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  • From: Toby Hemenway <toby@patternliteracy.com>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] How to decide?
  • Date: Sun, 6 May 2012 12:57:09 -0700

On May 6, 2012, at 11:49 AM, Jono Neiger wrote:
>
> In my intensive research into the natives-invasives issue I find that many
> scientists are beginning to question the inflated claims made against
> certain species. Science is slowly breaking through the wall of claims and
> rhetoric.

Thanks, Jono. The new debate in invasion biology is a nice example of science
finally cracking through preconceived notions. A lot of early invasion
biology was based on the assumption that new species were always doing harm,
since "invaders" are something that, deep in our psyches, we fear with good
reason. Even the term "invasion" is very biased, and is now being renamed
"species replacement" and other more neutral terms. Much of the early science
was done to prove what was being assumed: I've seen many papers whose point
was to show that a new species results in fewer numbers of the old species,
which is very circular logic (a new species has to replace something, by
definition), but it got plenty of grant money. But finally people started
seeing undeniable signs that in many cases, the new species were supporting
just as many native allies as the old, and building soil and having other
beneficial effects. One example of the bias is how, if a plant were a native
nitrogen fixer, the nitrogen was considered fertility. But if it was a
non-native N-fixer, the N was labeled a disruptive input upsetting the local
cycles.

So scientists, being human, are not immune from bias. But the methods are
designed so that bias eventually becomes apparent. It's why it is so
important to be constantly looking to see what your assumptions and beliefs
are, at deeper and deeper levels, so that you can test them and see where
they are controlling how you ask questions and what answers you'll accept
(it's why I regularly read climate-change denier stuff--they may yet come up
with something, but so far, I can't see any). It's well documented that
people are far more likely to retain information that confirms what they
already know, and forget contrary information. And that's why anecdotes are
not a good basis for making decisions; we select the ones we like (and
usually embellish them in the repetition). I think invasion biology was
largely based on anecdote and selection of confirming data for a long time.
Now it's starting to accumulate real data, and the early assumptions--natives
good, exotics bad--are crumbling.

Toby
http://patternliteracy.com







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