Conservation lessons from taboos and trolley problems

Away from Trolley Problems and Toward Risk Management

As automated vehicles receive more attention from the media, there has been an equivalent increase in the coverage of the ethical choices a vehicle may be forced to make in certain crash situations with no clear safe outcome. Much of this coverage has focused on a philosophical thought experiment known as the “trolley problem,” and substituting an automated vehicle for the trolley and the car's...

Conservation lessons from the Pacific Islands

Lessons from Research for Sustainable Development and Conservation in Borneo

I present a brief synopsis of six key lessons provided by research on forest ecology and conservation, focusing particularly on the Malaysian state of Sabah in northeastern Borneo. These lessons are generalizable to other contexts, especially for tropical developing nations, where surviving forests are under growing pressures from a range of human activities.

Conservation and human behaviour: lessons from social psychology

Despite increased effort from non-governmental organisations, academics and governments over recent decades, several threats continue to cause species declines and even extinctions. Resource use by a growing human population is a significant driver of biodiversity loss, so conservation scientists need to be interested in the factors that motivate human behaviour. Economic models have been appli...

Uncertainty, resource exploitation, and conservation: lessons from history.

The r e are currently many plans for sustainable use or sustainable development that are founded upon scienti f ic information and consensus. Such ideas ref lect ignorance of the history of resource exploitation and misunderstanding of the possibility of achieving sc ient i f ic consensus concerning resources and the environment. Although there is considerable variation in detail, there i s rem...