You can instantly, humanely kill every member of animal species deemed "invasive," from the areas they don't belong.

21d

In areas where they have been declared to be invasive species, yes.

21d

Technically all stray and most loosely monitored homed cats are considered by ecology experts to be invasive.

21d

Correct. And potentially unfortunate.

AchVonZalbrecht

20d

Unfortunate to the local bird populations. Cats are the number one killer of birds, taking out approximately 2.4 billion birds per year in the US alone.

GoldDHD

20d

I am absolutely not being belligerent or anything, but isn't the implication of "invasive species" that they displaced the natural counterparts? Wouldn't racoons, snakes, other birds, foxes, etc, multiply due to more abundant food (birds)? Until birds went down to the 'sustaining' level of the original predators?

AchVonZalbrecht

20d

That’s a fair point. By no means am I qualified to speak on anything nature-wise (I just like hiking and almost failed bio in college for my business degree).

I just know that the biggest threat to bird populations is outdoor cats, and I know that the reason there are so many outdoor cats is because humans like keeping them as pets. I’m sure someone smarter than me with more research can connect the dots of declining bird populations (~%25 of “breeding birds” since 1970, whatever that means) and both cat populations and habitat destruction. Considering that there are 3 billion fewer birds today than 50 years ago, and cats kill that many birds every 15 months or so, I’d say that the prevalence of cats as pets in our society has threatened the bird population in North America and globally.

In a sense, humans are kind of the invasive species, bringing our cat population to levels that would threaten continental wildlife populations.

iEatPalpatineAss

20d

So horses would not go extinct from North America again, right? Because the first group of horses did go extinct, and all the horses we have now are descendants brought from Europe, but I don’t think they’ve been declared invasive by any governments.

20d

Correct.

21d

Certain species, sure. Pythons in the Everglades being a topic that I hold dear to my heart (as I'm a gator typing on the internet), but also the armored catfish people throw out, and lion fish. Kudzu and tumbleweeds (thanks CGP Grey) as well are ones I really want to see gone. I'd like to instantly delete cats/rats/dogs off various pacific islands and hopefully save the few species left there. Feral hogs.

The term invasive species means harm to the environment and that's my rationale. I don't care if a species that gets introduced can find a niche and outcompete a local species by being better. I care that the whole system is being affected to a degree that is beyond simply "finding a niche".

21d

☺️ This is where I was looking to go with this scenario.

Mainly my own concern is with extinctions being caused by the lack of balance... And it won't even do those island cats any good, once they have hunted all the local prey species to extinction.

21d

Nah, because if I do then how can I go make a living hunting them?

21d

Aha! An interesting, if selfish, approach to the question. Thanks for the POV

21d

Only half joking. I've casually looked into it and have found about 10 different states and a few countries that I can legally make a living just hunting certain invasive species. Hell, there are 4 different things I can hunt in Florida alone.

iEatPalpatineAss

20d

Aside from Burmese pythons, what else do you hunt?

Also, are you Troy Landry? Can I get an autograph?

20d

There's also iguanas, pigs, macaques, tegu, and cane toads.

So 6 now that I think about it, not 4.

20d

What are those giant snails called? The eat at the stucco to consume the calcium. In their native land they are a food source, but here, invasive.

20d

Can't remember, but is that "hunting" or "harvesting"?

20d

Despite our "Kinder gentler society" and how they are changing verbs to creative softer tones with euphemisms, such as replacing the hard sounding K in kill with the soft H sound in harvesting, that fact still remains that if it is a plant we intend to eat and we uproot it, we say we are harvesting. If it's a plant we don't want around, we kill it. And anything, not a plant, is killed. We kill deer and harvest their meat and organs.

Oh, it sounds kinder, of course unti someone says your child's life was cut short when the were harvested by a drunk driver. Or the judge sentences a man to be held until his date of harvesting.

Eodbatman

20d

It’s “harvested” if its carcass is used for food, energy, or materials. It’s “killed” if it is ending its life for any other reason. So a kid isn’t “harvested “ by a drunk driver unless the driver then consumes the kid or uses the kid for materials.

