# Killing the last two is worse than killing two. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 21, 2009, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/killing-the-last-two-is-worse-than-killing-two/493805 "2009-04-21T02:22:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2009, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/killing-the-last-two-is-worse-than-killing-two/493805/21 "2009-04-22T15:08:31Z")
> [@scifisam2009](#): > > It’s an ethical question. It doesn’t necessarily have to have an obviously logical reason. It does for me. I require it of myself. > [@](#): > > The logical reason could be either: > > If I kill the last two of this species, that crosses a line. Maybe people will be more likely to kill all my kids rather than all but one. Retribution doesn’t work as a reason because if you’ve just made the human race extinct, there’s no-one to come back to get revenge - and no-one to get revenge upon. > [@](#): > > Yes, this last pair of the species could lead to something bad. However, I know that they’re the last pair of the species. I’ll be observing them. If they lead to something bad, I’ll probably notice it and stop it happening. In the meantime, we can study these creatures, see what makes them tick, and work out how to fight better against similar creatures in the future. This seems like a pretty good one, even if the “moral crime” in question then becomes the killing of potential, rather than the extinction itself. > [@](#): > > It’s something to do with the imperative to reproduce. Yeah. Not a good answer. It kinda fits, though; the more life there is, the more life there is for us to eat or use in other ways. Dead things are pretty much worthless; even maggots need new sources of recent death. But also the more life that is consumed by those who are not us. Ecosystems balance, eventually. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2009, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/killing-the-last-two-is-worse-than-killing-two/493805/22 "2009-04-22T15:24:36Z")
> [@](#): > > “The beauty and genius of a work of art may be reconceived, though its first material expression be destroyed; a vanished harmony may yet again inspire the composer; but when the last individual of a race of living things breathes no more, another heaven and another earth must pass before such a one can be again.” > – William Beebe, 1906 I think the difference between killing a couple of individuals of a common species, vs. causing the extinction of a species, is in the loss of uniqueness. Species have developed over many thousands or even millions of years, and we lose something irrecoverable when they vanish. Even if they don’t produce anything directly useful to us such a medicine, each species provides us with knowledge of how evolution occurs, so if we lose nothing else, we lose important knowledge. (Even if cloning makes it possible to restore lost species, it may be impossible to restore all the behavioral characteristics of the species, or for it to recover its place in its original ecosystem.) For a contrasting view, I like the following quote from Charley Douglas, an early explorer of New Zealand and naturalist: > [@](#): > > The Mountain Kiwi > > I have very little to say regarding this bird, as I have only seen two of them, and being pushed with hunger, I ate the pair of them, under the circumstances I would have eaten the last of the Dodos. > > It is all very well for science, lifting up its hands in horror, at what I once heard called gluttony, but let science tramp through the Westland bush or swamps, for two or three days without food, and find out what hunger is. Besides, at the time, I was not aware that it was an almost extinct bird. Had I known so, I would at least have skinned it and kept the head and feet. > > Charles Edward “Mr. Explorer” Douglas > New Zealand, late 1800s Fortunately, Charlie’s meal did not turn out to cause extinction of the species. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2009, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/killing-the-last-two-is-worse-than-killing-two/493805/23 "2009-04-22T20:34:03Z")
> [@Revenant\_Threshold](#): > > . It just won’t be a moral wrong of me to have done so until it actually occurs. Since whatever race in question won’t exist at all when they are extinct, causing that extinction\*\* can’t \*\*be a wrong. Then apparently you have it all figured out. Whats the question again? ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2009, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/killing-the-last-two-is-worse-than-killing-two/493805/24 "2009-04-22T20:36:06Z")
> [@Revenant\_Threshold](#): > > Sure to the first, but **instability** in and of itself isn’t **bad** - it has the potential to **help** as much as **hurt** , at least. . Not worried about global warming then either? ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2009, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/killing-the-last-two-is-worse-than-killing-two/493805/25 "2009-04-22T21:17:26Z")
> [@billfish678](#): > > Then apparently you have it all figured out. Whats the question again? How would you convince me otherwise? > [@](#): > > Not worried about global warming then either? Global warming would be an example of hurtful instability. As I said, it can do both. ---
**Author:** ![G0sp3l](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c68b51/32.png) [@G0sp3l](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/G0sp3l)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2009, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/killing-the-last-two-is-worse-than-killing-two/493805/26 "2009-04-23T02:35:20Z")
I’m not understanding how it’s a moral outrage to kill the last two of a species. Aside from human arrogance. If a species is already virtually extinct the ecosystem has already begun to adjust. I could understand if this would cause some butterfly effect but the fact is the planet adjusts. How many species have already been driven to extinction yet we are still here. Eventually, we’ll be gone also and something will still be here. Other than creating hardship for our own species, I can’t see a true tragedy here. Barring a rogue asteroid or some such. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2009, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/killing-the-last-two-is-worse-than-killing-two/493805/27 "2009-04-24T00:43:14Z")
> [@Revenant\_Threshold](#): > > It does for me. I require it of myself. Retribution doesn’t work as a reason because if you’ve just made the human race extinct, there’s no-one to come back to get revenge - and no-one to get revenge upon. This seems like a pretty good one, even if the “moral crime” in question then becomes the killing of potential, rather than the extinction itself. But also the more life that is consumed by those who are not us. Ecosystems balance, eventually. I wasn’t considering the entire human race being extinct - because, after all, you’d be gone then too, so you wouldn’t be able to worry about retribution at all! I mean that it’s good to avoid killing the last of a species because that also carries on to avoiding killng the last of a family or race. Sorry for the Godwin’s law thing here, but it’s part of the reason that Hitler’s government attempting to kill all Jews and Gypsies is seen as worse than a government killing the same number of people of different races. We don’t need to worry much about the last two of a species consuming more stuff - odds are, we’ll eat them in turn or find some other use for them. Ecosystems don’t always balance out, either; at least, not to the benefit of humans, which is all that really matters to us. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/killing-the-last-two-is-worse-than-killing-two/493805.md?page=1)