Hopefully your students will be able to debate among themselves, but you may want to challenge them to justify their views. Here are some common points students make, and how you could respond. 

“This species can’t be saved”

Conservationists certainly need to be pragmatic in their choices. If the population has dipped extremely low, then a lack of genetic diversity may be a barrier to the species’ survival. In some cases, a species has been saved against the odds, but this cost so much that some people may see funds as better spent elsewhere. However, we need to guard against doom and gloom, otherwise a belief that something can’t be saved becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

In Tickets for the Ark, I use the example of the Guam rail, which was once extinct in the wild. Now there is a small population living free, and their story shows that there can be hope for species that we may have given up on. However, similar stories don’t have such happy endings – reintroduction of the Hawaiian crow hasn’t worked, for example. 

“It’s natural selection”

What exactly do students mean when they say this? Are they pointing out that eventually all species will go extinct, and there’s nothing unnatural about that? That’s certainly true, and it’s worth remembering that we never prevent an extinction, we just delay it. 

Students may be making a more negative point, suggesting that a species isn’t good enough, so ‘deserves’ to go extinct. If so, it’s worth reminding them that this species was likely flourishing before humans destroyed its habitat. It’s also important to remember that a species isn’t a single entity, but a collection of organisms – it’s not like the species wasn’t trying hard enough at school so didn’t get the right adaptations! It’s meaningless to blame a species, but it is valuable to question whether it can adapt to our changed world. We may want to protect a habitat so this species has somewhere to survive, or we may want to embrace change.

“This species gets less attention”

Money gets divided very unequally between different species. We may well get better value from supporting species that have had very little attention – there could be some easy wins we’re missing.

“If we lose this species, it’s gone forever”

This is a common way to justify a focus on preventing extinctions rather than supporting common species. It’s a good argument, but we shouldn’t forget that declines can also be impossible to reverse. It’s easy to kid ourselves that while a species still exists, things will be fine for it one day – we’ll solve the problem in the future. This can take the pressure off, yet often once an ecosystem has changed it is impossible to recreate it.  

An argument in favour of supporting common species is that they likely have a much greater impact on the ecosystem and on humans. When there are very few members of a species left, they’re probably not having a big effect.

“This species benefits humans”

Benefit to humans is an excellent justification for conservation. Encourage students to think about this broadly. We’re very familiar with pollination, for example, but there are many other ecosystem services provided by nature. These include regulating climate, increasing water quality, maintaining soil fertility, food, timber and supporting our mental health. These benefits aren’t distributed equally though, so it’s important to think about who benefits. The people who benefit from visiting a forest as tourists aren’t the same people who use the forest for subsistence. It’s too easy to focus on what benefits us, without thinking how others are affected. 

Some students may react against the idea that conservation is to benefit humans. Ask them who or what conservation should benefit. Do they mean species or ecosystems? Remind them that species and ecosystems can’t feel any pleasure or pain – a species has no capacity to care whether it exists or not. Also remind them that change is the one constant in nature. There’s no reason that an ecosystem should take a particular form – a forest isn’t morally superior to a meadow. I’ve written an introduction to this issue and broader environmental philosophy.  Perhaps they want conservation to benefit wild animals? This is an important and overlooked point, which could make for an interesting discussion. How would they protect wild animal welfare? Are some animals more important than others? 

Some people use economic benefits as a justification for protecting nature, and for good reason – the many examples include pollinators increasing yields of crops such as oilseed rape, increasing farmers’ profits. Economic valuation is facing a backlash, but that doesn’t necessarily mean a backlash against protecting nature for people. It’s important to distinguish between protecting nature for the benefit of people and not for its economic value. This is a chance for students to think about the relationship between the economy and human wellbeing. 

You may also want to help them explore what ‘benefits to humans’ means, and which they think are important. Are they talking about actions that enhance human wellbeing, now and in the future, or are they talking about economic gain? 

“Humans caused the problem, we should fix it” 

This is perhaps the hardest discussion to navigate. First up, we need to remember that human impact on nature isn’t automatically bad. Humans evolved over as part of nature, so it’s not somehow unnatural or wrong for us to impact the rest of nature. This is a relief for conservationists, because if it’s wrong for humans to affect nature then conservation is wrong! We don’t know what nature would look like if humans hadn’t evolved, and that isn’t important. We are nature. 

However, some of our actions have been very destructive and there are good reasons we might want to reverse the damage. Water pollution is bad for human and animal health, destruction of peatlands contributes to climate change, and reducing soil fertility threatens our ability to grow food. We therefore need to separate out practical and philosophical arguments. It’s not automatically wrong for humans to change nature, but some of our changes have brought problems for people and for animals. 

It is important to acknowledge the damage without demonising all humans. For a start, young people can feel a huge burden of responsibility and guilt for damage they didn’t do. It also risks humans being seen as a problem instead of part of the solution. In the extreme, an ideological separation of humans and nature has been used to justify evicting indigenous peoples from land they have managed sustainably for millennia. Ultimately, pitting humans against nature is not a good way to inspire people to get involved in conservation. 

Encourage students to justify why a change in nature is bad, and remind them how much nature has already changed. The spread of agriculture meant some habitats were destroyed but others were created – flowers benefitted when forests were cleared and more light reached the ground, and birds such a sparrows thrived on farmland. Agriculture also allowed us to feed more people!

“The problem is too many people”

There are often arguments about whether the Earth should have fewer people. These arguments can be dangerous when they come from the western world. Population growth is occurring in parts of the world where fewest resources are consumed – we tread on dangerous ground if, as high-level consumers, we call for other people to have fewer children so that we can sustain our lifestyles. It can be much more productive to look at our own consumption, while acknowledging that a certain level of consumption is essential for living a good life.

Some solutions to reducing population growth can violate human rights. However, the most powerful solution also supports human rights: empowering women. Increased access to education and healthcare will empower women in their reproductive choices, simultaneously bringing down the birth rate and improving wellbeing.  

“I like this species”

This is a perfectly legitimate justification, and in reality it’s how many decisions are made. Do you want to live in a world where giant pandas exist? I certainly do, they enrich my life. That’s a good enough reason to protect them. 

However, a natural affinity with certain species has caused us to overlook others. For example, wasps are hated, but they can be very important for farming. The common wasps we are familiar with feed their larvae with caterpillars and other crop pests. This is important pest control. Likewise, parasitic wasps kill some pest insects. There are vastly more wasp species then bee species in the world, but they are so understudied that we don’t know to the nearest 100,000 how many species there are!