Another one of my favorite economic factoids was in a book called "Secrets of the Old Growth Forest" by David Kelly and Gary Braasch: In the mid-80s scientists at Oregon State University determined that the cost of reproducing the functions of just one old growth Douglas fir tree by technological means was very close to the cost of the US space program from its inception to Neal Armstrong's walk on the moon. Just one tree!

At various times over the past couple of decades my colleagues and I have considered the "value" in assigning financial "value" to what I prefer to call the gifts of the Earth, and what others call ecosystem services. My biggest problems with the concept are these: Everything is connected. Bees are connected to flowers are connected to clean air are connected to GE-free fields are connected to climate variations are connected to other insects, and so on. If we're going to assign a value to bees, then we must assign a value to everything bees need to be healthy. But assigning value means separating the bees out from everything else. And in reality we can't do that and still have bees. Another problem: Assigning value is essentially meaningless because no amount of money can recreate anything in nature. We cannot buy ourselves back an extinct species. We can throw money at existing problems and, if we're lucky, we may have a positive impact. But that's not what we're talking about here.

I understand the thinking behind assigning value to aspects and services of the Earth. It's an "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" kind of thing. But I don't like it and I think it's fraught with many unforseen problems. Not to mention the fact that it means we are letting "them" (those who only see value in monetary terms) determine the terms of the debate. IMHO we need to be moving away from the almighty dollar kind of mindset. Ultimately money is meaningless. It's paper or not even - it's figures in a ledger or information that gets transferred from here to there. Whereas the Earth is real, is solid, is (I believe) sacred. It does not belong in my checkbook.

I disagree with SMLowry, because ecosystem services do not imply separating out value of bees and individual plants, rather delineating various ecosystems and assigning a value to the ecosystem services as a whole per ecosystem. This is the iffy part: how do we properly assign a value to the existing values versus potential values. For example, a bog in the mountains completely separated hydrologically from the rest of the hydro unit but containing rare plants might have a much lower value than an invaded Phragmites australis wetland which is filtering highway run-off, even after including recreation values.

There are other potential problems with putting values on ecosystem services, such as figuring out where the money would come from for landowners, who could easily make money off development, but not ecosystem services. If there is a framework of paying for destroying an ecosystem, landowners will argue that this is in fact a tax, and Adam Stein's argument that this is not a tax will be challenged.

Great post overall, I would love to see a discussion on this topic.

This scheme could only be implemented via a successful power struggle and the struggle would not end, as it hasn't for any other environmental or conservation gain.

I think that protecting what remains of biodiversity will take something much more than appealing to people's ethics. Just look at the hundreds of billions spent on everything from war to space travel instead of conservation. The vast majority of people put nature on the bottom of their list.

If there were a way to control 500 billion dollars for a decade (wield great power), we could buy up and place in the hands of the conservationists of every country just about every last endangered ecosystem on the planet with money left over for maintenance and security. The power struggles to get at those resources would instantly begin. It is all a collective fantasy of a handful of treehuggers, biologists, and conservationists that anything short of that will save it.

There is hardly a reader of the Grist Blog who would not plunk a cabin on waterfront property or in the mountains if they could afford it. Of my peers who can afford it, all of them have done it, ski lodges, hobby ranches, waterfront cabins, you name it. Placing a value on nature is essentially making it unaffordable to have your way with it, but those with enough money will be able to afford it anyway. Money is just a convenient form of power.

In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world

I take great offense to the notion that Mother Nature is worth "X" amount of money.  That was some philosophical question that was, sorry to say, not even worth asking.  /sammie

Onward through the fog

As for the link, WorldChanging is running a series on ecosystem services. Well worth hopping over there.

Blog: Down to Earth

Well, I am a reader of the Grist Blog, and I have no desire whatsoever to go cabin-plunking.  And somehow I feel I am not alone.

The same writer's Nietzschean/Randoid rejection of "appealing to people's ethics" is superficially understandable.  Yes, there is evil in the world, and almost all people are governed at one time or another by selfish motives.  But really, his attitude is cynical, pusillanimous, ignoble and short-sighted.  Sammie's reaction, "I take great offense," is what that attitude deserves.  In fact, people are much more complicated, ethically, than BioD seems to think.  And they deserve much more credit than he wants to allow them.  Patience and hope too.

We, and our friends and allies, are the teachers here.  When animals and plants go extinct on account of human activities, we bear a large part of the responsibility: either we did not work hard enough to say what needed to be said, or we presented an ill-designed lesson.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

As for assigning monetary value to nature, I agree with (I think) most here that there is an intrinsic value (ethical, aesthetic, or whatever) to preserving nature. But face it: we're in the minority.

Consider, instead of the value of what nature does for us now, the added cost if we destroy part of nature. For example, a healthier Mississippi delta means that less robust (read: expensive) flood protection would be needed in New Orleans. Better natural water drainage means a less-expensive wastewater treatment regime.

