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Speaker 1: Pushkin from Pushkin Industries. This is Deep Background, the show

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Speaker 1: where we explore the stories behind the stories in the news.

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Speaker 1: I'm Noah Feldman. This May, the United Nations released a

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Speaker 1: report based on thousands of scientific studies, saying that a

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Speaker 1: million species are at risk of extinction. It said that

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Speaker 1: humans were altering the natural world at a quote unprecedented pace.

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Speaker 1: This is something that Elizabeth Culbert has been reporting on

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Speaker 1: for years. She's a staff writer at The New Yorker

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Speaker 1: and the author of the twenty fifteen Pulitzer Prize winning

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Speaker 1: book The Sixth Extinction, which is all about biodiversity loss

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Speaker 1: as a result of the human impact on the environment. Elizabeth,

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Speaker 1: thank you very much for being here with us. I

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Speaker 1: want to ask you about biodiversity from a range of perspectives,

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Speaker 1: and I want to start with the question of what

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Speaker 1: biodiversity is. It's a kind of catchy phrase, and we

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Speaker 1: all feel bad when we hear that biodiversity is endangered.

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Speaker 1: But what do we mean when we actually say biodiversity. Well,

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Speaker 1: that's a good question. I think that in its most

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Speaker 1: basic sense, you know, biodiversity refers to the variety of

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Speaker 1: life on Earth, and a sort of shorthand is often

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Speaker 1: how many species there are on Earth, and the fact

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Speaker 1: of the matter is, we don't know how many species

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Speaker 1: there are on Earth. They like to use that estimated

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Speaker 1: number of eight million, right, Yeah, I mean there are

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Speaker 1: all sorts of numbers that get thrown around because you know,

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Speaker 1: we've only sort of named and identified, you know, around

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Speaker 1: a million species, so people have to sort of extrapolate

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Speaker 1: from that based on, you know, the rate at which

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Speaker 1: you're discovering new species. Things like that. We do know,

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Speaker 1: don't we that? However, many species there are a whole

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Speaker 1: bunch of them are insects. Right. When people is that

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Speaker 1: eight million number, they tend to say five and a

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Speaker 1: half million or insects. And even if you accept that

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Speaker 1: as a total projection, they're saying that substantially more than

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Speaker 1: half of the species in our biodiversity measure are in

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Speaker 1: fact insects. Yes, the vast majority of species on Earth

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Speaker 1: are invertebrates, so you know, animals without a backbone, and

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Speaker 1: of those, the biggest group are insects. Yes, definitely. So

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Speaker 1: when we talk about the number of species on Earth,

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Speaker 1: no matter what it is, as you point out, or

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Speaker 1: even what order of magnitude it is, it's likely that

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Speaker 1: you know, a great, great proportion of that will be insects.

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Speaker 1: So can I ask a follow on question? That's it's

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Speaker 1: a little philistinish, I fear, but I actually think it,

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Speaker 1: So I want to ask you about it. And it's this,

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Speaker 1: when we're talking about these vast numbers and then we

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Speaker 1: talk about decline, what is the thing that we're supposed

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Speaker 1: to be so panicked about, right, if we were to

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Speaker 1: go from eight million species and I understand it's not

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Speaker 1: a real number to seven million species, what is it

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Speaker 1: it's inherently so worrisome about that observation on its own. Well,

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Speaker 1: I think there are a number of different ways to

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Speaker 1: answer that question. And the first one that comes to

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Speaker 1: mind is if you're eliminating you know, a million species,

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Speaker 1: that's an indicator that something very very serious is going on.

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Speaker 1: And if you're a living organism, you know, like a human,

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Speaker 1: you might wonder, you know, why, why is that happening?

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Speaker 1: And how is it going to impact you know, my species,

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Speaker 1: because it's pretty unlikely that you're getting rid of, let's

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Speaker 1: just say, even an eighth of the species on Earth

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Speaker 1: with no impacts. Now, if you want to look at it,

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Speaker 1: you know, kind of what does this mean to me?

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Speaker 1: What are those million species mean to me? Right now?

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Speaker 1: I think the answer that you could give is you

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Speaker 1: just don't know. You know, human life, though we live

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Speaker 1: in this sort of a lot of manufactured habitat most

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Speaker 1: of us, most of the time, we're still absolutely vitally

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Speaker 1: dependent on the biological world, biological geochemical cycles, which we're

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Speaker 1: screwing around with very very dramatically right now, and that's

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Speaker 1: why we're seeing these very high extinction rates. And which

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Speaker 1: species we actually depend on, which species are absolutely crucial

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Speaker 1: to human life, we don't know, But you wouldn't want

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Speaker 1: to screw around with it to the point that you

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Speaker 1: find out and realize, oh, that that was the one

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Speaker 1: that was really crucial. So can I follow on that too? Though?

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Speaker 1: I hear the argument and it sounds like it's an

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Speaker 1: argument from uncertainty, right It says something like, that's a

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Speaker 1: lot of species. Anytime you're losing a high percentage of

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Speaker 1: what's out there in the world, things could go terribly awry,

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Speaker 1: and we just don't know how that might be the case.

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Speaker 1: So you know, why not try to mitigate and avoid

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Speaker 1: the things that are causing this decline in species? If

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Speaker 1: that's the argument I tell me first time, I getting

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Speaker 1: it right. Well, I mean that's I could offer you

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Speaker 1: another argument, and that would simply be an ethical argument.

