On Mar 11, 10:52 am, Bertie the Bunyip wrote:

No one dismisses creationism as a possibility, its just that the
evidence for it is not there.

Reasonable people hardly ever dismiss everything out of hand.
Sloganeers and crusaders have to.

or Jay Stephens say that it is impossible. What they do say is that the
evidence does not point to it in any way shape or form and that the
people trying to "prove" it's likely are beginnning with a premise and
trying to make the evidence fit that.

I submit there's a corollary -- dismissing a premise because it
doesn't fit your cosmology/theology/philosophy.

Similarly the evidence is pointing towards ecological messes of all
sorts from human activity. Looking at some in microcosm is an aid in
grasping the bigger picture. ( not that I think that anything I say is
going to make a blind bit of difference to anyoone who just doesn't want
to know) Anyhoo, for instance, the nile Perch was intrduced to Lake
Victoria years ago. The Nile Perch is a very big fish and very
nutritious. It can feed a lot of people. It was farmed in the lake for
the benefit of the local populace, but of course, some inevitably
escaped. The reproduced and thrived in the lake. The lake was previsouly
populated by small ciclids. Little 4-8 inch fish of various species that
have lived for millions of years in the lake and fill an ecological
niche that is as elegant as any to be found on the planet. The locals
have been fishing them for tens of thousands of years, too. They are
good eating and easy to prepare, only needing to be split in two and
died on a log in the sun.
Of course, the Nile Perch is thriving because it is eating all of these
little guys and the populations have been decimated. The locals, unable
to get a decent meal with a wading net, now have to fish the Perch,
whose numbers are also dpeleted because there aren't enough Ciclids to
keep them going. The Perch is a big greasy fish and needs to be cooked
over a fire, so there is now a new demand for firewood. Of course, being
tropical, the firewood is almost all slow growth hard wood so the
forests in the region of the lake ( which is bigger than most US states)
is dwindling partly because of this mess...
Just one more story. Of couse global warming will probably help these
people out in some way I haven't been able to imagine.

I'll leave hat invention up to Jay, eh?

Bertie

We've seen species introduced worldwide with concomitant ecological
imbalances -- witness Starlings, English Sparrows, and Lake trout (you
must kill them in Yellowstone -- or be fined).

The underlying premise when these things are discussed is that only
humans can create imbalances, or that humans are "outside" or the
realm of what's "natural."

We're seeing the results of such "restoration to the balance of
nature" here in Pennsylvania, as the second growth forests mature and
result in near sterility on the forest floor. In a truly "natural"
ecosystem, there is constant destruction and recovery.

As we cannot afford unmanaged wildfires in our heavily populated
state, the game commission grants logging rights on State gamelands.
The result? Within 3 years there is a more diverse and healthy
population of fauna and flora.

Is this ecologically unsound?

I know it's been a few hundred posts back, but I am far from arguing
for unmitigated plowing of the ecosystem. What I have been arguing is
that the incessant over-the-top predictions of calamity are not proven
or assumed by --their own experts --, and that much of the hysteria
is driven by politicians and other hucksters who see opportunity ripe
for a power grab.

Dan