In his short paper from 1985, “The Biological Diversity Crisis,” Wilson proposes a worldwide goal similar to the world goal of eradicating smallpox. Each country should make an effort similar in scope to the effort put into the moon landings in order for this goal to be achieved in 20 years. The subtitle of his paper is “Despite unprecedented extinction rates, the extent of biological diversity remains unmeasured,”
In short his proposed goal is “we should aim at nothing less than a full count, a complete catalog of life on Earth.” This is an immense problem. There is no consensus on the number of species even to an order of magnitude. Estimates range from a few times more than the 1.7 million species already named to some delineated local estimates such as the “possible total of 30 million insect species, mostly confined to the rainforest canopy.” Part of the problem is the “Familiarity with organisms close to home give the false impression that the Linnaean period has indeed ended.” That is that the average person only sees the large species that are familiar to them and rarely do they see any new species so the notion of possibly billions of species yet to be discovered is alien to most people. “Why does this lack of balance in knowledge matter? It might still be argued that to know one kind of beetle is to know them all, or at least enough to get by. But a species is not like a molecule in a cloud of molecules. It is a unique population of organisms, the terminus of a lineage that split off thousands or even millions of years ago. It has been hammered and shaped into its present form by mutations and natural selection, during which certain genetic combinations survived and reproduced differentially out of an almost inconceivably large number possible.”
Systematics is the study of biodiversity. Systematists name and describe organisms (taxonomy) and determine their relationships (phylogenetics). “To attempt an absolute measure of diversity is a mission worthy of the best effort from science.” Wilson goes on to say that systematics is under populated, still in its infancy, and has great potential for development. “The magnitude and cause of biological diversity is not just the central problem of systematics; it is one of the key problems of science as a whole. It can be said that for a problem to be so ranked, its solution must promise to yield unexpected results, some of which are revolutionary in the sense that they resolve conflict in current theory while opening productive new areas of research. In addition, the answers should influence a variety of related disciplines. They should affect our view of humanity’s place in the order of things and open opportunities for the development of new technology of social importance. These several criteria are, of course, very difficult to attain, but I believe the diversity problem meets them all.”
Consider questions such as: if there are X number of species on Earth, why not more or less? Such a question can raise questions in a whole range of disciplines from geology to climatology that could be tested in regions and lead to more knowledge of the interconnection of the environment with life. Another question: why are their diversity hotspots such as most rainforests? “Would it be possible to increase the diversity of natural systems artificially to levels above those in nature without destabilizing them?” Or just how many species need to be in a field to avoid the dangers of mono-cultures? Wilson makes an analogy to 19th century physics to describe our understanding of the elements and forces involved in life processes and their connection to the natural environment: “Our current understand of the forces is still only rudimentary. The science addressing them can be generously put at about the level of physics as it was in the late nineteenth century.” The electron was discovered in October 1897; the proton in 1909. Systematics is at a point analogous to physics before quantum mechanics, nuclear physics, before the discovery of the proton. All the sciences that benefit from systematics are also all handicapped.
There are two good practical reasons for cataloging all life on earth. The first is for the safety of our food supply. “Throughout history…a total of 7000 kinds of plants have been grown or collected as food. Of these, 20 species supply 90% of the world's food and just 3—wheat, maize, and rice—constitute about half. In most parts of the world, this thin reservoir of diversity is sown in monocultures particularly sensitive to insect attacks and disease. Yet waiting in the wings are tens of thousands of edible species, many demonstrably superior to those already in use.” With industrial level mono-farming the likelihood of losing one of these most important species increases with time. “Cavendish, the most commonly available banana variety, is facing the risk of extinction. A fungus that ravages roots is gradually eradicating Cavendish from banana farms all over the world.”[1] “In the developed world, we have access to only a limited number of banana varieties. The predominant variety is the Cavendish banana, the most commonly consumed fruit in the world. It replaced the Gros Michel variety, the former favourite banana, when it went extinct in the 80s. Now, the Cavendish is heading for the same fate.”[2]
The second good reason is for our benefit. “[O]ne in ten plants species contains anticancer substances of variable potency, but relatively few have been bioassayed. Economists use the expression ‘opportunity costs’ for losses incurred through certain choices made over others, including ignorance and inaction. For systematics, or more precisely the neglect of systematics and the biological research dependent upon it, the costs are very high.”