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Speaker 1: I suppose what gives humans, you know, we obviously have

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Speaker 1: the ability to eliminate a lot of species. What gives

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Speaker 1: us the right, as it were, to do that. I'd

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Speaker 1: like to talk about both of those, if it's if

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Speaker 1: it's okay with you. They both seem super important. The

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Speaker 1: first is a kind of human centric argument, right, you know,

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Speaker 1: we should care about these features of our world because

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Speaker 1: we might really be in trouble if we don't. The

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Speaker 1: second is an argument from morality or from ethics, not

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Speaker 1: humans focused in the same way that says, well, you know,

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Speaker 1: we shouldn't assume that just because we're the humans, we

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Speaker 1: have the right to do all these things that we

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Speaker 1: have the capacity to. So I think those are both

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Speaker 1: super interesting and important. I'd love to talk about both them. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: on the uncertainty argument, this seems to me kind of

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Speaker 1: different than the argument with respect to say, climate change,

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Speaker 1: which is, you know, the other very pressing environmental issue

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Speaker 1: of our moment. There there's overwhelming evidence that rising temperatures

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Speaker 1: are going to transformative and transformatively bad effects on huge

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Speaker 1: numbers of human beings in the pretty near foreseeable future.

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Speaker 1: And that sounds like, as you know, you're looking for

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Speaker 1: clarion calls to action. That sounds like a pretty powerful one.

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Speaker 1: It's human focused, and it says things are getting bad

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Speaker 1: in the following set of ways with respect to the biodiversity.

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Speaker 1: Isn't the uncertainty argument slightly mitigated by the history of

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Speaker 1: big extinctions? I mean, you call your book the six Extinction,

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Speaker 1: because there are five massive prior extinctions, and those all

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Speaker 1: took place, and they were caused by disasters into typically

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Speaker 1: of various kinds. Of course, they led to big changes

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Speaker 1: in the nature of the biodiversity that was out there,

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Speaker 1: but we don't know for sure that we would be

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Speaker 1: the dinosaurs as it were, right, I mean. And the

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Speaker 1: question then becomes, if we're balancing at the human level

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Speaker 1: a whole bunch of competing interests, the main one, as

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Speaker 1: far as I can make out, is the size of

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Speaker 1: a population, because the report suggests that the most significant

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Speaker 1: of the various things that's leading to the decline and

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Speaker 1: biodiversity is just how many people we have and growing

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Speaker 1: food for them and eating animals and fishing for fish,

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Speaker 1: and the range of other features that come with having

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Speaker 1: so many people. So if we're trading off human values

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Speaker 1: like the population against uncertainty, isn't that sort of different

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Speaker 1: than the climate change context, where you know that we're

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Speaker 1: in a lot of trouble, and we're in a lot

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Speaker 1: of trouble very very soon. Well, I want to see

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Speaker 1: if you if you accept the idea, you know that

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Speaker 1: we're causing a mass extinction, a spasm of extinction, you know,

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Speaker 1: potentially on the level of these mass extinctions of the

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Speaker 1: path the most recent one of which you know, it's

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Speaker 1: believed was caused by an asteroid impact. That's the event,

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Speaker 1: the End Cretaceous extinction, which did in you know, not

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Speaker 1: just the dinosaurs, which were a dominant form of life

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Speaker 1: on land, but also lots of other major groups of organisms,

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Speaker 1: and also opened the door for us, not totally coincidentially,

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Speaker 1: our little rabbit like rodent like ancestors. Yes, absolutely, But

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Speaker 1: even if you were a bird or a small mammal,

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Speaker 1: kind of shrew like mammal which lived through the End

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Speaker 1: Cretaceous extinction and eventually did give rise to us, I

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Speaker 1: don't think that the End Cretaceous extinction was an event

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Speaker 1: you would have wanted to live through. It's not the

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Speaker 1: kind of world you would have wanted to, you know,

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Speaker 1: bequeath to your shrew like children. I think that the

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Speaker 1: defining characteristic of a mass extinction is a lot of

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Speaker 1: a lot of bad shit going down and cascading effects

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Speaker 1: that would affect all groups. So yes, some made it through, absolutely,

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Speaker 1: But to take the kind of view sixty six million

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Speaker 1: years later, it's easy to sort of sort of blithely say, well,

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Speaker 1: you know, that doesn't look so bad from a distance

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Speaker 1: of sixty six million years, But I think I look bad.

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Speaker 1: That's that's not the argument, But go on, okay, But

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Speaker 1: also to say, well, you know it takes your you know,

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Speaker 1: you pay your money, you take your chances. We're the

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Speaker 1: dominant organism. Now we might come through this extinction event

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Speaker 1: still of the dominant organism. I don't think any biologist

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Speaker 1: on the planet would say that would be a good

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Speaker 1: debt to make. But that's not I mean, to be

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Speaker 1: completely you know candid, that's not that I don't think

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Speaker 1: is the strongest version of the argument. I mean, the

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Speaker 1: strongest version of the argument is something like this, we're

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Speaker 1: involved in a world of constant trade offs. We have

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Speaker 1: a lot of people on the earth. Those people need

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Speaker 1: to eat, and even if all they're eating is fruits

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Speaker 1: and vegetables, they need agricultural in order to do that.

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Speaker 1: If we significantly changed the degree to which we're relying

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Speaker 1: on agriculture and other things to raise food, if we

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Speaker 1: could do that in some way, they would still let

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Speaker 1: us affordably feed all these people that we have. That

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Speaker 1: would be one thing. But we don't actually have the

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Speaker 1: full capacity to do that yet. Well that's a that's

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Speaker 1: a hardy I mean, you could say you're damned if

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Speaker 1: you do, you're damned if you don't. I mean, we

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Speaker 1: rely very, very heavily on you know, the health of

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Speaker 1: our soils, pollination services that are delivered for free by

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Speaker 1: lots of those insects that we were talking about. It's

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Speaker 1: not clear that you can do without those and feed

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Speaker 1: you know, eight billion, going on nine billion people. Totally

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Speaker 1: fair point, but it's a tradeoff situation. You know, reducing

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Speaker 1: population substantially, which was the view of all thoughtful educated

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Speaker 1: people a century ago. We don't think that's ethical anymore.

