I’ll just edit instead!

  • ScrewdriverFactoryFactoryProvider [they/them]English
    5•2 years ago

    If I had to choose one I’d choose one of the ones that’s already going extinct so I could disrupt as few ecosystems as possible

    Alternately, is there an invasive species that harms the ecosystems it invades and doesn’t have a non-invasive counterpart? Maybe domesticated cats?

    • @[email protected]English
      1•2 years ago

      Alternately, is there an invasive species that harms the ecosystems it invades and doesn’t have a non-invasive counterpart?

      humans fuck

    • @[email protected]
      3•2 years ago

      I’m going to provide one very important reasons it would be disastrous to the ecosystem if humans were suddenly deleted from the Earth: what happens to the many currently active nuclear reactors? And what happens when Chernobyl’s sarcophagus finally corrodes entirely and exposes that radioactive blight to the entirety of Europe and central Asia? Probably nothing good is the answer.

      • @[email protected]English
        2•2 years ago

        I would be willing to put money on “likely nothing” being the answer for active nuclear reactors. They’re highly automated from a safety perspective these days. I’d be more worried about chemical plants

        • @[email protected]
          1•2 years ago

          That’s a good point, too. My general idea was we have certain things we’ve created that we can’t leave unchecked or else it might be disastrous for the environment. Human infrastructure expects humans to exist.

    • uphillbothways
      10•2 years ago

      Humans are the only species that would ask a question like this with ecologically damning effects. So, yeah.

    • @[email protected]
      26•2 years ago

      Would be interesting to tally up the negative impacts of removing humans as well.

      Culls of invasive species would no longer occur, which would be detrimental in those ecosystems.

      A fairly significant number of endangered animals probably only exist today due to human intervention and breeding programs (i am well aware that we probably made them endangered in the first place)

      Cross breeds would be done as well, Ligers and Mules require humans for breeding. Although in fairness they are definitely not natural to begin with.

      Many animals we have domesticated would be done for as well, most smaller dogs are completely, reliant on humans for food and grooming. Many cats would be okay, but some breeds are likely dead ends as well. Jersey cows would probably have a bad time as well, without milking, sheep might have issues as well?

      Interesting thought experiment.

      • Deebster
        14•2 years ago

        Yeah, this is a good topic. I can add a few:

        Short term, pets in houses, farm animals, etc will need to escape and start fending for themselves otherwise they’ll starve (or dehydrate).. Oops, I’d somehow missed an entire paragraph of your post 🤦‍♂️ Sheep need us to trim their wool, because we’ve bred them up grow fair more than they need. They’ll get too hot if they don’t have problems with defecation first (an actual thing farmers have to worry about).

        Medium to long term, when dams and dikes aren’t maintained they’ll eventually fail, flooding vast areas including the Netherlands.

        I guess that the world will continue heating for a bit even once we’re gone, so we wouldn’t be around to theoretically use our tech to help. Obviously, we’re the reason it’s happening in the first place, but nature’s not equipped to deal with change that’s this rapid.

        • 𝕽𝖚𝖆𝖎𝖉𝖍𝖗𝖎𝖌𝖍
          7•2 years ago

          Yes, most of those we created through breeding, but you could argue that wolves and coyotes created modern deer the same way.

          I do wonder if many would go extinct in the medium term from predation, before they can evolve fast enough to adapt; I’m thinking farm pigs and chickens would be OK in the short term - they don’t need us to survive - but wild dogs/coyotes/wolves, large cats like the NA lions, raptors, foxes… they’d all be putting a lot of pressure on those mostly defenseless breeds. Pigs are not wild hogs. Cattle and horses exist just fine in their environments without humans. Even with predation, herds are large and they aren’t defenseless.

          Sheep are an exception; like you said, they need us to perform maintenance because of how we’ve bred them. Are there others?

          • Monkey With A Shell
            6•2 years ago

            My thoughts go to a lot of our stored and operational fuel supplies. Nuclear fuel (both civil and weapon) would eventually become exposed through lack of storage container maintinance and cooling starting meltdown reactions in their localized environments. Oil extraction, distribution, and refining systems are automated to an extent but somewhere a tank is going ng to rupture or just run out of space and then it’s all getting into the environment, likely at sea to have what effects that may cause.

              • Monkey With A Shell
                2•2 years ago

                I’m sure it’d level off, but a driver falling asleep at the wheel on the highway tends to cause problems. If the BP spill in the Gulf had nobody trying to cap it off who knows how long it’d have kept going.

      • Turun
        1•2 years ago

        Good point! Within a few weeks billions of animals would die. Chicken, pigs, cows, cats and dogs.

        We definitely need to clarify what “good for the planet” means if we want to decide on the best answer.

  • ChainweaselEnglish
    26•2 years ago

    Most positive effects on the planet but not humans?
    Cattle, they’re a major source of greenhouse gasses, as are all the industries built around growing, processing, and transporting them.

  • @[email protected]
    13•2 years ago

    Humans. Can you imagine how happy all of nature’s spicies would be to get rid of this murderous polluting ravaging selfish disease of species called human? All animals to start to breath clean air, restore their trees and natural habitat, slowly recover their climate, and the fish thriving without plastic , toxic waste and oil pollution. It is the best animal to delete for positive outcome no other choice comes close.

  • @[email protected]
    16•2 years ago

    Mosquitoes are pollinators. Sucking blood and being annoying is only a small part of their functionality.

  • Gyoza Power
    11•2 years ago

    Hard to say. Mosquitos, is probably not one of them because even as much as we hate them, many animals prey on them, so unless other insect replaces them as a food source for those animals, them disappearing would probably affect many other species and subsequently, other species that may feed or depend in some form on those that feed on mosquitos.

    My answer would probably be ticks, since I don’t think there’s many animals that feed on them and their only usefulness is population control, which should be doable by other species either way.

    Edit: bed bugs as well, since it was mentioned by other commenters, I hate those fuckers and last I checked they weren’t any animal’s primary food source.

    • Lorindól
      8•2 years ago

      I remember reading some scientic article that examined what would happen if we eradicated the mosquitos entirely.

      Surprisingly, they came to the conclusion that they’d just be gone and we would be a lot happier without the nuisance and the diseases they spread.

      No other species is dependent on mosquitos as a food source, they could easily find enough to eat with them gone. Mosquitos apparently serve no known vital purpose in their ecosystems, although it was mentioned that males of some species have some little value as secondary pollinators.

      • Gyoza Power
        2•2 years ago

        That’s interesting. With how many of them there are and knowing that many species eat them, I would have expected that at least some of them would suffer in some way.