The second goal emphasizes the human love for large mammals with large eyes. As humans, we love some species more than others based on their appearance, such as dolphins, tigers, pandas etc. Even though, the idea of saving species based on human love for them seems unethical, studies have shown that larger animals often form the keystone species therefore their survival is critical to the maintenance of that ecosystem.
Goal Three: Slow the Rate of Extinctions. The third goal emphasizes the extinction value of species. For this goal, Marris talks about mathematical ecology, which uses algorithms to model the practicality and financial burden of saving one species vs. another. Using such an approach can result in humans losing species that they really love, as well as mirrors breeding because efficiency is stressed out.
Goals Four: Protect Genetic diversity. The third goal focuses on the concept of species. Often times a population is genetically far more different, than another closely related species. As a result, the importance preserving genetic diversity as opposed to just species comes in. It allows for greater complexity of life and helps with the process of evolution. Genetic diversity represents millions of years of evolutionary activity; hence protecting it is highly important. However the idea questions the value of the individual species. Is an animal only important because of its varied gene pool? In that case genetic diversity can simply be preserved in laboratories. As a result, in her fifth goal Marris outlines definition of biodiversity and why it’s important.
Goal 6: Maximize ecological services & Goal 7: Protect the spiritual and aesthetic experience of nature, present contrasting point of views. Maximizing ecological services mirrors an economic approach of maximizing profit, where finite resources are implemented in such a way that the output is the greatest. Ecological services are estimated at billions of dollars, therefore it does make sense to follow that. However, maximizing services doesn’t necessarily guarantee aesthetics. On the contrary, protecting the spiritual and aesthetic experience of nature focuses on the emotional response we get from looking at nature that often various from person to person. Both goals 6 and 7 are rather extreme and something, which is a combination, would be a more acceptable.
Marris sums up her book with the notion that a single approach is not adequate to utilize every form of land and forming rambunctious gardens. Hence, she provides 7 goals which can be used for conservation.
Poster Questions:
What is the trend in the prevalence of different cancers in various geographic locations? What possible environmental factors could have led to this?
How does drinking water quality differ in various parts of NYC and what factors contribute to this? What health issues have resulted?
How does the use of pesticides differ geographically and what health effects can result from exposure to pesticides?
Possible Poster Questions:
1. Which New York City subway station contains the highest rat population and how does New York City control the rat population?
2. What diseases are killing organisms in the New York City area and which of them can directly affect humans?
3. Which cities in the United States have the cleanest air and which have the most polluted? Why?
In the final chapter of her book, Rambunctious Garden, Emma Marris outlines seven major goals of conservation. However, her point is that there is no single goal that will be suited for all situations. Marris believes we need to let go of the pristine and focus on common goals for every piece of land.
The first goal Marris presents is the biocentric view of life, which aims to protect the rights of other species. This idea is also termed “deep ecology,” believing that all living things have intrinsic value and should be protected. Of course, ecologists do not agree on which species should hold more value than others. Hence, when choosing between the rights of cats and the rights of albatross nestlings they are destroying, there is a great deal of uncertainty among deep ecologists (221). As a result, conservation based on biocentric goals is going to differ depending on perspective.
The second goal Marris presents is the idea of protecting the charismatic metafauna, or the very large animals that humans love. Such species include whales, dolphins, elephants, gorillas, tigers, pandas, etc. While it may seem selfish of humans to prefer larger species, scientists have found that many of the most popular are keystone species. Meaning, these species are integral parts of the ecosystem and as a result, preserving them would mean helping to preserve the species that live alongside them. However, simply focusing on one set of species can get highly emotional and is not always guaranteed to provide an umbrella for the lesser-advocated species.
In presenting the third goal, Marris cites Hugh Possingham, an Australian mathematical ecologist, to show that slowing extinction rates does not always protect ecosystems. Possingham believed that the extinction value of every species was equal and as a result, we should focus on the more financially feasible protection projects. This means that some favorite species will be lost because it is too financially taxing to invest in their cause. It also means that protecting species is sometimes implemented through captive breeding programs to be efficient with resources. Hence, the mathematical approach to slowing extinction is not all encompassing.