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Speaker 1: You know, we're beyond that kind of eugenics phase. We

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Speaker 1: we accept the world's population for what it is, and

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Speaker 1: so then we're in a world of trade offs and

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Speaker 1: how do how do we make those trade offs against uncertainty.

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Speaker 1: The extinction of the Cretasius tertiary boundary that we were

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Speaker 1: talking about was an asteroidal extinction. It wasn't human caused.

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Speaker 1: This one is human caused, and to some extent, it's

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Speaker 1: the result of humans making decisions that are designed to

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Speaker 1: serve the interest of humans. They may be the wrong decisions,

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Speaker 1: we may be getting it totally wrong, but they are decisions,

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Speaker 1: for example, with respect to growing things that humans have

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Speaker 1: made the judgment are necessary to keep us going. You're

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Speaker 1: trading off, on the one hand, supporting human life against

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Speaker 1: on the other hand, the uncertainty of the consequences of

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Speaker 1: the decline. Yeah, and I think that is exactly what

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Speaker 1: we're doing. We're doing it unconsciously, and I also want

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Speaker 1: to say we are quite possibly doing it very unwisely.

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Speaker 1: What looks like a good trade off in the moment

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Speaker 1: right in twenty nineteen, which looks like a good trade

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Speaker 1: off to us right now, is that a good trade

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Speaker 1: off for our kids? Is that a good trade off

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Speaker 1: for our kids kids? I mean, these are questions that

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Speaker 1: you know, unfortunately from purely scientific, biological and even you know,

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Speaker 1: probably ethical view are unanswerable, but I think they have

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Speaker 1: to be factored in. One other point that I want

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Speaker 1: to make, and I think it's pretty important, is as

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Speaker 1: we eat higher and higher, and as more and more

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Speaker 1: of us, you know, eat higher and higher, as it were,

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Speaker 1: on the food chain, we're using more and more calories

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Speaker 1: to produce our own chloric intake. So I don't think

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Speaker 1: it's at all true that you know, land use decisions

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Speaker 1: are straightforward. They're very very complicated, and they you know,

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Speaker 1: have to do with not just feeding eight billion people,

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Speaker 1: but how we're feeding eight billion people. For sure. I

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Speaker 1: don't dispute that for a moment. I wanted to turn

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Speaker 1: out to this ethical argument that you raise, which is

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Speaker 1: different from the where you know, we're playing dice with

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Speaker 1: our future. It's the argument that, as you put it,

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Speaker 1: humans have the capacity to have a you know, an

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Speaker 1: unpresented effect on the environment. That's why you know, a

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Speaker 1: lot of people think we're already in the anthropasy and

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Speaker 1: age defined geologically as the time that humans are having

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Speaker 1: an impact on the earth. But we shouldn't. We don't

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Speaker 1: have as you put it, the right to do that.

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Speaker 1: I don't know if you hold that view, but I'm

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Speaker 1: actually really curious to hear whether you do, and if so,

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Speaker 1: to hear a little bit more about why you think that. Well.

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Speaker 1: I mean, I think from a obviously, humans are one

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Speaker 1: species out of let's just say eight million, right, I think,

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Speaker 1: you know, the history of human consciousness, as it were,

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Speaker 1: has been a kind of widening circle of our concern

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Speaker 1: and I think that, you know, we may look back

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Speaker 1: at this particular moment when we kind of blithely did

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Speaker 1: in a lot of species, and a lot of species

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Speaker 1: I want to say that are very very close relatives

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Speaker 1: of ours. I mean, you know, orangutangs, gorillas, chimps are

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Speaker 1: all very highly threatened right now. So we are doing

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Speaker 1: in you know, species, a very high level of consciousness.

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Speaker 1: We can you know, you can get into the question

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Speaker 1: of also, you know, whether we make a distinction, whether

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Speaker 1: this ethical argument even allows for a distinction between conscious

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Speaker 1: creatures and unconscious creatures, And perhaps it doesn't, but I

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Speaker 1: should point out that we are sort of doing in

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Speaker 1: you know, our evolutionarily our very closest relatives, and I

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Speaker 1: don't think we're going to look back on this. I

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Speaker 1: don't think that, you know, humanity, whatever you know becomes

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Speaker 1: of us, is going to look back at that. That's

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Speaker 1: going to look like a crime. That's going to look

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Speaker 1: you know, not less necessarily crimes against humanity, but crimes

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Speaker 1: against humanity's closest relatives. I'm super fascinated by this line

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Speaker 1: of line of thought. I always have been, and it's

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Speaker 1: you know, a lot of environmentalism takes some part in

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Speaker 1: this kind of mode of thinking that we ought not

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Speaker 1: to have this effect on the world, not just because

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Speaker 1: we're causing pain, not just because we're eventually having you know,

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Speaker 1: terrible effects, as you said, killing off our closest cousins,

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Speaker 1: but more broadly, that somehow we shouldn't be so focused

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Speaker 1: on human consciousness. And I guess my question, and this

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Speaker 1: is something I've always struggled with myself. So it's not

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Speaker 1: like I think there's some magic blood answer to it is,

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Speaker 1: what about the our observation that, although of course we

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Speaker 1: do image far out of proportion to all other species,

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Speaker 1: that no other species seems to exercise this kind of

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Speaker 1: concern for making sure that they take into account the

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Speaker 1: interests of other species, or even other individuals of the

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Speaker 1: species I mean all species. But that just seems like

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Speaker 1: another kind of you know, human sallipsism. To be honest,

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Speaker 1: I mean, this is meant to say that what would

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Speaker 1: be salapsistic would be assuming that because humans uniquely have

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Speaker 1: the ability to think of the interests of others, therefore

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Speaker 1: it must be that the correct ethical way to be

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Speaker 1: is I think of the interests of others. This is

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Speaker 1: the question from meant to be from the other side, well,

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Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, that's one way to look at it.