Right now, not only are the costs of ignorance and inaction high in terms of opportunities forgone, but the number of opportunities is also going down at the fastest rate ever, possibly worse than the mass extinction event 65 Million years ago. We are at the start of a mass extinction event that we are causing through habitat destruction. “Biological diversity, apart from our knowledge of it, is meanwhile in a state of crisis. Quite simply, it is declining. Environmental destruction, a worldwide phenomenon, is reducing the numbers of species and the amount of genetic variation within individual species….The rate of extinction is now about 400 times that recorded through recent geological time and is accelerating rapidly. Under the best of conditions, the reduction of diversity seems destined to approach that of the great natural catastrophes at the end of the Paleozoic and Mesozoic Eras, in other words, the most extreme for 65 million years. And in at least one respect, this human-made hecatomb is worse than any time in the geological past. In the earlier mass extinctions, possibly caused by large meteorite strikes, most of the plant diversity survived; now, for the first time, it is being mostly destroyed”.
The study of species to understand them and to see if there is a benefit to humanity is hampered by so few scientists studying them. One reason given is the lack of taxonomic expertise. Wilson tells the story of how difficult it is to get information on already identified spiders in most countries due to this lack. “If systematics is an indispensable handmaiden of other branches of research, it is also a fountainhead of discoveries and new ideas…” in surveying, in classification, in descriptions, especially in informing conservation efforts, and foreign policy. most trouble spots in the western hemisphere are in the tropics and the troubles are linked to biology. “The problem of Third World countries, most of which are in the tropics, are primarily biological. They include excessive population growth, depletion of soil nutrients, deforestation, and the decline of genetic diversity in crop and forest reserves…the intricate economic and social problems of tropical countries cannot be solved without a more detailed knowledge of the environment. Increasingly that must include a detailed account of native faunas and floras.” The biological diversity crisis is a world wide phenomenon and its importance is part of our common human problems. But at the same time some countries are in a much better position to do something about it. “The United States would do well to seek a formal international agreement among countries, possibly in the form of an International Decade for the Study of Life on Earth, to improve financial support and access to study sites. To spread technical capability where it is most needed, arrangements can be made to retain specimens within the countries of their origin while training nationals to assume leadership in systematics and the related scientific disciplines.”
In his “Diversity, The Little Things That Run the World,” address at the opening of the invertebrate exhibit on May 7th 1987, Wilson makes the case for conservation of invertebrates. Invertebrates are animals without a backbone. They are older phylogenetically and much more numerous than vertebrates in absolute numbers, in biomass and in number of species. They are everywhere. Most are so small we do not even see them. “The truth is that we need invertebrates but they don’t need us. If human beings were to disappear tomorrow, the world would go on with little change….but if invertebrates were to disappear, I doubt that the human species could last more than a few months. Most of the fishes, amphibians, birds, and mammals would crash to extinction about the same time. Next would go the bulk of the flowering plants and with them the physical structure of the majority of the forests and other terrestrial habitats of the world. The earth would rot. [closing the nutrient cycle then] other complex forms of vegetation would die off, and with them the last remnants of the vertebrates. The remaining fungi, after enjoying a population explosion of stupendous proportions, would also perish. Within a few decades the world would return to the state of billion years ago, composed primarily of bacteria, algae, and a few very simple multicellular plants.” Habitats must be preserved or we lose everything.
[1] https://www.businessinsider.com/bananas-going-extinct-gros-michel-cavendish-disease-2023-9#:~:text=Cavendish%2C%20the%20most%20commonly%20available,t%20agree%20on%20what's%20best.
[2] https://bananageddon.webflow.io/blog/the-science-of-bananas-why-are-bananas-vulnerable#:~:text=The%20predominant%20variety%20is%20the,went%20extinct%20in%20the%2080s.