As the saying goes, it's like housework: noone notices you do it until you don't do it.

But, most people who can afford to do so, use part of their disposable income for a second home. Admittedly, the people I know who have done so do not represent a statistically large sample size, but it is very consistent. Those who can afford to do it have done so, and those who have not could not afford to do so, almost straight down the line. Given enough disposable income, most use some of it for a second home. Here is a short list of second homes of friends and close acquaintances (we have stayed in several of these places):

1. Modern, three bedroom home along Columbia river in the Gorge.
   
2. Modern, three bedroom home along Chelan River.
   
3. Brand new 20 acre hobby ranch in Yakima.
   
4. Modern ski chalet in Chelan (my wife and daughter are visiting there as I write).
   
5. Condo on mount Baker.
   
6. Brand new home on beach along Puget Sound.
   
7. Cabin in Adirondacks.

But by and large, the game remains the same: money rules the world, not ideals of a group of people that are on the outskirts of main-stream society. As such, assigning monetary values to ecosystem services will provide for a way to support conservation. Let's try to move away from moral issues with this idea, because flailing our collective arms about how the world should be will not affect in any meaningful way the reality of the world.

I would like to see a more robust discussion on how we can make the ecosystem services' monetary values work within our system, i.e. where do we get the money to counteract development: regulatory 'tax' on development? HOw about the argument that economic development is very necessary?

The fact is that government and industry tend to act on the basis of cost/benefit analysis, and they can't incorporate benefits into that analysis that have no concretely measurable value. Putting dollar values on ecosystem services is a way of giving them a place in cost/benefit analysis. "What gets measured gets done."

Nobody's threatening the refined ethical and aesthetic sensibilities of nature lovers -- moral umbrage strikes me as exactly the wrong response to what is a practical attempt to protect the natural resources from which we all benefit.

grist.org

On the front it has a line at breast height with DBH above (DBH = diameter at breast height). It's a lot funnier on girls, but still funny.

But my point is that Dave is right, it's hard to measure aesthetic and moral qualities of a place. There have been studies on the first, and it really depends on the person, not so sure about the second one, but I would think that would depend even more on the observer. And if you can't measure it, how can you act on it?

This is what we need to get across. People in general don't understand how fragile ecosystems are. They don't see what they're doing in the context of what everyone else is doing elsewhere and the impact it has even on things that aren't specifically touched. For example, growing up there was a wonderful woods behind our house. I spent all my time there, took my boyfriends back there as a teenager, cross-country skiied through them to the downhill ski area, "ran away" to them when I got frustrated with my parents. These woods were full of wonderful wildflowers and my favorites were the pink, white, and (rare) yellow lady slippers. Every spring I'd watch for their emergence, anxious to see if any large white ones would come up amongst the pink. It was a ritual of mine from the time I was about six years old. Then whoever owned the woods sold some lots for second homes. Even though no homes were built on the spot where the ladyslippers grew, those ladyslippers gradually disappeared. Today they are completely gone. We don't have to destroy something directly to kill it. Just being there is sometimes enough. How much are those ladyslippers worth do you suppose?

I think it's extremely important to clearly put forth a perspective that does not always equate everything with money. If that wetland, say, was "valued" at 5 billion dollars does that mean we need to pay the owner 5 billion dollars not to develop it? I'd be willing to bet there'd be plenty of landowners who would demand to be compensated for the lost development "value".

And if I had the disposable income to plunk a cabin down somewhere, I'd rather take that money and rent something that already exists for a week or a month or whatever. A cottage on Crete, for example . . . sigh . . . , or an apartment an ancient city. . . . I get to see and experience more of this wonderful Earth without plunking anything anywhere.

 Finally (for now), I believe there is a place for moral umbrage when it comes to protecting ecosystems simply because so much has been lost already. It's not as if we're starting with a pristine planet and it's time this reality was integrated somehow into decisionmaking.

For better or worse, money is the way we assign value in the global economy. I can't realistically see that changing on anything like the timescales we need to address global warming and other environmental problems. So why not assign dollar values, if for no other reason than to make plain the immense, concrete value we derive from unspoiled ecosystems?

Again, I'm sympathetic to your POV, but we're in a bit of a time crunch. We need to be ruthless and clear-eyed in our tactics. Ecosystem services really are worth an immense amount of money, so if it helps to make that explicit, I'm all for it.

I'd be curious to hear more about Adam's objections.

grist.org

Enviro:  But you simply can't destroy Parcel 37.

Court:  Why?

Enviro: Well, it's been there for thousands of years.

Court:  So?

Enviro:  It's sheltering dozen of species, filtering our air, preserving our groundwater, preventing soil erosion.

