Date: Mon, 24 Apr 2000 12:46:41 EDT From: Gallep@aol.com To: cp@opus.hpl.hp.com Message-Id: <aabcdefg1247$foo@default> Subject: Plant Rescue - even against the laws??
>If I know that a tract of land is to be logged come winter and I am out
hiking around >there and happen across a plant I want, if it is not legally
forbidden, I will wild >collect it, or its seed.
>>This seems like the common sense that should prevail even if colleting is
>>potentially illegal.
In my opinion this is a very important and difficult point: can it be
acceptable to take and rescue plants even when it is illegal?
On one hand we have the bulldozer example: Feeling and mind tell us that it
can definitely not be wrong to rescue plants from destruction. Furthermore
most of us (included me) will like the idea of rescuing and / or spreading
species by cultivating them and of cultivating all existing species with the
aim to get one day a situation where it is really no more necessary to take
plants from nature.
On the other hand these measures will often be illegal. For example in
Germany it is definitely forbidden to take any plants from nature without a
permit - and you probably never would get this permit, even not in our
bulldozer example. Could it be acceptable to excuse the violation of laws in
these cases?
Going this way would at least cause three problems: 1. In general it
would lower the moral barriers to break laws made for saving nature
(independant of the fact that these laws miss this aim in this case).
2. It would open doors for the misuse of this way ("Oh sorry, I THOUGHT
there WOULD come bulldozers soon!") 3. Everybody would feel competent to
judge what's right and what's not right.
Fact is: excusing the violation of laws can lead to destruction of nature -
and observing laws can lead to the same result. Perhaps a problem less for
lawyers (like me; who would have thought it?) and botanists than for
philosophers.
With the words of Paul Temple - just some ideas, just thinking and asking
aloud. I don't know the answers, but I think we should keep the problems
in mind.
Frank
PS: For those who are interested in German laws concerning endangered species
there are two new articles on the homepage of GFP (Carnivorous Plant Society
for the German-speaking Area), http://www.carnivoren.org, keyword:
Naturschutz (sorry, only in German).
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