20d

Touche. Thank you. 😊

20d

Oh, the snails harvest the calcium and then we eat them. Lol.

Mayiask1

21d

That’s a lot of dead cats.

21d

Yes. Which might be a strong motivator for some people, in either direction. BUT, a lot of rare and endangered local birds would wake up safer the next day.

-7

21d

yeah, safer, expect for the rats that will climb into their nest and eat their eggs without cats to keep the populations down.

the law of unintended consequences LOVES it when we fuck about with nature like that

21d

My dude there are bird islands where there were no rats or bird predators before the cats came. If the rats are there they're probably invasive too.

21d

Rats went a lot of places on boats, google bubonic plague lol

User deleted comment

21d

21d

“Do please try to keep up” lmfao it’s all invasive species don’t be such a knob

FearlessKnitter12

20d

Quite the opposite. It's all invasive species or none of them.

Don't you feel foolish now?

20d

ah i was wrong, my bad!

do i feel foolish for making a simple mistake? not really, but thanks for caring :)

edit: my point still stands for all areas to which rats are indigenous though

nah-knee

20d

You should feel foolish for being so quick to insult others and act as if you’re better than them when you were the one that was so hilariously wrong in the first place

20d

should i? nah i dont think so, its a simple enough mistake, and i dont hate myself like most of you lot on here do, so i dont put myself down for simple mistakes like that, ill leave that to you thank 👍

nah-knee

20d

It’s interesting you think most people on here hate you, I’m surprised when your personality is so wonderful. It’s funny that you go so easy on yourself for making a “simple mistake” but when you perceived others were wrong you didn’t think it was a simple mistake and instead just believed they were stupid.

Continue thread...

User deleted comment

20d

20d

THANK YOU

ACam574

21d

Rats

Unfortunately it would be undone in less than two decades but it gives some species time to recover.

manimopo

20d

So all/most humans die goodbye humans

20d

Humans haven’t been declared invasive.

manimopo

20d

The other animals who's homes have been destroyed and gone extinct would argued otherwise

20d

I’m not saying humans haven’t been destructive, just that OP has specific criteria and humanity doesn’t fit it.

manimopo

20d

he edited after I responded.

21d

What about bees? Scientists say they aren't incasive but they are killing our natural pollinators?

21d

Where exactly is it claimed that bees are threatening local pollinators? Isn't it the other way around where invasive things are killing out the bees?

21d

I don't have the exact research on hand but I can assure you that bees were introduced to America from other countries. Atleast from the research I've done and seen. You can totally do your own research though!

21d

Aha that's covered under where I said domesticated animals are exempt except where they have been declared invasive.

We need bees, we don't need those mega murder hornets that come in and eat all the beehives.

ClonedThumper

21d

We do not need honey bees. There are still native pollinators in North America that are being out competed by a protected species because people like honey.

21d

Dude I was not tryna fight w you ob logistics. I was just curious on if you'd considered that or not and obviously you havent.

21d

If they're not considered invasive by science then they're not included! Considered!! also not a dude

21d

Some scientists consider them invasive but it's not a consensus.

jimmystar889

20d

We don’t need honeybees. They’re invasive

21d

The entire point of my comment was that we dont need bees. We are forced to rely on bees because they are taking away respirces from out natural pollinators, and not all bees are domesticated.

20d

Africanised bees are invasive, so…

shemjaza

21d

What about domestic animals? Is it just the feral ones who die, or is it the farmed and kept ones as well?

21d

Domesticated animals are exempt except in situations where they are specifically designated "invasive." ("Invasive" does not automatically mean the same thing as "migrated in the past," they have to be causing ecological problems to be considered invasive now.)

shemjaza

21d

But in a region with invasive animals are the ones who are still under human control and not loose in the environment okay, or caught up in the death ray?

21d

Well farm pigs and feral hogs are still considered the same species, but the feral ones are the only ones designated, so I would say the ones under human control are safe.

There's some unfortunate implications around pets though, depending on how you make the rules, because either people are going to lose a lot of pets, or fucking cats are going to get out again almost immediately and go back to fucking everything up.

shemjaza

21d

It is a tough one.