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Speaker 1: But I think that once again, the history of you know,

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Speaker 1: the last you know, five hundred years or whatever from

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Speaker 1: you know, turning from a geocentric to a heliocentric world

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Speaker 1: should be sort of questioning trying to decenter humans. And

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Speaker 1: we are faced with this really interesting situation and board knows,

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Speaker 1: you know, if I had the answer to this, I

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Speaker 1: would be happy to impart it. I don't, but I

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Speaker 1: certainly think that all of these things are worth questioning

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Speaker 1: pretty profoundly at this particular moment in time. And so

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Speaker 1: we're faced with this really interesting two divergent trends as

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Speaker 1: that were here. One this as I say, d centering

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Speaker 1: of people, you know, we're descended from a common ancestor

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Speaker 1: with chimps. The Sun does not revolve around the Earth.

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Speaker 1: There's revolves around the Sun. So we're one planet among

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Speaker 1: you know, millions and potentially billions, So we're pretty small

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Speaker 1: aspects in the universe as it were. But then we're

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Speaker 1: also one of the lessons of the last generation or

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Speaker 1: so has been Wow, we are having a really significant

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Speaker 1: impact on this one planet that we as humans call

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Speaker 1: home and on everything that shares it with us, and

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Speaker 1: that shares an evolutionary history with us that you know,

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Speaker 1: we now know goes back almost four billion years. So

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Speaker 1: those are pretty heavy numbers in both directions. They sort

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Speaker 1: of point and conflict directions, and the fact that we

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Speaker 1: have not found as satisfactory way of working our way

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Speaker 1: through them is unfortunate because this damage is permanent. You know,

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Speaker 1: when you get rid of the species you have, you

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Speaker 1: have permanently cut off its evolutionary possibility. So we're really

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Speaker 1: screwing with the evolution of life. And once again, this

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Speaker 1: goes way beyond you know, our kids and our kids kids.

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Speaker 1: It goes to the future of all life on Earth,

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Speaker 1: you know, forever. I love the way you put that

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Speaker 1: that there's a deep contradiction between two two different insights,

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Speaker 1: one that we're just another species and the other that, boy,

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Speaker 1: we're not just another species. We're having this disproportionate impact

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Speaker 1: when it comes to screwing with evolution. To use your phrase, um,

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Speaker 1: are you a believer that that's always a bad thing?

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Speaker 1: I mean, I assume that you're in favor of all

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Speaker 1: kinds of ways that we tweak evolution that make us

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Speaker 1: better off as as humans, from you know, from antibiotics

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Speaker 1: on down. You know, I'm not I don't want to say, like,

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Speaker 1: you know, screwing with evolution is some you know, you're

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Speaker 1: right as you say, every time you know, you um,

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Speaker 1: you know, step on that you know, aunt or whatever

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Speaker 1: you've on some level, obviously everything is always you know,

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Speaker 1: screwing with you know, other organisms all the time. But

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Speaker 1: I think we very rarely knowingly and consciously and happily

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Speaker 1: cut off entire limbs of the evolutionary tree. And that

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Speaker 1: sort of brings me back to our closest relatives. I mean,

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Speaker 1: there were a lot of human cousins around at one point.

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Speaker 1: We know more and more about different you know, sort

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Speaker 1: of human species or subspecies. The Neanderthals, the nencipents, their

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Speaker 1: doubtless others out there that no longer exist, quite probably

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Speaker 1: because of us. And we are also looking at getting

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Speaker 1: rid of great apes. If you just look at the

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Speaker 1: future of the evolution of consciousness, right, if we consider

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Speaker 1: those to be the animals of the highest you know, consciousness,

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Speaker 1: we are potentially creating a world where consciousness you know,

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Speaker 1: will not arise again, or will not arise for a

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Speaker 1: very very very long time, and you know, take a

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Speaker 1: very very different form, quite likely at that point. But

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Speaker 1: it just so I understand. Are you saying that if

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Speaker 1: those other higher primates continue to exist in and in

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Speaker 1: larger numbers, that there would be the possibility of the

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Speaker 1: of a repeat in the evolutionary process in which consciousness,

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Speaker 1: at least of the human type it would evolve another time,

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Speaker 1: another time around. No, I'm not necessarily saying that, although

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Speaker 1: that is that is certainly possible. I'm just saying that

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Speaker 1: if you consider you know, our great ape you know

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Speaker 1: cousins to be conscious, and I certainly think that most

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Speaker 1: you know, animal behaviorists would that consciousness itself would continue

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Speaker 1: to exist. There would be other species of apes that

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Speaker 1: would eventually arise they would not necessarily be humans. They

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Speaker 1: would be other things. They would be you know, they

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Speaker 1: wouldn't necessarily be have any more or less consciousness, you

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Speaker 1: know than a gorilla does. Now let's just say, but um,

