The New York Times has claimed that the "anthropause" experienced during the pandemic (as human activity was radically decreased) both "healed" and "hurt" Nature.
The article that made that claim, by Emily Anthes, noted that the breeding performance of common murres, on an island off the coast of Sweden, dropped by 26 percent during the early part of the pandemic. This happened, apparently, because the "anthropause" helped eagles, who then made life more difficult for the murres. Mostly, the way I read the article (the murres maybe being an exception) things got better for other species when human activity decreased.
In a way, for those who love the Natural World, you can read The Times' article as "good news." If human beings don't manage effectively to deal with human-caused global warming, and if this leads to the end of the kind of human activity we call "civilization," at least other species will benefit.
Having drawn this truth to your attention, however, please let me restate the point I made in my blog posting yesterday. Wouldn't it be wonderful if human beings could intentionally find ways to damp down human "activity," the better to give space to other species? Couldn't we do that without pushing human civilization over the proverbial cliff? If we could - if we could do LESS, not more, and do that voluntarily, we would end up with better results for all living things.
More goats on the city streets? More ducks in the city square?
There could be some real advantages!
Image Credits:
(1) - https://rgs-ibg.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/geoj.12373(2) - https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/16/science/pandemic-nature-anthropause.html
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