Evil Corporate Lawyer:  The new highway extension will create 172 jobs, lessen the average commuter's travel time by 20%, bring $25 million/year in tolls and will spur local small business production with shops, gas stations, restaraunts. We estimate the local economy will see a boost of over $100 million in the first two years.

Enviro:  But the speckled blue monarch butterfly has it's primary habitat in Parcel 37!  It's endangered!

ECL:  Rolls eyes.

Court:  Laughs.  Judge bangs gavel for order.

I totally agree with SMLowry that we should not have to be forced to quantify Nature's value in order to help people recognize Nature's value - the recognition should be obvious and automatic.  But since we are a culture that can obviously and automatically recognize the virtues of the Almighty Dollar, perhaps it would not be such a bad thing to offer the Enviro the ammunition to level the playing field.  Consider:

Enviro: It would cost $22.7 million annually to manually filter the air that is filtered by the trees in Parcel 37; a new ground-water treatment facility would cost $500 million to build and $37 million to run & maintain annually; the supporting walls and structures that are needed to shore up the eroding landscape will cost $113 million; and the loss of shade trees in the region will increase air conditioning bills by an average of 17%.

Callous, perhaps, but compelling.

It would be great if everyone in the world had the same enormous respect for and desire to care for the natural world as your average Grist reader does. And we can all wish for this and spread the word. But it is clearly not the case. We have to find a way to place a value on natural ecosystem functions if we are going to persuade the money grubbers and power hungry leaders of our civilization to preserve the biosphere. They don't understand preserving nature just becasue it is the right thing to do. They need to know what's in it for them. And money is the only language their tiny reptilian brains can understand -- yes, that's a bit of an insult to reptiles, but the best I can come up with.

(1) Litter. I learn every spring that the campaign to stop littering has not entirely succeeded. Hordes of volunteers walk the highways bagging everyone trash. It is not yet "uncool" to litter.

(2) Voles. I've learned that  voles are essential for the health of boreal forests. They apparently help disperse a mycorrhizal fungi essential in delivering nutrients and water to the roots of many types of trees. Conservatives nevertheless laugh at researchers studying voles. I believe it would be useful to know the dollar value of the service... and ask timber companies whether they would mind paying someone a decent wage to do the vole's work... and ask consumers whether they would mind paying for it by increasing the cost of building materials. And this is only one of the services provided by voles.

(3) Cabins. Why would someone plunk a cabin in one natural location to use a few times each year?! If you can afford a cabin, wouldn't you rather travel to see a new place each time you escape from the urban rat nest?  I assume you need that cabin because you live in a city... hee hee hee. I would not build that cabin unless it was my sole domicile and I could telecommute (feel free to send job offers).

(4) Wetlands. At least one person was concerned that the owner of the 5-billion dollar wetland would demand payment or develop it. Pure extortion. It is possible and we should ensure laws are in place to prevent this. But a more like scenario in my opinion... when voters realize that their vote in favor of absolute property rights comes with a multi-billion dollar tax hike to pay for flood prevention measures, water treatment facilities, and an increased risk of exposure to harmful chemicals and microorganisms, they might prefer to curtail development and maintain the wetland.

Just my 25 cents.

Owning a cabin by the lake - wouldn't want it if you gave it to me.

Just knowing that the lake is there - priceless.


The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.

Incidentally, I found your method interesting. Perhaps you or someone else can identify and provide some historical information about this style of argument.

Good conversation. I'm sorry that I've been away from the computer all day.

One comment: I think there's a tendency to get carried away with white-hat/black-hat characterizations of those who love nature and those would destroy it for profit. Hence we hear about "money grubbers" and "power hungry leaders", etc.

But when I wrote that in most parts of the world, littering is not particularly seen as uncool, I wasn't actually referring to the self-indulgent and wealthy. I was referring to the average person, and on a global scale, the average person is quite poor.

A sense of environmental ethics and aesthetics is something that grows with wealth, not shrinks. It's a cultural value, not a universal value. That's why I think that both carrots and sticks are necessary. Certainly cultural values can and do change over time (thank god), but the process is slow. So appeals to self-interest definitely have a place.

www.terrapass.com/blog

And by the way, Nature is neither our mother nor our father. It is simply the universe and everything in it, including ourselves. We are not outside of it, nor is it outside of us.

The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.

What I was referring to earlier, and I think I am on the same page with SMLowry, is touched on by Kaela's use of the interesting word "callous."  That is, there is a moral coarsening that occurs when we commodify things, when we are doubtful of their worth unless and until a dollar value is assigned them; and more specifically, there is a coarsening occurring, even a blinding, an enfeebling and failing of the senses, when we can conceive of the Earth and her communities of living beings only as commodities.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

I think I got too far with the analogy. My question: how do we approach this issue politically, where do we (I'm sure there are people who are using this method) start using the value as full-on leverage on politicians and courts. I also believe that EIS's (Environmental Impact Statements) are a way of approaching this: include an actual value per acre. However, as we all know, there are constant attempts at eroding the value of these, and oftentimes the findings are discarded.

