curl-6 on 09 May 2015
| SuperNova said: The question about the mosqitos is more tricky. Fucking with the natural eco - balance that has evolved in a certain region over thousands of years can have devastating results and I've never heard of and experiment where introducing a new species or removing one entirely from a habitat didn't fuck things up even more. It balances out over the next few thousand years again, but it still might not be the effect you're looking for. For example how do these mosquitos influence the food chain? Is there an animal dependant on these? That animal would starve. And so on. A better solution imo would be to genetically modify (e.g. random mutation) these types of mosqitos so that they become unsuitable to carry the illness. Let that spread though the species. As for the ethics, I don't have a problem with "killing off" viruses, after all I don't mourn peoples cancer cells either, but tinkering with the animal kingdom via planned extinction is not a good idea imo. There's too many factor we don't really understand, and even then effective medicine or vaccines would be much preferrable. |
Mosquitoes do indeed constitute a food source for many species. Their aquatic larvae are a staple diet among freshwater fish. The adults are eaten by bats, birds, spiders, other insects, etc.
How do you feel about the guinea worm, an animal that can only reproduce by infecting humans and causing debilitating illness?