Goals four and five focus on protecting genetic diversity and defending biodiversity. Defining these terms are crucial to developing plans for conservation. Some organizations choose to focus on protecting animals that are genetically “weird” in hopes of preserving millions of years of evolution. In the case of biodiversity, the complexity of ecosystems makes it difficult to pinpoint what needs to be preserved. As a result, there is a lot of gray area when tackling conservation from the perspective of preserving biodiversity and even genetic diversity.
The last two goals of maximizing ecosystem services and protecting the spiritual/aesthetic experience of nature provide contrasting approaches to conservation. Focusing on ecosystem services is a practical approach that realizes we have finite resources that need to be preserved. However, this approach does not account for biodiversity or aesthetic beauty. On the other hand, the idea of protecting nature for its spiritual and aesthetic qualities is an emotional approach that attributes value to the beauty of nature. Hence, we must once again choose between what is practical and what we value.
Altogether, these seven goals stress the need for compromise. We cannot simply view conservation through a single lens. Each party involved in the conservation effort of a piece of land must decide what their individual goals are and find common ground between those goals. This is the idea of the rambunctious garden, where there are different chunks of wilderness in different places conserved with different motives.
Marris starts off the last chapter by saying that when dealing with the preservation or care of nature no single goal will work out in every possible scenario. So, this means that for every piece of land out there we have to come together and create a common set of goals to help preserve it. Lucky for us she provides us with some sort of basis in the form of seven goals to go about creating a set of common goals amongst ourselves.
The first goal she mentions is, to protect the right of other species. I like the analogy she gave here about all of us species being a community it might be a little cliché but it kind of reminded me of the lion king and how every living thing has a purpose in the circle of life. Furthermore the quote she put there from Aldo Leopold fits in very well with this idea, “When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect” This basically means that people usually take care of their communities in a certain manner and treating the community with a certain degree of dedication and care is important for the survival of the community.
The second goal she mentions, in my opinion isn’t really a goal it’s more about kissing up to the people. This means that try and preserve certain species that people care about like Dolphins, Polar Bears, Tigers or Panda Bears, because if people like them they wont want to destroy them. Another reason that Ecologists say these animals have importance is that ecologists believe them to have a great effect on how the ecosystem works. Furthermore if the animal lives in a large amount of area it might help get people to agree to protect the whole area and not just the species.
The third goal that she mentions is the one of slowing the rate of extinctions. So, if a certain species is not doing too well for whatever reason you should keep some of the species elsewhere like a zoo. (She used in her example amphibians) Now she brought a very big problem with this goal in that lets say the environment changes so much that the amphibians can no longer survive there, should they forever be in the zoo? She brought a good point by saying keeping the amphibians in a box to save amphibian diversity is a lot like keeping Incan art in a museum to preserve their culture. But, I feel like her response is a good answer, we may not be able to save ecosystems, but at least we could save species.
The fourth goal is to preserve genetic diversity for example, even though a polar bear may be closely related to a brown bear even more so than other brown bears, this does not mean we should let it go extinct. So, while species diversity is important Genetic diversity is just as important. The quote she brings from Nick Isaac sums it up pretty well, “You are in a spaceship leaving Earth with three paintings. Do you take three Rembrandts, or do you take one Rembrandt, one Leonardo and one Picasso?”
The fifth goal is to preserve biodiversity, you don’t just want to save every species and have them in zoos on display. The point is for them to be able to exist in nature in the way that they evolved to exist.
The sixth goal is to maximize ecosystem services in other words the grass is making oxygen for us for free. Marris then proposes that in that case we should just take the plant that does this the best and to just use that one. An answer Marris gave to this is that there is existence value, where knowing that other species exists has value.
The Seventh goal and in my opinion, the most important is how nature is aesthetically pleasing to us, it gives us a sense of relaxation and every once in a while people use nature to get away from it all and refresh themselves, therefore we should preserve it.