A few additional points I would like to add to the conversation.

1. I highly value the environment, but not all of it is priceless. No one truly believes the environment is priceless. That is nonsense. If it was priceless then all of us would be living like monks. We are plenty willing to trade some amount of nature for the goods and services we also value.

2. In most decision-making the default value for the environment is zero and monetizing the environment actually creates value where none was recognized before.

3. The major issue with monetizing the environment is that it affords no intrinsic value to non-humans. This is my major problem with anthropocentric valuation, monetary or not, and why I argue for basic standards of animal welfare so forcefully.

It is possible to distinguish between, on the one hand, an "intrinsic" worth of pieces of undeveloped land, say some wetlands, or a terrain with significant bee populations, calculated strictly according to their economic effect on human activities in the vicinity, to which a monetary value can be assigned, dependent on the market circumstances of those activities; and on the other, a much more subjective approach, which ethics and aesthetics enter into, resulting in a fluctuating monetary value even in the short term.

One example of fluctuating monetary value within short periods is the financial markets: stocks, bonds, futures, whatever; perhaps we should include real estate.

But the appraisal of art, as ATreyger tentatively suggests, might be a more useful model for when we are talking about undeveloped land, with its flora and fauna.

Consider what happens on the popular PBS show, "Antiques Roadshow," in which a large team of professional appraisers travel to convention halls in US cities and meet with owners of all kinds of curious objects, some of them true works of art.  Typical lines of the appraisers:

1. "Do you remember how much you paid for this?"  Usually, the owner of an object has paid much less for it, in a shop or fair or yard sale, than it has just been appraised for.  The moral is, markets are of all kinds, and unregulated local markets can significantly undervalue anything.  And they usually do, because a high-priority interest is getting rid of stock.

2. "At auction, this could go for between five and seven thousand dollars."  A range with a forty percent increase of the maximum over the high minimum value is not unusual.  Presumably there is a complicated calculation going on in the appraiser's mind, involving both a vague sense of "intrinsic value," and a sense of market desirability, and an acquaintance with the unpredictability of auctions.

3. "If there were a signature," "If the name were inscribed," "If you had the documentation," such-and-such a piece would be worth so much more.  But why?: that seems so unfair, if the piece could otherwise pass for an original such-and-such.  Well, because all our historic associations count for something, sometimes for a great deal.

Currently a controversy is going on, regarding a recently turned-up bunch of paintings which with respect to style and provenance seem to have been done by the great modernist painter Jackson Pollack.  A Pollack expert says: Yes, these are paintings by Pollack.  Others, using a techy analysis device, say: Umm, no, we have doubts.

Now, the resolution of that controversy will affect the value of those paintings.  But why?  If they are good enough to convince a Pollack expert, then what is the problem?  Do they not have an "intrinsic" worth, divisible from any subjective associations?

I can say nothing, I expect, to mollify the engineering crowd among our readership, who might think, "If it functions perfectly as a Pollack painting, then it must be valued as high as any Pollack painting."  Nevertheless, it is true, the historical, aesthetic, sentimental associations of anything do indeed affect its value.

My husband and I travel periodically (in small rented cars) between NYC and Jenkintown, PA, where my parents live.  We usually follow small roads, not the highways, through scenic areas, in Bucks Co., PA, and north-central NJ.  Over the years, I have observed some beautiful forested slopes being chopped away, with residential developments replacing them.

How does one "appraise" that?  Even if that wooded slope, and all its plants and animals living there, did not have a positive economic effect on human activities round about, does that mean it was neutral, valueless, worth zero bucks?

Does not the fact that that was a beautiful place count for something?

Does not the fact that many plants and animals lived there, count for something?

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

It is at best, a crude analogy. Art, buildings and even languages rise and fall at the speed of light in comparison to species. An extinction is essentially forever on a human time scale. Extinction is a one-way ratchet, creating less and less biodiversity faster and faster. The only way to halt it is to stop the destruction of habitat. Zoos are filling up with species that no longer exist in the wild as a last ditch but ultimately futile attempt to stop the extinction event. People cannot seem to grasp the concept that life co-evolved and is dependent on other life forms. Humanity cannot survive on a planet populated solely by us, our farm animals, rats and roaches, which is only a slight exaggeration but the direction we are heading. The web of life is unraveling rather fast. Forty years from now, ocean fishing will end. Gigantic dead zones like the one recently found off the Oregon coast will become more and more common.

I want to see large areas roped off, interconnected and effectively protected. Let the areas in between the protected zones develop but protect the interconnected zones with religious zeal (that does not mean we can't sustainably extract renewable resources from some of these places). Humanity can thrive without "developing" (destroying) those places.