Look, I think your death ray would be great for the environment.... and if a few "I don't believe in de sexing." types lose their pets, then it's a price I'll pay.

wpbth

21d

Lion fish,

Blocked-Author

21d

Humans?

21d

Nope, not covered by the premise.

Blocked-Author

21d

Humans are an incredibly invasive species in almost every area and could probably get classified as such by scientists.

keIIzzz

20d

I mean a human isn’t going to classify humans as invasive, considering that’s a concept more or less created by humans

bugabooandtwo

21d

Ticks are spreading into areas they aren't supposed to be. Seems like a one one to wipe out.

21d

Great point, I'd be worried about disease carrying mosquitos migrating as well.

MidwestAbe

21d

Took a look at a number of state departments of natural resources pages on invasive. I'm not sure what there is to lose. No one's cat is going to die. We still have cattle and hogs and chicken.

But we don't have nasty bugs eating trees and lots and lots of plants that are really changing the landscape.

So I do it.

21d

Oh you know what, I didn't end up including plants in my scenario, but I absolutely SHOULD have.

MidwestAbe

21d

Plants probably make up the bulk of any Invasive list in the US. In my state we have an Invasive fish and a few insects and now a tick. But the plant list is a lot longer.

strawberrysoup99

20d

Lionfish, bull weavels, those ash tree bugs, rats, a plethora of plants... yep. I hit that button with a sledgehammer. That kind of cosmic do-over would do the world wonders. A lot of the ones that come from across oceans only did so because we had no concept of invasive species until we brought them there.

I'm sure we'd fuck it all up eventually, but it'd give us a generation or two to hopefully learn our lessons.

Yverthel

20d

I would pose that the most invasive, damaging species on the planet is humanity.

weratapo

20d

Humans and earth, peace out yo

Podria_Ser_Peor

20d

Yes, they tend to do more wrong than good and better it be a humane death than the current alternative, plus you would get rid of a lot of diseases in some parts of the world (example the Aedes aegypti mosquito isn´t originary from south america but it´s the main spreader of dengue fever and yellow fever over there, so it would be really good to get rid of those, same wih a lot of rodents transmitted diseases)

fgunternahrer

21d

Invasive from which point in history. At amy given point I. The history of the earth some new better species was out performing the others and spreading it's territory. That's how it works. We have sped it up by manually moving things across the globe. It it did still happen naturally throughout all of time it was just a slower crawl so where do we draw the line from invasive species to natural evolution. At one point mammals were an invasive species that outcompeted the dinosaurs

21d

Aha, follow the nuance in the scenario:

Anything that has been declared by scientists currently to be invasive.

So for instance domesticated animals are exempt, except in specific cases like where feral cats got into that bird island and fucked it up, and they specifically declared cats on that island to be an invasive threat.

Or those herds of thirty to fifty feral hogs that evolved from escaped pigs and are tearing up parts of America now.

In situations where animals have migrated, but not been painted as "invasive" by scientists, they're not covered by this hypothetical.

Coconut crabs for instance have migrated to coasts all over the world, following the same natural currents that brought coconut palms across continents. And all of their various environments are now well adapted to them, so those don't count. But nuisance iguanas that are terrorizing Florida, that got brought over on boats, those do count. Make sense?

21d

So using the Australian example.

If it wanted to kill toads and rabbits. I would kill all invasive species? So every cow, chicken, goat and sheep on the continent?

That's one hell of a monkey paw. I would not take that deal. Think of the impacts on the food supply and the economy.

21d

Domesticated animals are not CONSIDERED invasive, by scientists. So they would get a pass.

21d

Ok.

But Brumbies, wild pigs and feral bulls are all considered invasive species.

Does that mean every horse, pig and domestic cow dies?

That's still a huge impact on the food chain and the economy.

21d

Only those members of the species which are designated invasive get killed. They have to be in the area, and considered invasive. So where science makes an exception for domestication, so does the death event.

21d

There is no biological difference between a brumby and a domestic horse.

So is this just a case just a case of pets are fine in your hypothetical?