Marris ends off by saying one goal isn’t going to cut it in every situation and sometimes your going to have to put in more effort to preserve the land. But, she also mentions how “we have forever altered the Earth, and so now we cannot abandon it to a random fate. It is our duty to manage it.”
When I was reading chapter eight and chapter nine the main thing I understood from it is how Marris is trying to take us into a new path in dealing with nature, more specifically one that involves the future of nature. The first thing I found important while I was doing the reading is this concept that Marris introduced to me known as the Designer Ecosystem. For one thing it caught me off guard because earlier in her book she talked about the concept of Rewilding and this is the exact opposite. Rewilding is a way of reverting nature from how it is now to its former pristine form. Basically this means that conservationists would take a piece of land and try to return it to how it was a few thousand years ago before the influence of man took hold. Designer Ecosystems from what I understood is a way of organizing the ecosystem around a certain place or in a certain manner that will be beneficial in some way. One example that Marris provides is how they are fixing certain parts of the ecosystem to remove Nitrogen from the water. To be more specific she explains how in one place they tried to design a stream but after adding a certain amount of boulders into the ecosystem she says herself it “looks more like a wet land than a stream”. But, to emphasize her point she is showing how by manipulating the ecosystem it can prove to be beneficial. Furthermore, in my opinion this is a much better approach to conservation than rewilding. For one thing even without human interaction nature would have changed, so reverting the ecosystem to how it ‘used to be’ doesn’t make sense, I mean some of the changes would have occurred without our interference, so this form of conservation whereby we design the ecosystem to have a beneficial purpose seems to make more sense. I mean why try and fix a broken past, when instead we could look towards a better future. As for chapter nine again in my opinion she is telling us to watch for the future. The way she does this could clearly be seen in the beginning of the chapter when she brings a story about when she was kayaking in a river in Seattle, Washington and she witnessed a Salmon do an impressive jump a few feet from her kayak. She then proceeds to try and make us guess where she was; she starts off by asking us to guess if she was in the Sol Duc River or even if she was in a rainforest in British Columbia. Then she juxtaposes those two by saying she witnessed this in the middle of Seattle. In my opinion she is showing us how nature is everywhere, like in the heart of a city and since the title of the chapter is called “Conservation Everywhere” she is telling us to conserve all the nature, literally everywhere. So to reiterate my initial claim I truly believe in these two chapters where Marris is trying to tell us to care for the future of nature.
Chapter 10 of Emma Marris’ Rambunctious Garden provides seven goals for humans to follow so that we may move towards solving the ecological preservation conundrum. In short, Marris advocates we “give up romantic notions of a stable Eden, be honest about goals and costs, keep land from mindless development, and try just about everything” (170).
Marris’ first goal entails protecting the rights of other species. All of nature has an inherent value, or land ethic, that covers every living and non-living feature. However, this can be tough to adhere to at times when the rights of certain species conflict with another.
The Marris asserts, “The land as a unit has a right to run itself without human meddling in some places” (156). By practicing deep ecology as opposed to shallow ecology, humans can learn to care for the environment while simultaneously caring for themselves.
Protecting charismatic megafauna is Marris’ third goal. The term charismatic megafauna refers to species that humans like and are more inclined to save. Such animals include whales, dolphins, elephants, gorillas, tigers and pandas – all big mammals with big eyes. When protected, these animals become keystone species that can lead to the umbrella conservation (or unintentional conservation) of species that live alongside them.
Next would be to slow the rate of extinctions. Every species should be equally worthy of protection. This means creating “conservation hotspots” and zones where endangered species live together. One of the problems, however, is that “narrowly focusing on stopping extinctions…saves species but not necessarily ecosystems” (160).
Fourth is to protect genetic diversity. Unfortunately, the distinctions between species are not always clear-cut and this lends to obscurity when deciding which groups of organisms are eligible for endangered species protection. Marris argues, “if the genes are more important…then you don’t even need to keep living populations going in zoos…All you need are the sequences” (162).