In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world

Another thing to consider when assigning monetary value to nature: Who benefits from the financial assignation? Everyone in town, a few rich folks, a corporation? And who pays the price when the "value" of nature as doesn't compare favorably (in monetary terms) to prevent its loss? Everyone in town? Poor folks? Non-humans? What happens when resources traditionally seen as "commons" (like clean water, for example) are assigned monetary value? Suddenly they're "worth" something and the fight begins to exploit them. They are no longer commons, but someone's property. And it's downhill from there.

Jason raises some interesting points, especially no. 3 regarding the zero value assigned to non-humans. But how would basic standards of animal welfare be factored into the economic equation? There seems to be the assumption that if such standards existed they would be used as an adjunct to economic valuation. In other words, bears aren't worth anything but because of our standards of animal welfare they must be protected and cared for (along with their habitat?). How would this work in a strictly economic sense? And if it does why not use the same process for beauty and silence and open space, etc.?

Jason's second point, that assigning value to nature creates value where none was recognized before, to me, reveals the absurdity of conventional economics. Everything of value, regardless of what it is, ultimately has its source in nature. Whether we recognize it or not, all nature has value and all nature should have standing.

The art/antiques analogy makes an important point. The main difference being that art and antiques are created by people and the loss of a wonderful painting or vase or whatever, while sad, does not threaten the well-being of humans, animals, or any part of the Earth. On the other hand, that history and sentiment do affect value, and that this is a recognized and accepted method of valuation, sets a precedent that could be adopted to value ladyslippers, beautiful landscapes, and other qualities.

In my area people whose homes have beautiful views (viewscapes they are called) are fighting a new property tax valuation process that drastically increases the value of their land because of the view alone. The problem is, many of these places have been in the same family for generations and often these families (most often elders) don't have much money so they are being forced to sell because they can't pay the increased taxes. Who buys the land? People wanting second homes, of course.

We humans make things so complicated for ourselves and even more so when we insist that everything worth anything must be assigned a dollar value. Why can't we creatively devise a non-monetary way to value resources and "ecosystem services"  that has standing in political and legal terms?

That being said, if we created a system where our actions towards the non-human world were more restricted that would in effect be a true recognition that they have intrinsic value that we can't exploit. I accept that economics has a very hard time with this, which is why my value system is not bounded by utilitarianism.

My point that in decision-making the environment typically has a default value of zero is not a knock against economics at all- it is a knock against politics and human ignorance- economists have been trying for decades to get society to recognize environmental values in tangible ways.

J.S.

Economic Illiteracy Harms The Planet! www.voicesofreason.info.

How would that be less complicated than just assigning a dollar value, which fits neatly into already established political, legal, and economic systems?

grist.org

http://www.natcap.org/

Many things with great value have no dollar value; to assign one is folly, a fantasy of economics. Humanity has de-evolved away from its roots, and no longer believes that Nature is part of Man, no longer understands that we are nothing without Nature. We live in our boxes and self-created images of the world; we tell ourselves that we don't need anything else, yet how quickly we would wither and die without fresh air, clean water, and good food.

The Earth nourishes us, teaches us, and lifts our spirits. Go ahead, pretend you don't need Her, that She is not your Mother. See how long you live, if you can call it Life.

The problem with economics is that it needs growth; those new developments are not really needed. The new jobs and tax bases are exactly cancelled by the increased need for more jobs and services. In the interim, a few folks get rich, Man's footprint gets bigger, and Nature is weakened. Until our leaders see this, we will continue to destroy the things we need more than money and growth.

a liberal in redsville

SM, once again aesthetics are difficult to define, particularly with nature: do we have an auction so that the highest bidder's bid is the value for that particular view and then base the decision-making process out of that? Sidenote: in order to maintain that view, we might have to do some 'unnatural' things, since nature is dynamic at every level.

By the way clean water is not a 'commons' in the more technical sense of the word: it can be private, State (state or federal), commons or open-access. The majority of flowing water right now is a State-controlled resource, although some states are worse at controlling it then others. Private ponds without an outflow are just that: private. Commons would be something like a pond in a community park, or an isolated (not flowing) body of water used by a certain community, which still might be controlled by the State. The open-access is something like deep sea fisheries, without any control, not applicable to fresh water. (Sweet, got a chance to use something I learned)

I like the way you think SMLowry, but it does not mean that this is the way the majority of the world does: we live in a human world, and it is nearly impossible to get away from that. Even you, in a somewhat remote location have neighbors and internet. By the way, your parents or ancestors came to live on the spot where you live, and this was the beginning of the current tide of people: I dislike the second home idea, but permanent residents that are moving in have nearly as much right (in a moral sense, in a legal they have as much) to be there as you do. Of course, I would guess, the problem isn't the new people, but the second-homers for you, but I will let you elaborate.