21d

Answer covered extensively elsewhere in comments

21d

Edit your post then. You can't expect us to dig though all the comments.

21d

OP clearly says declared invasive by scientists, science makes an exception for domesticated animals in most (but not all) scenarios, so that's what this follows.

21d

I'm asking for clarification.

Does killing invasive wild pigs/horses/cows mean killing livestock animals as well? In most cases they are exactly the same species, because if the expectation is pets don't count" the question completely removes the moral dilemma. Why wouldn't you remove invasive animals if there was no downside ?

Smooth-Physics-69420

21d

Any invasive species, you say?

21d

Actually what I said was any species currently considered invasive by scientists.

A lot of people think they're being clever making top level comments hinting about the "most dangerous game" which is also aggravating when I specifically said "no humans will be killed" in OP.

Smooth-Physics-69420

21d

Well, shit. Because technically speaking, we are the most invasive species.

I guess this shall require more complex thought.

Normal-Detective3091

21d

Those awful feral hogs in Texas. They're dangerous. They can severely injure a full-grown human and kill cattle and horses.

21d

Oh, I know it.

That guy became a meme for complaining about it as a defense of automatic weapons, and I laughed. It's the only time in my life I later admitted I was wrong about something said by a Republican. (Still don't think a legal free-for-all on AR-15s is the proper answer to feral hogs, but that is way off topic for this post.)

Other ones that especially concern me are feral cats on bird islands, parthenogenetic marbled freshwater crayfish invading Ontario, lionfish, murder-hornets, and the loss in diversity of ants worldwide.

Kitfox_1

21d

I’m an Australian raised out in the country so I’d likely pick feral cats. Not counting humans, cats are easily the biggest pest in Australia environmentally and have caused untold devastation to so many native species

prettyflyforamemeguy

20d

The Eastern Grey Squirrel of Washington State. It’s a nuisance that’s invasive and pushed the other native squirrels either north, remote places or put them on the endangered species list. I didn’t have a problem with them until I realized how much they damaged property and took over the food supply that normally would go to multiple types of squirrels and not just one

Adept_Thanks_6993

20d

Yep.

Kind_Moose3603

20d

What about plants like hogweed and tumble weeds? I'll do it either way, but I want to know.

20d

I should have included plants, yeah.

Sea_Permit8105

20d

As an australian PLEASE! Not to be mean but fuck those feral cats.

2_72

20d

I’m a bit disappointed humans aren’t being brought up more..

Sufficient-Pause-837

20d

I want to kill Wasps. But can I opt in for it to be painful?

haikusbot

20d

I want to kill Wasps.

But can I opt in for

It to be painful?

- Sufficient-Pause-837

^{I detect haikus. And sometimes, successfully.} ^{Learn more about me.}

^{Opt out of replies: "haikusbot opt out" | Delete my comment: "haikusbot delete"}

Gethighflykites

20d

This would mess with a lot of zoos.

keIIzzz

20d

Do bedbugs count lol

Ok-Geologist8387

20d

So all humans will die here in Australia?
That kinda sucks...

fongletto

20d

If it was 'every' invasive species not a chance. Firstly because that definition is WAYYYY too lose, what do you mean by 'in' their proper habitat. Certain 'invasive' species are species that just naturally found their own way over to other places through natural events and had nothing to do with humans.

If I could selectively do it for certain species that are a pest to humans then I would.

There's nothing inherently wrong with a new species out competing an old one who can't change or adapt fast enough. That's literally how evolution works.

BritishGuitarsNerd

20d

I definitely would, yes. New Zealand for eg had such a unique situation, loads of birds and no mammals, then invaders fucked it all up.

LoopyMercutio

20d

I’m gonna go with “NO” on this one, solely because I could see the argument of humans themselves being an invasive species in, well, most of the world. They do fit the criteria.

20d

Humans do not fit the criteria of this hypothetical. It specifically says "No humans will be killed."

NoDanaOnlyZuuI

20d

Mosquitoes

twizrob

20d

Absolutely I love killing things but holy crap would it stink for awhile.