Marris continues on to promote the idea that we must define and defend biodiversity. Protecting biodiversity is an illusive concept that emerged in the early twentieth century. Marris jests that biodiversity is the “shorthand of complexity” for it can become extremely intricate. In fact, biodiversity may end up being the most problematic conservation goal because there is so much to it.
Marris’ sixth goal is to maximize ecosystem service. Although the “what have you done for me lately” argument seems like an unrealistic one in ecology, Marris declares we must not treat resources as inexhaustible and valueless. Instead, we can create a mutual relationship in which both humans and our environment can benefit.
Lastly, Marris champions we protect the spiritual and aesthetic experience of nature. While everyone’s ideal image of nature differs, we must remember that it is not always pristine.
Marris concludes her chapter and book by stating that no one goal is better than another. While some are more or less feasible and others are easier said than done, we can all agree that nature, “…a place to refresh our spirits or to contemplate something that is grander than ourselves” is too precious to mistreat (167).
In the last chapter of Rambunctious Garden: Saving Nature in a Post-Wild World, Emma Marris lists seven goals for conserving nature. Throughout the novel, she presented new methods of attempting to save nature because older conservation methods are flawed and impractical. In order to understand how to best preserve nature in an area, we need know what our goals are. She explains that “no single goal will work in all situations” so people will need to come up with a common set of goals for each project. She then explains the seven goals, describing what the idea behind each one and why it might not work in certain cases.
The first goal is to protect the rights of other species. The idea behind this goal is that every species has an intrinsic value and should therefore be protected. Two problems that this goal faces involve determining what the intrinsic value of a species is and conflicts between the rights of individual plants or animals and the protection of a population or species. As an example of the first problem, this goal is sometimes only applied to animals when plants and landscapes deserve rights too. Marris exemplifies the second problem by suggesting a case in which cats are killing all the albatross nestlings on an island and the cats may have to be killed.
The second goal is to protect charismatic megafauna. The idea behind this goal is humans like certain large animals and don’t want to see them go extinct. In many cases, these charismatic megafauna are keystone species, which greatly impact an ecosystem, and protecting them will benefit the entire ecosystem. A problem with this goal is that protecting charismatic megafauna may not always be beneficial for other species in the ecosystem. The example Marris provides for this is an elephant park in Africa that has become overcrowded with elephants and plants species are suffering as a result.
The third goal is to slow the rate of extinctions. The idea behind this goal is that we should treat all species as equally and return the rate of extinctions to its state before humans interfered. The problems with this goal are that it can be too costly and it doesn’t necessarily save ecosystems.
The fourth goal is to protect genetic diversity. The idea behind this goal is to focus on saving species that are weird because they contain genes that have come from millions of years of evolution and aren’t present anywhere else. One problem with this goal is that a simple solution to it would be to simply save genetic samples of these species. This would mean that, although the genetic material would be safe, the organisms themselves might not exist alive in the real world.
The fifth goal is to define and defend biodiversity. The idea behind this goal is to protect variety of species, genes, and ecosystems. Two problems with this goal are that it is extremely complex and it may put more value on keystone species than redundant species.
The sixth goal is to maximize ecosystem services. The idea behind this goal is to focus on ecosystems and species that help humanity. The problem with this goal is that doesn’t necessarily protect species or ecosystems that do not provide a service but simply have an existence value, or a value that comes from just knowing that it exists.
The seventh goal is to protect the spiritual and aesthetic experience of nature. The basic idea behind this goal is to preserve natural environments because people like them. The problem with this is that people have the tendency to put less value on environments that are not pristine.
I believe that these are good goals to have for conservation and agree with Marris that we need a variety of goals so that we can protect the many different types of ecosystems that have different types of values for humans. Marris has presented many solutions to ecological problems but almost every one has drawbacks. In order to determine which solutions are viable for a particular problem, we need to know goals and which drawbacks ae acceptable given those goals.
