World Environment News - Letter to the Editor Competition
Planet Ark asked budding environmental journalists, bloggers or concerned eco citizens to express themselves on an environmental story that moved, angered or inspired them. In the age-old style of 'Letter to the Editor' we wanted people to have their say for the chance to be published and we were not disappointed.
We had some excellent entries but there can only be one winner. The World Environment News 'Letter to the Editor' competition winner is Kyle Crider, with his entry 'The First Rule of Intelligent Tinkering'. Kyle a $500 donation made in his name to Friends of the Earth, kindly donated by our partner Colonial First State. Read his entry below.
Thanks to everyone who entered, we appreciate the time you took to write and submit your entry. Don't forget you can now follow the World Environment News on Twitter.
The First Rule of Intelligent Tinkering
Dear Editor,
I am writing in response to your World Environment News article "U.S. To Investigate Protection For 374 Water Species" of Sept. 28, 2011. According to the article, "The 374 species in 12 southeastern states that are up for this review are among 404 that environmental groups had petitioned to protect."
Many "jobs versus the environment" voices are questioning why the U.S. government should protect "89 species of crayfish and other crustaceans; 81 plants; 78 mollusks; 51 butterflies, moths, caddisflies and other insects; 43 fish; 13 amphibians; 12 reptiles, four mammals and three birds."
Biologist Paul Erhlich perhaps gave us the most concise answer: "The first rule of intelligent tinkering is to save all the parts."
Every species, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant, is the product more than a billion years of evolution. Each species is one facet in the miraculous blue-green gem of life that is our living planet. In terms of genetic information alone, the loss of a single species may be likened to the burning of the Great Library of Alexandria. We will never know how many disease cures or other scientific breakthroughs are lost with each species' extinction. But we do know that humans rank among giant meteors in terms of the frightening numbers of species that we are exterminating. With a nod to Pogo, we have met the "Sixth Great Extinction"-and it is us.
Just one example: The Madagascar Rosy Periwinkle (Catharanthus roseus) is an endangered plant whose insignificant white flowers stand in the way of slash-and-burn agriculture. Yet if business-as-usual ("jobs versus the environment") had won the day and the Rosy Periwinkle had lost, today we would not have vincristine and vinblastine, two drugs derived from the plant and used to treat childhood leukemia and Hodgkin's disease, respectively.
Or, as Aldo Leopold so eloquently stated in Round River (1953): "The last word in ignorance is the man who says of an animal or plant, ‘What good is it?' If the land mechanism as a whole is good, then every part is good, whether we understand it or not. If the biota, in the course of aeons, has built something we like but do not understand, then who but a fool would discard seemingly useless parts? To keep every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering."
About Kyle
Kyle Crider first learned the rule of "intelligent tinkering" from his mentor, Dr. Edward Passerini, Professor of Humanities and the Environment (retired) at the University of Alabama's New College. Currently, Kyle is living his green dream job as "Manager - Environmental Operations at Ecotech Institute and Education Corporation of America." while pursuing his Ph.D. in Interdisciplinary Engineering at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Planet Ark's World Environment News is brought to you in partnership with Colonial First State.