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Speaker 1: that would be a possibility, that would bevolutionary possibility that

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Speaker 1: was open. If you do away with all the species

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Speaker 1: of great apes, as we are, you know, pretty much

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Speaker 1: on our way to doing right now, then you're just

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Speaker 1: cutting off that evolutionary possibility. And I'm simply using this

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Speaker 1: example once again of apes because I think that it,

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Speaker 1: you know, there are a lot of other evolutionary branches

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Speaker 1: that are being you know, cut off for a whole genus,

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Speaker 1: let's us say, is disappearing, or there's only one species

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Speaker 1: left in the genus and it's disappearing. I mentioned apes

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Speaker 1: because I think people have an emotional reaction to them,

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Speaker 1: and if they thought of a world without great apes,

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Speaker 1: and they think of that evolutionary possibility being closed off,

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Speaker 1: that would have some you know, emotional connection that you know,

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Speaker 1: if I tell you about this, you know, genus of

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Speaker 1: I was just out in Nevada, and I you know,

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Speaker 1: was met saw. I don't know what word you'd use

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Speaker 1: encountered a you know, a fish that's the last fish

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Speaker 1: in its genus because we've been soaking the wall are

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Speaker 1: out of the Nevada Desert, so all the other species

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Speaker 1: in this genus are gone. I don't think that has

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Speaker 1: as much, you know, kind of connection to people, but

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Speaker 1: it's it's another way in which you know, we are

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Speaker 1: we are cutting off that evolutionary possibility. Can I ask

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Speaker 1: about what we can do? I mean, what are the

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Speaker 1: real world doable things that could substantially reduce the harm

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Speaker 1: that we're doing to to biodiversity that's out there in

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Speaker 1: the world. Well, I think that, you know, the basic answer,

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Speaker 1: probably the first order answer would be gets back to

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Speaker 1: that question of land use that we were discussing. I mean,

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Speaker 1: if we did not cut down the rest of the Amazon,

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Speaker 1: cut down the rest of the rainforest in the Congo,

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Speaker 1: you know, these big big still extant and you know,

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Speaker 1: relatively intact what are called biodiversity hot spots. The tropics

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Speaker 1: is where most of the diversity of the world exists.

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Speaker 1: There's you know, historical reasons for that. The tropics have

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Speaker 1: been have had a fairly stable climate for a long

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Speaker 1: time and had the ice ages and the temperature, fluctulating,

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Speaker 1: all things which are bad for a species continuation. Right

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Speaker 1: There's just been a long history of life evolving under

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Speaker 1: relatively stable conditions in that you know, that's one theory,

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Speaker 1: and it's it's a pretty popular theory. That's why, that's

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Speaker 1: why there's so much biodiversity in the tropics right now

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Speaker 1: as opposed to in temperate zones like you know, where

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Speaker 1: you and I live, where you know, there was ice

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Speaker 1: covering this area for you know, until twelve thousand years

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Speaker 1: ago or so. So obviously everything that's repopulated where I

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Speaker 1: live in western mass has has arrived re arrived in

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Speaker 1: the last twelve thousand years. So if we you know,

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Speaker 1: sort of got together as as it were, and decided, okay,

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Speaker 1: let's let's leave those parts of the world as intact

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Speaker 1: as possible, that would be one way to really probably

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Speaker 1: make a pretty big difference, not to stop this losses

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Speaker 1: by any stretch of the imagination, because there's all sorts

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Speaker 1: of other factors at work, including climate change, which that

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Speaker 1: report which you alluded to, you know, talked about becoming

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Speaker 1: a major driver of extinction. It probably is not yet

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Speaker 1: a major driver extinction, but it's it's it's looming very,

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Speaker 1: very large. So another you know, point that I guess

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Speaker 1: I would make getting back to this question of you know,

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Speaker 1: climate change is something we can all see as a

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Speaker 1: threat to you know, life as we know it for humans.

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Speaker 1: A lot of the things that we would try to

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Speaker 1: do for our own good would also probably although not necessarily,

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Speaker 1: because there are ways to combat climate change that would

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Speaker 1: have very you know, very significant land use change component

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Speaker 1: that would probably not be good for other species but

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Speaker 1: might be good for people. So that's another potential trade

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Speaker 1: off there. But it's also possible that there are ways

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Speaker 1: to mitigate climate change that would have a big impact

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Speaker 1: on the rest of the species of the planet too.

426
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Speaker 1: So there are there is in some senses, we're not

427
00:24:16,436 --> 00:24:18,876
Speaker 1: pitting our interests against those other species, but we actually

428
00:24:18,916 --> 00:24:22,276
Speaker 1: have a confluence of interest there. Elizabeth, you said something

429
00:24:22,316 --> 00:24:25,636
Speaker 1: that really grabbed me when you said that if we

430
00:24:25,716 --> 00:24:31,116
Speaker 1: could protect these tropical biodiversity hotspots, and you mentioned the

431
00:24:31,156 --> 00:24:34,556
Speaker 1: Amazon rainforest and the rainforest in the Congo, that we

432
00:24:34,596 --> 00:24:38,796
Speaker 1: would go some significant way towards reducing our attack on biodiversity.

433
00:24:38,796 --> 00:24:41,036
Speaker 1: And I have to say, you know, just by thinking

434
00:24:41,036 --> 00:24:42,876
Speaker 1: about this issue a little bit and reading your book.