Biod, the problem isn't the extinction of any particular one species, despite the fact that there are many keystone species, which support existing structure of a community. If we drop those out, e.g. beavers, sea otters and humans (yes, in many cases we are a keystone), then the communities are not crucially dependent on any one particular species. They will merrily keep on truckin' despite the loss of a particular Asteraceae as an example. The problem with the current extinction event is that we have so many spp. going, many of which are in same functional groups. Once the loss reaches a particular level, we will start to see actual deterioration of community and ecosystem functions.

At the same time, it is very hard to remember what things were like more than 60 years ago for the population as a whole, because they are either not old enough, or senile (no offense to anyone that is that old). This is especially true for the natural world, since envi attitudes only began to be sparked in a major way around then. But my point with this is that we will move on despite deteriorated ecosystems: many people right now either love the idea of so many deer because of how cute they are or because of the hunting, no one seems to care about the deteriorated woods.

Apologies for the long-winded post.

I bet your mother would be pretty upset that you deny that she is you mother. Nature doesn't care about what you think about it.

There's a reason for why we talk about valuation of services, not aesthetics or companionship. In many ways, the way that I view your and SMLowry's point is that we should ?legislate? our love for the Earth, kind of like marriages or what have you. There are several inherent problems with that, specifically that some people do not care much for 'earth-love', which I bet you would get a prison term in Alabama. Another one is that some people do not care for aesthetics, companionship or love, just power and as a proxy, money.

I agree with your point about growth as the model for economics though, there needs to be a different model.

SM, you're right, but there are limits to change: either propose a ground-shaking new model within economics and convince enough economists to help you change the paradigm, or focus on working within the system.

There are people who are attempting the first, so far they have not been successful. Moral obligations and responsibilities are obviously important, but the crux is in the actual model.

There is nothing wrong with this situation except when we define benefit only for the individual and in the short term. Environmentalists just have a longer time-frame in view than most other humans (though even we may aspire to a mere seven generations, tops), and we sometimes, perhaps, see beyond our personal self-interest more than most. Preserving "natural" landscapes and bio-diversity is undoubtedly in our own long-term interests as a species and I believe that this is a perfectly sufficient reason for our efforts.

And I also believe that it is also quite reasonable to assign value to these efforts in the international currency of exchange of human value, i.e. money.

The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.

First, keep in mind that value and price are totally different.  Value is subjective, prices are aggregations of expressed values - and they are objective.  Putting a price on nature won't change the fact that some people value nature for its own sake, but it will make more people consider the environment when making decisions.

Ecosystem services need to be priced because that is the only way they will be taken into account, on a large scale, in decisions that involve trade-offs between disturbing nature and leaving it pristine.  It is the only way that nature's services can be compared with alternatives.  

This question isn't new, and in fact many environmentalists and most economists agree that pricing nature would be a useful tool.  So how do we put prices on nature's services?  They cannot be assigned in a conscious effort, because any conscious effort to assign prices to all nature's services will be skewed by personal values.  Remember, prices are aggregations of subjective values.

The key to this equation is being missed in almost every conservation I hear or article I read about it - it has to do with property rights.

Prices are the mechanism of the market, but things can't be traded in a market - or priced - until someone, or a group of people, has ownership over them.  The only way ecosystem services can be priced is if someone owns those services.

Once ownership of the services is established, then the negotiations can begin.  Do we pay Joe X amount for the water filtration services that his wetlands provide, or do we pay Bill Y amount to build a water treatment facility?

We've overlooked the important question in this debate, which is how are the property rights over ecosystem services to be assigned if the services are to be priced, and therefore entered into decision-making processes?

Personally, there are many apes and bears that I would rather not meet.  Which is not to say that I do not wish them all good health and long life.

Squishing roaches and mosquitos is a rather different ethical problem.  In this household, neither of these insects is common; more frequent, indeed apparently resident, is silverfish, which, considering our library, is a problem.  I have already discussed this in other Gristmill threads, and am still developing my thought on the matter.  The principle is, the life of the bug is a serious moral reality, so extinguishing it should never be done thoughtlessly; on the other hand, seeing that the bug has lived long enough to come into our presence, there are other goods which outweigh the good of its further existence; and so, if it can be accomplished, squish the bug as swiftly as possible, so that it feels little or nothing.

By his own lights, the Dalai Lama does not squish a mosquito that is biting him.  He blows upon it, suggesting that it go away.  Ommm ...

