Lauret Savoy�Mount Holyoke College��Writer�Professor�Black American�Native American��
“’Our troubles,” E.O. Wilson observes in the Diversity of Life, “arise from the fact that we do not know what we are and cannot agree on what we want to be. The primary cause of this intellectual failure is ignorance of our origins. Humanity is part of nature.” he continues, “a species that evolved among other species. The more closely we identify ourselves with the rest of life, the more quickly we will be able to discover the sources of human sensibility and to acquire the knowledge on which an enduring ethic, a sense of preferred direction, can be built.” Perhaps danger lies most basically in not recognizing who and what we are.
The Biodiversity Crisis – is an Abundance Crisis
Why Should We Care About Biodiversity?
Esthetic and Ethical - Biophilia
Utilitarian - Necessary
“…the only solution to the sixth extinction is to increase the area of inviolable natural reserves to half the surface of Earth or greater.”
– E.O. WILSON
“… species is the unit of biodiversity that can and must be studied most thoroughly with the practical aim of saving the whole.”
Why Half? Which Half?
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Educator Ambassadors
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2020: 9104 observations over 3.4 km2
2020: 3846 observations over 587, 041 km2
Map Design Challenge – authentic group work
MAP DATA�Look at each map and think about how the information might be useful or important for making conservation decisions.
Does it help to compare a map to the others?
half-earthproject.org/half-earth-project-educator-ambassadors/#resources
Resources for Exploring Hummingbirds�half-earthproject.org/the-richness-and-rarity-of-hummingbirds-a-guided-inquiry-activity-series/
The Half-Earth Map
The Map of Life
The Encyclopedia of Life
Lab of Ornithology
Global Land Needed to Meet Conservation targets
for 32,000 vertebrate species - 48.5% solution
D. Scott Rinnan
SPECIES PROTECTION SUCCESS
Protection of land that does not also protect species habitat does not increase a country's SPI.
Ambassador Sign up
half-earthproject.org/half-earth-project-educator-ambassadors/#join
DLiu@eowilsonfoundation.org