435
00:24:42,876 --> 00:24:46,276
Speaker 1: I don't think I sufficiently took on board until you

436
00:24:46,356 --> 00:24:49,396
Speaker 1: just said it that in a way, this all may

437
00:24:49,436 --> 00:24:51,196
Speaker 1: be more doable, or much of this may be more

438
00:24:51,276 --> 00:24:55,276
Speaker 1: doable than we tend to think when we face major

439
00:24:55,996 --> 00:24:59,996
Speaker 1: environmental challenges, in the sense that, although they are obviously

440
00:25:00,076 --> 00:25:04,836
Speaker 1: very strong practical, logistical, and political challenges associated with reconfiguring

441
00:25:04,876 --> 00:25:08,636
Speaker 1: institutions to protect indigenous people, who often are the people

442
00:25:08,636 --> 00:25:14,836
Speaker 1: who live in these biodiversity hotspot zones, Nevertheless, if you

443
00:25:14,836 --> 00:25:18,636
Speaker 1: could achieve a lot of this by protecting a handful

444
00:25:18,636 --> 00:25:22,636
Speaker 1: of identifiable areas on Earth, that seems a lot more

445
00:25:22,756 --> 00:25:28,036
Speaker 1: doable than sort of a global transformation in either population

446
00:25:28,116 --> 00:25:32,196
Speaker 1: numbers or in the way that food is grown, or

447
00:25:32,196 --> 00:25:34,156
Speaker 1: even in human diet. I mean, there may be lots

448
00:25:34,156 --> 00:25:35,876
Speaker 1: of great reasons to all of those things, and I

449
00:25:35,876 --> 00:25:39,436
Speaker 1: don't dispute that, but when I think about the biodiversity challenge,

450
00:25:39,716 --> 00:25:42,036
Speaker 1: when you're read the UN report, or at least it's

451
00:25:42,156 --> 00:25:44,916
Speaker 1: it's summary, it sounds as though, oh, my goodness, you

452
00:25:44,956 --> 00:25:46,916
Speaker 1: know this is happening, It's inevitable. There's nothing that we

453
00:25:46,956 --> 00:25:50,476
Speaker 1: could really do substantially about it that would actually be doable.

454
00:25:50,516 --> 00:25:52,396
Speaker 1: But this seems a little more doable. This seems within

455
00:25:52,436 --> 00:25:55,716
Speaker 1: the realm of the reasonable, and it also seems like

456
00:25:55,716 --> 00:25:59,436
Speaker 1: it could be done without imposing tremendous costs on the

457
00:25:59,476 --> 00:26:02,316
Speaker 1: rest of the world. Is that slightly more optimistic? Take

458
00:26:02,356 --> 00:26:04,516
Speaker 1: that I just took away from what you said at

459
00:26:04,516 --> 00:26:07,236
Speaker 1: all credible? Or do you actually feel the pessimism that

460
00:26:07,276 --> 00:26:09,996
Speaker 1: I previously felt and that I think I took away

461
00:26:09,996 --> 00:26:12,316
Speaker 1: from your book, If you'll forgive you saying so, well,

462
00:26:12,356 --> 00:26:15,036
Speaker 1: I guess I however, somewhere between the two, I mean.

463
00:26:15,516 --> 00:26:18,116
Speaker 1: Ed Wilson has a fairly recent book called A Half

464
00:26:18,196 --> 00:26:21,596
Speaker 1: Earth where he sort of proposes putting aside, you know,

465
00:26:21,756 --> 00:26:24,476
Speaker 1: half of the land on Earth for for other species.

466
00:26:24,516 --> 00:26:27,476
Speaker 1: And that sounds, you know, like an awful lot. But

467
00:26:27,796 --> 00:26:30,756
Speaker 1: you know, when you look at these pretty intact places

468
00:26:30,796 --> 00:26:35,356
Speaker 1: like the boreal forest of Canada, the Amazon, the tropical

469
00:26:35,436 --> 00:26:40,196
Speaker 1: rainforest in parts of Africa, you could you could imagine it.

470
00:26:40,236 --> 00:26:43,676
Speaker 1: I think you can imagine, as you say, doing that

471
00:26:43,796 --> 00:26:46,636
Speaker 1: now that requires us to think totally differently about the

472
00:26:46,636 --> 00:26:52,996
Speaker 1: world's It requires, you know, transnational agreements. Unfortunately, you know,

473
00:26:53,076 --> 00:26:59,596
Speaker 1: there's no body and in fact, they very awkwardly acronymed ipb. Yes,

474
00:26:59,996 --> 00:27:03,356
Speaker 1: was you know sort of designed to be the inner

475
00:27:03,396 --> 00:27:07,236
Speaker 1: Governmental Panel on Climate change for biodiversity, to have some

476
00:27:07,356 --> 00:27:10,996
Speaker 1: group that was looking at this from an international perspective. Now,

477
00:27:11,036 --> 00:27:13,436
Speaker 1: do they have any clout? You know, that's a very

478
00:27:13,636 --> 00:27:16,436
Speaker 1: very good question. Well, is there any talk of an

479
00:27:16,476 --> 00:27:20,396
Speaker 1: international treaty regime, for example, comparable to or connected to

480
00:27:20,396 --> 00:27:23,116
Speaker 1: the climate change treaty regime, which, you know, it's a

481
00:27:23,196 --> 00:27:25,396
Speaker 1: topic for another day. Of course, the great challenges that

482
00:27:25,476 --> 00:27:28,556
Speaker 1: even that treaty regime faces. But is there any movement

483
00:27:28,596 --> 00:27:32,076
Speaker 1: out there for a kind of treaty regime that would say, look, yes,

484
00:27:32,156 --> 00:27:36,716
Speaker 1: substantial wealth transferred to the countries that house these biodiversity