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

An interesting cost-benefit analysis would have to be undertaken, particularly for water-filtration. Let me use NYC drinking water: the entire city is fed by three or four large reservoirs in the Catskills and a smaller one in Westchester county. The city used its influence on Albany to regulate the use of forests, ag lands and development around the reservoirs: i.e. incorporating best management practices (BMPs) and preventing forest cutting. I am actually not sure what is the level of regulation on forest management, but for some reason I thought it was relatively large. Anyhow, the main problem arose with development: the locals didn't like the fact that they couldn't develop and make money off of that, and in this region, money is desperately needed (to have the American lifestyle). I don't think the city is paying all that much in conservation easements, but the locals are forced to comply through laws and regulations.

Anyway, the city planners love the idea, because they don't have to create a water filtration plant at a cost of 4-5 billion dollars.

Clearly, the goals of and benefits to the city are great, but the costs to the local landowners are much greater on a per capita basis. If there are people out there (I guess I could find some in my school or possibly on-line, but geez, I have to do something?) that have better knowledge of this issue, please don't be shy. My example needs more filling out.

I guess the point is that I would like to find out how much the landowners are receiving as a result of the regulations on their land and whether it compensates their potential income through development or clearcutting (there are financial issues with clearcutting versus selection system, i.e. clearcutting is a 'maturing' asset, while selection cuttings are a never-ending series). And if the actual economic value is approximately the same, it becomes even more difficult when we consider that the plant is a one-time investment with maintenance fees but it would be decommissioned after 50 years?

I'm losing it...

I have a mind myself and recognize
Mind when I meet with it in any guise
No one can know how glad I am to find
On any sheet the least display of mind.

   Robert Lee Frost


The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.

On the other hand, Canis, I have indeed squished many potato beetles, Japanese beetles and other "bad" bugs as determined by the fact that they eat or otherwise destroy the plants I am nurturing for my selfish human reasons. When I first started gardening I was a bit squeemish about squishing between my bare fingers, but no more. I also kill ticks, black flies, and mosquitos which we have in great abundance here in Maine. Our local Fryeburg Academy has a spring Black Fly festival, and I swear the area where I live, close to the Saco River, the "old" Saco River (where it origionally ran until engineers changed the course to straighten it for log drives way back when), and resultant boggy places is the mosquite capital of the known world (except, perhaps, the current tropics, which we may eventually end up being as well in the hopefully distant future).  (The editor in me wants to tear that run-on sentance apart, but I'm not going to.)

Atreyger, where I live, on the Fryeburg, ME/Conway, NH border in the foothills of the White Mountains, development is many-fold. Second homes, more tourist resorts (most of them corporate chains these days), box stores (outlet malls, NH still has no sales tax) also corporate chains which undermine small local stores to the point that we lose some each year, and more and wider roads to by-pass all that development, then development springs up on them as well. Some of the homes are mansions lived in just a few weekends a year, some are ticky-tacky look-alike condos for those of more modest means seeking a second home. Some boast "ski from your front door" access. In other words, they are built on the sides of mountains where, IMHO, they have no business building anything. Tourism is the name of the game. Skiing and other snowy activities in winter (which is why I'm perplexed that climate change isn't more of a concern here), and outdoorsy things in the summer, and, of course the ever-present shopping. If the homes being built were affordable to those who live and work here I would have less problem with them, but as the wages being paid here are so paltry (most earn much less than $10/hr with no benefits and little job security) no one is building what locals call "workforce housing". Similarly, I would have less issues with pumping water from the aquifer if it were being supplied to people who lacked potable water rather than being bottled and sold to profit Nestle and a few already-rich landowners.

But that's what happens when "ecosystem services" are privately owned. Here in Maine landowners own their land and everything under it. In places where water is scarce, this isn't always the case, which protects the resource, to a certain extent. Naturescene, I would hate to see "property rights assigned" so the "services" could be priced and entered into the decisionmaking process as you suggest. To whom will they be assigned? I'd be willing to bet it won't be to someone like myself who is not motivated by profit. Rather it will be to the bigwigs in town who are always (it seems) motivated by both profit and love of power. And what mechanisms will be put into place to protect them from simple, momentary greed? Once a resource is depleted or destroyed, it's gone and no amount of money can bring it back, no matter how inherently valuable it is to the continuation of life, human or otherwise.

The NYC water scenario is, unfortunately, so typical of how too many local people think. One would think that people who live in a beautiful place would want to keep it that way. But that is just not always the case. Here, for example, people are always blaming those moving from the city for the development problems, but when I read the articles in the paper it's the old family names I recognize who are selling the land, dividing it up and getting rich. It's the old family names who own and manage the real estate businesses and who sit on the planning board and make decisions about what is allowed and what isn't. Of course there are plenty of locals who oppose this, but they aren't the ones who hold title to acres and acres of fields and forest. They're lucky if they own a home on an acre or two. In the case of landowners in the Catskills, it would seem fair that they benefit more than they are from the fact that they are assuring clean water for NYC. There does need to be more fairness involved in situations such as these, even I can see that.

