Are Humans Morally Responsible for The Preservation of Other Species?

The human species is a powerful one.  Because of our inventiveness we have become the dominant group the earth and are ruthless in following our own desires.  Because the need to survive is a basic drive we have ignored what our behavior is doing.

Because our species has developed a complex system of buying and selling, everything we touch is affected by money.  This means that it is in someone’s interest to make money out of whatever resources they can use to advantage. 

As a result we have polluted large areas of terrain, exploited habits and destroyed them without thought for the future.  There are frightening statistics of the number of plants and animals which become extinct each year and most of us don’t seem to mind. They don’t affect us in our daily lives, why should we care?

We are morally responsible for other species for a number of reasons. Over the millions of years the earth has evolved, and the evidence for evolution is there. Other species have taken over niches which no one else wanted and they have changed and adapted to take advantage of that place. This means there is a careful balance in each habitat which is very easily upset by the disappearance of one species and as a result other species will die.  The elegance of this evolutionary development is awe inspiring.

If we destroy so many species now, ones that will never be seen again, we are denying future generations of the benefits that some of those plants and animals may have for us as humans.  For instance, the South American rain forest is full of plants which have been found to be excellent medicinally.  Human greed and arrogance is removing those plants for the comparatively short term gains of crops.  Some of the species are so rare they have not been properly identified. There is a moral obligation not to leave our descendants with less than we were given. 

It is important to recognize that we belong to the animal kingdom.  There is nothing in our physiology, biology or chemistry which makes us any different from other animals.  If this is not the case why do we use animals to test toxic materials before they are tried on us.  

Apart from the morality of protecting other species we should be able to appreciate the beauty of the natural world.  We might fear reptiles, but they have evolved with as much rights as we have.  They are not inherently bad, they have different priorities.  Part of the moral responsibility is in respecting that other species have as much right to their space, habitat and way of life as we have.  

We have allowed our greed, lack of foresight and lack of awareness to destroy in a short time what has taken millennia to evolve.