485
00:27:36,716 --> 00:27:42,716
Speaker 1: hotspots in exchange for much stricter protection of those zones

486
00:27:43,876 --> 00:27:48,796
Speaker 1: with international monitoring if necessary, and guarantees not to turn

487
00:27:48,876 --> 00:27:52,236
Speaker 1: that or allow that land to be turned into farmland,

488
00:27:52,516 --> 00:27:54,636
Speaker 1: and again paid for. I mean, this would be more

489
00:27:54,636 --> 00:27:56,796
Speaker 1: expensive for the local people. And I'm the last person

490
00:27:56,836 --> 00:27:59,356
Speaker 1: to want an arrangement to disadvantages the local people. And

491
00:27:59,396 --> 00:28:02,676
Speaker 1: says that, well, because biodiversity hotspots are where you live,

492
00:28:02,716 --> 00:28:04,396
Speaker 1: you have to continue to live in poverty. That seemed

493
00:28:04,396 --> 00:28:06,116
Speaker 1: to me personally at least, exactly the wrong way to

494
00:28:06,156 --> 00:28:08,676
Speaker 1: go about it. But you can imagine a relatively as

495
00:28:08,756 --> 00:28:12,916
Speaker 1: these things go, straightforward treaty arrangement where the rest of

496
00:28:12,916 --> 00:28:16,476
Speaker 1: the world pays and gives advantages to the countries that

497
00:28:16,516 --> 00:28:20,316
Speaker 1: are the hosts of the hotspots and they make certain commitments.

498
00:28:20,836 --> 00:28:23,116
Speaker 1: Is anybody talking about that? I mean, it seems logical

499
00:28:23,156 --> 00:28:25,556
Speaker 1: in light of what you've said. Well, there there is

500
00:28:25,956 --> 00:28:29,476
Speaker 1: a companion treaty to the Framework Convention on Climate Change.

501
00:28:29,476 --> 00:28:34,476
Speaker 1: It's the Convention on Biological Diversity. It doesn't get nearly

502
00:28:34,476 --> 00:28:37,516
Speaker 1: as much pressed, but it does exist. Admit, I've never

503
00:28:37,556 --> 00:28:39,756
Speaker 1: heard of it until this moment, so you're right, it doesn't.

504
00:28:39,756 --> 00:28:42,716
Speaker 1: So go on, and what does it say? You know,

505
00:28:42,916 --> 00:28:46,436
Speaker 1: it is one of these very it has very high

506
00:28:46,516 --> 00:28:52,116
Speaker 1: aspirations for how we're going to you know, preserve biological diversity,

507
00:28:52,196 --> 00:28:54,916
Speaker 1: but it has, you know, no teeth. I think it

508
00:28:54,956 --> 00:28:59,596
Speaker 1: would be a platform that you could work out international

509
00:28:59,916 --> 00:29:02,596
Speaker 1: transfers of wealth, as you say, but I as far

510
00:29:02,636 --> 00:29:05,596
Speaker 1: as I know, those are not happening now. One way

511
00:29:05,676 --> 00:29:09,436
Speaker 1: in which that is happening is with you know, these

512
00:29:09,436 --> 00:29:12,956
Speaker 1: sort of forest credits that people are using as in

513
00:29:13,076 --> 00:29:17,956
Speaker 1: connection with you know, climate change, right as offsets climate offsets.

514
00:29:17,956 --> 00:29:20,116
Speaker 1: If you if you don't cut down your rainforest, you

515
00:29:20,116 --> 00:29:21,716
Speaker 1: know will pay you, and that kind of sort of

516
00:29:21,796 --> 00:29:25,916
Speaker 1: counts as a climate change mitigation effort. So that is

517
00:29:25,956 --> 00:29:28,996
Speaker 1: one arena, you know, where where there is money changing hands,

518
00:29:28,996 --> 00:29:30,836
Speaker 1: probably not a great deal of money, but a certain

519
00:29:30,836 --> 00:29:33,956
Speaker 1: amount of money changing hands. I want to sort of

520
00:29:34,036 --> 00:29:37,596
Speaker 1: just close by asking if you see there being some

521
00:29:37,996 --> 00:29:42,036
Speaker 1: spots for hopefulness. If you don't, that's that's totally fair.

522
00:29:42,476 --> 00:29:46,116
Speaker 1: Um I you know, I'm reacting to the possible moves

523
00:29:46,196 --> 00:29:48,876
Speaker 1: of treaty and regulation because if you can identify a

524
00:29:48,876 --> 00:29:52,476
Speaker 1: handful of big bad actors, it's humanly possible to pressure them.

525
00:29:52,516 --> 00:29:54,356
Speaker 1: I'm not saying it always works, but it's always at

526
00:29:54,396 --> 00:29:57,756
Speaker 1: least there's a path forward that you can imagine, you know, following.

527
00:29:58,196 --> 00:29:59,796
Speaker 1: You can name and shame, you can put pressure, you

528
00:29:59,796 --> 00:30:02,476
Speaker 1: can try to produce a regulatory regime, and those you know,

529
00:30:02,516 --> 00:30:04,876
Speaker 1: again they're no guarantees, but they seems a little hopeful.

530
00:30:05,196 --> 00:30:06,996
Speaker 1: But are there other points that you would think of,

531
00:30:07,036 --> 00:30:10,596
Speaker 1: as you know, gee, looks like a way forward, This

532
00:30:10,636 --> 00:30:14,956
Speaker 1: looks like a possible success or a replicable success. Well,

533
00:30:14,996 --> 00:30:17,716
Speaker 1: I think in theory there are, but all of the

534
00:30:17,756 --> 00:30:22,356
Speaker 1: problems that we're looking at environmental problems cannot be solved

535
00:30:22,876 --> 00:30:26,756
Speaker 1: without some kind of international framework, or cannot not even solved.