Finally (for now), atreyger, about that groundshaking economic alternative . . . For about twenty years that's exactly what I worked on, with many others around the country as well as in Canada, the UK, Australia, and New Zealand. Both of my books focus on this subject, creating an economy as if the Earth really mattered. It can be done, in places it is being done, but as you noted, it's not big enough, present enough, to attract both the money and respect it needs to expand and grow so as to seriously impact the current system, which I see as extremely flawed, flat (as opposed to wholistic), and single purposed (profit and a certain kind of growth being the main intents). I have some ideas why this is so. A lot has to do with image. Proponents are seen as too radical, impractical and unrealistic, and overall judgemental. People hate being judged or even sensing that they are being judged and will react by pulling back and even doing exactly the opposite to "show them". (Environmentalists must deal with this issue as well, since it marginalizes us). But even people who are intrigued, who want things to be different in their hearts find it difficult to get on the bandwagon and I think this is because they are waiting for others to do it first. They see the proposed alternatives as interesting but too risky for them just yet. Unfortunately this keeps the alternatives marginalized and until more people come on board that's the way it will continue to be.

I am no longer working in this arena for several reasons, some personal - burnout, needing to move to care for my disabled sister, becoming disillusioned with the "activist" way of relating to people - too often I felt like a resource being mined rather than a person to be respected and cared about. But I also felt that there had to be another way to reach people, that specifics matter less than overall perspective. In other words, if I could help even a few people re-think, re-feel their connection to the Earth, to nature, even to each other, then actions would change naturally. I still believe this, which is why I publish Gaian Voices. I am concerned, however, over the time frame with which we are working these days . . .

The appropriate amount can be taken out and if allowed to replenish, there is no problem. Private use of renewable resources is an inherent basis of our society, and while I disagree with private property in terms of trespassing, I don't necessarily see a problem with well-managed renewable resource use. I don't see a problem with hiking through someone's property, of course our system is set up against that, plus someone would have to maintain those trails and answer if a person hurts themselves, but that leads back to our system.

I do agree that making use of renewable resources is acceptable, the issue is one of sustainability. When determining what is sustainable we need to take into consideration the fact that the climate is changing and the impacts this could have on the vitality and diversity of a place. What was sustainable twenty years ago or fifty years ago may no longer be the case. Trees are weakened by acid rain, for example, and therefore more susceptible to damage by insects. Budding in January (which happened in many places this year) weakens trees and means we need to be more careful. The same with animals.

I don't see a problem with hiking across land I don't personally own either. I grew up doing it and no one cared as long as you were respectful. Now that is no longer the case, which is a shame. I do have a problem with things like snow machines on my property and when I first moved here I made a stink about that, forcing the local club to move the trail from my property to across the Old River. You would have thought I was the devil incarnate. On the other hand, if someone wants to bike or hike or ski or snowshoe I have no problem and made that clear. It was the noise and the pollution that bothered me and the loss of my dream of skiing out my back door into the peace and quiet of the woods and fields surrounding my home. It was a strange place to be in -- talking about my "property rights" when the idea itself is something I have a problem with.

By his own lights, the Dalai Lama does not squish a mosquito that is biting him.  He blows upon it, suggesting that it go away.  Ommm ...

Better to let the mosquito finish.  She needs that drop of blood more than we do.  Her offspring are worth much more than a drop of my blood.

I also noticed from my garden that when my solar hot water storage barrels (not insulated, tests only) were at about 100 F., not hotter nor cooler, then all the deer flies and mosquitoes attacked the barrels and ignored me.

I learned to love mosquitoes during an immersion course in Everglades ecology.  It was winter, but I was bit by at least a few thousand mosquitoes that week.  Our three instructors had the same philosophy, to let them bite.

Speaking about the value of nature, those mosquitoes taught me one of the most valuable lessons of my life so far.

They were very sweet people.  God knows why they bought their retirement home there.  I remember them very fondly.  And yet I hated visiting them, on account of those mosquitos.

During a typical visit in the summer, we all lost a great deal of blood, playing boccie with tactical ingenuity in the camel-backed street.

At least they had a screened-in house, which more or less worked.  Great Aunt Mary was a wonderful cook, and her ravioli were renowned.

Our wise friend Pandu writes:
<<
Better to let the mosquito finish.  She needs that drop of blood more than we do.  Her offspring are worth much more than a drop of my blood.
>>

Indeed, the biting mosquitos are the females, and each of them bites us in order to nourish her brood.  If the female mosquitos of the world were to negotiate with us to receive each of them no more than a drop of blood, with no pain and no threat of disease on the part of the donor, then that would be tolerable.

But who needs what, and who needs more than who else, and what is worth more than what else,: all of that requires a very careful ethicist discussion.

Mosquitos are sentient, in their remarkably finely adapted way; and they are our cousins -- rather distantly related, but still our cousins.  If and when we kill them, we should not treat that as a