Unintended Consequences of Environmental Intervention
In ecology, deliberate changes to an ecosystem can have unintended consequences, when these effects escape the control of those who introduced them. Examples include:
- The introduction of DDT as a pesticide, which led to the accumulation of the chemical in birds, interfering with their reproduction or killing them (cite sources).
- The introduction of rabbits to Australia by Europeans, which became economically and environmentally damaging, as the rabbits had no natural predators.
- The draining of American wetlands since colonial times, resulting in flash-flooding and seasonal droughts.
- The installation of smokestacks to decrease pollution in local areas, resulting in spread of pollution at a higher altitude, and acid rain on an international scale.
- After about 1900, public demand led the federal government to fight forest fires in the American West, and set aside land as national forests and parks to protect them from fires. This policy led to fewer fires, but led to growth conditions that made what fires did occur much larger and more damaging. Modern research suggests that this policy was misguided, and that a certain level of wildfires is a natural and important part of forest ecology.
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Famous quotes containing the words unintended, consequences and/or intervention:
“I thank heaven that the 4th. of July is over. It is always a day of great fatigue to me, and of some embarrassments from improper intrusions and some from unintended exclusions.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“The medium is the message. This is merely to say that the personal and social consequences of any medium—that is, of any extension of ourselves—result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology.”
—Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980)
“All of the assumptions once made about a parent’s role have been undercut by the specialists. The psychiatric specialists, the psychological specialists, the educational specialists, all have mystified child development. They have fostered the idea that understanding children and promoting their intellectual well-being is too complex for mothers and requires the intervention of experts.”
—Elaine Heffner (20th century)