536
00:30:26,756 --> 00:30:29,196
Speaker 1: I'm not even talking about solving them, cannot be mitigated

537
00:30:29,796 --> 00:30:33,636
Speaker 1: without some kind of you very very serious international cooperation

538
00:30:33,756 --> 00:30:39,036
Speaker 1: and as you suggest, probably transfer of technology, transfer of wealth.

539
00:30:39,636 --> 00:30:42,316
Speaker 1: But we are not willing to do that right now,

540
00:30:42,356 --> 00:30:44,996
Speaker 1: and we are moving in exactly the opposite direction. We

541
00:30:45,036 --> 00:30:49,236
Speaker 1: have a moment of resurgent nationalism when when we look

542
00:30:49,276 --> 00:30:52,036
Speaker 1: back at this, at this moment which I unfortunately believe

543
00:30:52,116 --> 00:30:56,156
Speaker 1: will be looked at as a moment of just extraordinary

544
00:30:56,636 --> 00:31:02,276
Speaker 1: heedlessness and madness and consigning you know, future generations to

545
00:31:02,356 --> 00:31:05,756
Speaker 1: some pretty bad stuff that we didn't have to consign

546
00:31:05,796 --> 00:31:08,916
Speaker 1: them to had we gotten our act together earlier or

547
00:31:09,396 --> 00:31:13,516
Speaker 1: right now. I think that the fact that we are

548
00:31:13,676 --> 00:31:17,556
Speaker 1: seeing this resurgent nationalism at a moment when international corporation

549
00:31:17,596 --> 00:31:21,076
Speaker 1: you know, really couldn't be more pressing. Will that be

550
00:31:21,116 --> 00:31:23,156
Speaker 1: looked at as a coincidence or will that be looked

551
00:31:23,196 --> 00:31:27,116
Speaker 1: at as you know, part of this this human package

552
00:31:27,236 --> 00:31:29,996
Speaker 1: of not being willing to face up to the facts

553
00:31:30,036 --> 00:31:35,516
Speaker 1: until it's you know, screamingly too late. Well, we humans

554
00:31:35,516 --> 00:31:39,196
Speaker 1: are better at collective action than any other species, and

555
00:31:39,276 --> 00:31:41,076
Speaker 1: we can do a lot more with it, and we

556
00:31:41,076 --> 00:31:43,156
Speaker 1: can do a lot more bad things with our collective

557
00:31:43,156 --> 00:31:47,996
Speaker 1: action any other species. And so we're sort of we're

558
00:31:48,116 --> 00:31:51,236
Speaker 1: our distinctive features as a species are are definitely at

559
00:31:51,276 --> 00:31:54,436
Speaker 1: the heart of the challenge we faced a biodiversity. Thank

560
00:31:54,436 --> 00:32:04,076
Speaker 1: you so much, thanks for having me. Elizabeth Colbert offers

561
00:32:04,156 --> 00:32:08,516
Speaker 1: us an extremely cogent and extremely depressing account of our

562
00:32:08,516 --> 00:32:13,756
Speaker 1: current moment. The problems we face are clearly international, and

563
00:32:13,796 --> 00:32:17,116
Speaker 1: if we want to avoid massive extinctions, they demand solutions.

564
00:32:17,916 --> 00:32:20,836
Speaker 1: It's not like we don't have the technology of international

565
00:32:20,916 --> 00:32:25,396
Speaker 1: governance available. We know what that technology is. It's called treaties.

566
00:32:25,836 --> 00:32:28,796
Speaker 1: It's called trees with teeth that can actually be enforced

567
00:32:29,196 --> 00:32:34,196
Speaker 1: and that will make governments preserve the environment. Unfortunately, we

568
00:32:34,236 --> 00:32:38,556
Speaker 1: are also in a moment of profound skepticism via nationalism,

569
00:32:38,796 --> 00:32:42,156
Speaker 1: of exactly the kind of international cooperation that would be

570
00:32:42,316 --> 00:32:45,476
Speaker 1: necessary if we were actually going to take on the

571
00:32:45,516 --> 00:32:50,356
Speaker 1: problem of the collapse of biodiversity. What comes next, I guess,

572
00:32:50,596 --> 00:32:54,716
Speaker 1: is nothing good unless we're able to turn things around

573
00:32:55,316 --> 00:32:59,636
Speaker 1: and begin to re examine the tools that actually let

574
00:32:59,716 --> 00:33:03,116
Speaker 1: governments compel each other to do things to preserve the environment.

575
00:33:05,716 --> 00:33:08,636
Speaker 1: Deep Background is brought to you by Pushkin Industries. Our

576
00:33:08,676 --> 00:33:11,756
Speaker 1: producer is Lydia Jean Coott, with engineering by Jason Gambrell

577
00:33:11,956 --> 00:33:15,716
Speaker 1: and Jason Rostkowski. Our showrunner is Sophie mckibbon. Our theme

578
00:33:15,796 --> 00:33:18,596
Speaker 1: music is composed by Luis GERA special thanks to the

579
00:33:18,596 --> 00:33:22,716
Speaker 1: Pushkin Brass Malcolm Gladwell, Jacob Weisberg and Mia Lobel. I'm

580
00:33:22,756 --> 00:33:25,156
Speaker 1: Noah Feldman. You can follow me on Twitter at Noah

581
00:33:25,316 --> 00:33:27,756
Speaker 1: R Feldman. This is Deep Background