No-Animator-3832

20d

The Chinese Sparrow War where the Chinese effectively eliminated "invasive" sparrows......resulted in a famine starving somewhere between 20-30 million Chinese to death.

HaggisPope

20d

I saw a video on a pretty helpful invasive species in Iceland recently. Linus, a plant that originated in Alaska, is a nitrogen fixer which can grow in low quality soil and improve it.

There’s some issues with it potentially crowding out native species but it seems very helpful for rewilding efforts

Cynis_Ganan

20d

Boop. Button pushed. 100%.

20d

We hunt those animals and harvest their eggs and ir meat.

Mioraecian

20d

Insects are a part of the animal kingdom. I'd look up one that is causing ecological damage and pick the.. we have a Ron of invasive beetles in my area.

20d

As an Australian, I’d have a lot of work ahead of me!

Rats. Cats. Mice. Rabbits. Cane toads. Camels. A number of fish species. Feral pigs.

Just for starters.

JadeHarley0

20d

Yes. And if it was stray cats I would also say yes.

Nemo_Shadows

20d

It would be nice if they could be harvested and used in something along the way.

N. S

pinniped1

20d

Even with the OP exemption for humans, I'd be worried about the butterfly effect of resetting ecosystems instantly to the way they were before scientists started considering animal migrations to be invasions.

Where is the line drawn? Just creatures that were in an area 10,000 years ago? 10 million years ago? Do extinct megafauna return or do we just get things deemed "native" that are living today?

It's tempting...because of those fucking murder hornets more than anything, but I don't know if I could pull the trigger and risk fucking up a bunch of ecosystems.

ReadyOrNot-My2Cents

20d

I would kill all mosquitos instantly. I've googled it before, and aside from serving as food for other insects/birds/small animals, they're entirely useless. They literally serve no purpose for the ecosystem.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chestnut_blight

20d

There are only actually a few mosquito species we need to kill, the ones that spread diseases. A lot of them (most of them) don't do that.

Least_Adhesiveness_5

20d

Yep. It's going to be disruptive, but it's worth it.

And we get to have pure American chestnuts in the Appalachians again once chestnut blight is eliminated.

Select_Collection_34

20d

Does this include naturalized animals?

Various_Succotash_79

20d

Eh. It wouldn't last very long. There's way too much international trade and travel nowadays. The first ship that comes from an area with native rats would re-infest every place they visit. And then the cats follow, etc. etc.

Maybe we'd have learned our lessons about things like wild hogs and cane toads, but probably not.

JustALullabii

20d

Instinctively I wanted to go with a very firm yes. Although it kinda hurts. Like, no matter how many birds they catch, cats still are very cute.

And then I thought of zoo animals. Like, we keep raccoons. They're neither domestic, nor live stock per se. But they are invasive where I live. So I'd have to go to work in the morning, knowing I'm going to find our three elderly ladies dead, because of me. And like, I know what their species is doing to our nature, out there. But that would still suck, because those three idiots did nothing wrong.

I'm still going with yes. I'd do it. But I'm going to cry about it for days.

smiling_mallard

20d

Assuming there is a difference between invasive d introduced then yeah.

EmbarrassedPudding22

20d

Death to mosquitoes

ProbablyAWizard1618

20d

Does this apply to perpetuity? You said it’s a one time thing but is there any lasting effect to prevent reintroduction? Because people still do a lot of the activities that introduced them to the wrong environment in the first place

20d

Education, I guess.

But like no more British Lords bringing game and weird pets, and shipping is a lot more careful now than it used to be.

Optimal-Machine-7620

20d

Can I do plants and send all the tumbleweeds back to Russia?

20d

I wish we could send all the uninvited Russians in Ukraine back to Russia, but that would be a different hypothetical.

unicornofdemocracy

20d

I would prefer to have this abilities for plants... because FUCK GARLIC MUTARD!

themadprofessor1976

19d

I would eliminate fire ants and kudzu

PlaidBastard

17d

Tongue in cheek, I think the way to abuse this is to hire an unethical scientist to declare various things invasive which are actually just inconvenient to you, the person with this terrible power of life and death. Not that the opposite ever happens, say with unethical wildlife biologists doing a bad job checking for endangered species when a new casino 'needs' to get built on one particular hillside and their boss' boss' boss is on the developer's Preferred Plus Bribery Plan, or anything.

