OK, make up your minds environmentalists!

So I was talking to a friend today.  She takes issue with the fact that I take issue with environmentalism.  Our discussion today was caused by this article about Arizona spending $1.25 million to save some endangered squirrels.

She argued that spending the money was a good thing because of the whole circle of life thing, saying you never know what bad things will happen if this particular breed of squirrel goes extinct.  I countered with extinction being a PART of the circle of life, and to name one bad thing that has happened because the dinosaurs became extinct.  Her counter was that dinosaurs became extinct because of a natural event, not because we were building roads through their habitats.

That got me thinking about life and common sense.  According to environmentalists, we (humans) are the product of a billion years or so of evolution.  If this is true, what is humankind but a very evolved animal – the king of the animal kingdom if you will, the top of the evolutionary ladder.

Now the other side of the argument is creationism.  God said, and it came to pass.  End of story.  We are created, we didn’t come from no monkey.  God created the earth, planted a garden, and then created man to care for the garden.  Expand the metaphor of the garden to the planet, and God gave us the earth and wants us to take care of it.

Which leads to the question: why is it that conservative religious groups who believe in the literal words of the Bible don’t seem to care about the planet?  Why is it that eco-leftists who believe we are just another animal care about the planet more than anything else? 

So, my question to eco-leftists and environmentalists is, if humans really are just highly evolved animals, then we are a PART of nature and everything we do is an act of nature.  The answer is simple: ALL SPECIES CHANGE THEIR ENVORONMENT TO THEIR BENEFIT: as sure as that dam built by beavers causing flooding in a valley is a part of nature, that road through the mountains is a part of nature because we are a part of nature (according to environmentalists).

As for creationism, I am not sure what I believe.  Intelligent design, day equals age, seven literal days, evolution, I honestly don’t know any more.  I prefer to focus on the here and now, and spending $1.25 million to save a squirrel population of 250 from extinction really doesn’t matter in the world of the here and now.