• Wilzax@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    Aedes mosquitos serve no known ecological purpose. They are purely parasitic, are not unique pollinators (as in, any plant they do pollinate is also pollinated by other species), and do not make up a substantial portion of the diet of any species.

    I would venture to say their extinction would have a positive effect on the Ecosystem by closing that transmission vector for the diseases they carry.

    • Gsus4@mander.xyz
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      3 months ago

      So basically disease wifi, then :)

      Could it possibly act as a form of reservoir for diseases that control the size of certain fauna, like…apes?

      • Wilzax@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        All I could find as a positive for their existence is that in the past they have kept humans from inhabiting rainforests and marshlands, and more generally control where grazing animals can feed.

      • Wilzax@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        Humans are not bad for the environment. Capitalism is bad for the environment. Before imperialism and capitalism, most places on earth were populated by indigenous humans who actually protected the land they relied on to survive. There was no drive to exploit the land for all its resources, and there was an existential motivator for preserving nature as best as possible.

        See OP’s comment in a different thread: https://lemmy.world/comment/11768484

        • KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          3 months ago

          arguably, if we’re talking about what’s bad for the planet, you could easily just make the argument that humans are over populated due to our advances in science and engineering allowing us to both live longer, and protect ourselves from the various threats in the environment meant to keep is at a reasonable level of population.

          Presumably, mother nature never intended for species to be consciously countering her very own playbook at every fucking turn possible.

          • Wilzax@lemmy.world
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            3 months ago

            Mother nature never intended anything because mother nature is just random chance and multiplication of the best fit

            • KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              3 months ago

              and we abused the mechanisms underlying that random chance in order to bypass the best fit line, like extremely aggressively.

              We’re essentially the worlds worst invasive species.

            • KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              12 days ago

              this is true, it’s also a dog whistle for many other things.

              This is a more philosophical consideration, rather than a political one though, mostly just a tidbit on how everything is relative and nothing actually matters lol.