These slides were used in a guided discussion on our causes for optimism and pessimism in conservation. It was based on Matt Ridley's The Rational Optimist, and Stephen K. Meyer's The End of the Wild, and was delivered as part of an undergraduate study abroad course considering wildlife conservation in Madagascar.

1. Rational Pessimism or
Optimism in Conservation?
An evaluation of two perspectives

2. A Quick Survey
Do you think we can successfully protect most species
on the planet from extinction?
What about protecting ecosystems from destruction?
Do you think the planet will support even human life
in 500 years? 1,000 years? 10,000 years?

3. Overview
1. State of the Planet
2. The Pessimistic View
3. The Optimistic View
4. What are you?

4. 1. State of the Planet
The Living Planet Index is a calculation of population trends for
3,038 vertebrate species showing a 52% decline.

5. 1. State of the Planet (cont.)
Of sub-component LPIs for marine, freshwater, and terrestrial
populations, freshwater is doing far worse with a 76% decline.

6. 1. State of the Planet (cont.)

7. The terrestrial LPI of populations inside protected areas shows a
decline of 18 per cent between 1970 and 2010
1. State of the Planet (cont.)

8. 1. State of the Planet (cont.)

9. 1. State of the Planet (cont.)

10. 2. The Pessimistic View

11. 2. The Pessimistic View
(cont.)
 Stephen K. Meyer. 2006. The End of the Wild.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
“The broad path for biological evolution is now set for
the next several million years. And in this sense the
extinction crisis-- the race to save the composition,
structure, and organization of biodiversity as it exists
today--is over, and we have lost.”
"We have lost the wild for now. Perhaps in 5-10
million years it will return."

12. 2. The Pessimistic View
(cont.)

13. 2. The Pessimistic View
(cont.)
 Mechanisms
 Local Disturbances
 Encroachment of built environment into natural
environment
 Over-exploitation of natural resources
 Global forces make damage “irreversible”
 Climate change
 Globalization
 Increased consumption

14. 2. The Pessimistic View
(cont.)
Good-bye?

15. 2. The Pessimistic View
(cont.)
Hello?

16. 2. The Pessimistic View
(cont.)
 Counter-Arguments
 The assumptions are wrong
 Consumption falls with change in consciousness?
 Global population eventually radically decreases?
 Technology reduces impacts?

17. 2. The Pessimistic View
(cont.)
 Counter-Arguments
 Conservationists will develop effective interventions
 Rights-based management
 Conservation criminology
 Technologies improve reserve effectiveness

18. 2. The Pessimistic View
(cont.)
 Counter-Arguments
 No one will care
 Higher standard of living
 Shifting baselines
 “Manicured” green spaces
will still exist
 Diversity of (artificial)
intelligence will vastly
multiply

19. 3. The Optimistic View

20. 3. The Optimistic View (cont.)
 Matt Ridley. 2011. The Rational Optimist: How
Prosperity Evolves). Harper Perennial.
“Somewhere in Africa more than 100,000 years ago…A
Species began to add to its habits, generation by
generation, without (much) changing its genes. What
made this possible was exchange, the swapping of
things and services between individuals…”
“The future of the Species was bright, though it did
not know it.”

21. 3. The Optimistic View (cont.)

22. 3. The Optimistic View (cont.)
 Mechanisms
 Spread of progressive ideas (democracy,
enlightenment values, scientific inquiry)
 Continued innovation through exchange of ideas
 Pessimism is genetically/culturally favored

23. 3. The Optimistic View (cont.)
Good-bye?

24. 3. The Optimistic View (cont.)
Hello?

25. 3. The Optimistic View (cont.)
 Counter-Arguments
 There is no technological fix to our immediate
pollution problems

26. 3. The Optimistic View (cont.)
 Counter-Arguments
 People will not care about saving “the wild”

27. 3. The Optimistic View (cont.)
 Counter-Arguments
 Pessimism is the reason our fears are never realized

28. 4. Which are you?
 Are you a rational optimist (like Ridley) or a pessimist
(like Meyer)?
 Are you somewhere in between?
 Is it possible to be both?

29. Closing Thought
“[W]ith or without either our help or hindrances the
earth’s reefs will go and then come again, as long as the
sun delivers its rays and the waters flow. Whatever role
we might play in the next great extinction will surely
have less effect on the tenacious reemergence of reef-
builders than it will on us. Reefs, we know, can survive
without us. The opposite may not be true.”
- Julia Whitty, The Fragile Edge