Eighteenth International Conference on Environmental, Cultural, Economic & Social Sustainability

Abstract

Estimating whether the earth’s biota is in the middle of a crisis relies heavily on comparisons between present and past data about biodiversity or biodiversity surrogates. In this paper, I first compare measurements of biodiversity to measurements of paleodiversity. My intent is to understand whether commonly used inferences from paleodiversity measurement to biodiversity estimates are epistemically well-motivated. I claim that justifying such comparative evaluations (e.g. using paleodiversity data to show we are currently facing a biodiversity crisis) is harder than it appears. I argue that paleodiversity measurements are incommensurable with contemporary measures of biodiversity, given the different ways that biodiversity is conceptualized. Specifically, unlike current biodiversity measures, paleoestimates rely heavily on an understanding of biodiversity as species counts, like the famous Sepkoski (1982) diversity curve of marine invertebrates. But the understanding of current biodiversity is not reducible to species inventories. I call this mismatch the “incommensurability problem”. I do not argue that paleodata are useless in conservation efforts, but that paleodiversity is not directly commensurable to estimates of contemporary biodiversity and loss without additional qualifications. I conclude by proposing a possible ways of overcoming this incommensurability problem inspired by Santana’s (2014) proposal to eliminate “biodiversity” from research agendas, and instead focus on biological values. Using Santana’s view, the justification of claims such as “we are in the middle of a crisis” does not hinge on a proper comparison between paleodata per se and the current state of biodiversity. Rather, “crisis” amounts to an anthropocentric loss of ecosystem services.