CloudyRiverMind

21d

All humans are dead...

21d

Another redditor who failed to read the assignment

CloudyRiverMind

21d

Not from killing them, but from the side effects of this. Many "invasive" creatures have adapted to their environment and can be considered vital now.

-6

21d

Bold of you to assume humans aren't the invasive species themselves. Seems to me Earth was doing just fine until we came along. I think there's only one invasive species on this planet, and it ain't rabbits.

21d

It's an easy gateway to supporting "genocide", which I'm 99.99% sure is against Reddit TOS regardless of your opinion on the one that gets talked about a lot over in the sandbox.

21d

Genocide is against a specific group of humans. All of humanity is equally responsible. I would never advocate for murder, for this reason exactly. There's always a person to be blamed, a finger to be pointed. It's impractical to think we can somehow reverse all the damage that has been done.

21d

I meant, "X are invasive but Y are not" argument so just woosh all of them get deleted

21d

Probably because they're pointless. As with my point, invasive species eventually become native and part of the environment. That environment either adapts or it does not.

21d

Woosh the point went over your head.

"X people are invasive by Y people are not, so X people as a whole woosh all are deleted from history, and just so happens X people are disliked by the Z person that argues for having this hypothetical decision and has a subjective opinion about X and Y peoples."

That, is called genocide, using the definition put forth by Geneva. And that's why OP said no.

"All of humanity is equally responsible"

Bullshit and you know it.

"All of humanity, including the ones around today, are responsible for the extinction of horses in North America".

Those horses went extinct before Columbus got there meaning every human who was not part of the genealogical progression out of Africa and into the Americas were not involved and thus not responsible.

"We can't reverse the damage of a bleeding wound so it's best to let it bleed out instead of stop the bleeding and let it heal best it can".

That's some real doomer shit right there. Until the whole population is gone or the environment is damaged beyond saving, the ability to stop the bleeding and letting the place heal back best it can is always on the table.

That's the ethical question here. Wipe all invasive species off the planet from places they invaded, or not and let the damage continue until the place is permanently scarred. This is actually a moral good because it assumes all invasive species have a native home range that is still around. Those "invasive" species will survive in their home ranges.

21d

You must be fun at parties. Let me guess, lonely cat person?

21d

I don't like parties. But I'm not lonely. I embrace my solitude very gratefully.

21d

Wow, really hit the nail on the head there

21d

Yeah, we're going to entirely avoid this line of discussion in this hypothetical. Thank you...

-3

21d

Hmm, not a very philosophical nor interesting hypothetical, then. Plato didn't leave his cave by talking about the birds and bees, but to each their own.

21d

Feel free to post another one then! But I wanted to explore one specifically about the scientific impact of unintended animal migration to previously isolated ecosystems caused by human activity. Not another "what if humans disappeared/never existed." To me that subject is tired and boring.

21d

maybe you should have worded you OP better then.

21d

I think it was worded fine. Most people in the threads understood it.

meatpopcycal

21d

That’s bullshit, the planet created us to make plastic.

21d

"Everything happens for a reason." I highly doubt that reason was to destroy the one home we were given. At least, if it was, humans are clearly not the reason. Which might be more concerning than our obsession with plastic forks.

d4fat1

20d

Let's start with people/humans and see where people will still exist. idk anything more invasive than us.

LoganLikesYourMom

20d

Are humans considered an invasive species?

Rasty_lv

20d

Do humans count?

Whane17

20d

Gbye huge numbers of humans. Thanos snap.

houseprose

20d

Click…. There goes most of us. Myself included.

20d

I feel like a lot of you didn't even read the OP

A_Nameless

-1

21d

Humans just fucking turn to dust outside of Africa.

Shaithias

-1

21d

I declare myself to be a scientist and I declare all capitols of all nations to be protected sanctuaries, and all humans in said capitols to be an invasive species. Bye bye politicians.