We Share the Planet with 8.7 Million Different Species Besides Ourselves

And as the dominant species, our responsibility is enormous.

Photo by NASA on Unsplash.

Yes, we humans rule the planet. In some ways we’re pretty amazing. We’ve got opposable thumbs and we can understand abstractions such as language, history, and math.

But then there are our animal friends: the cat, the dog, the cow, the crested gecko, etc. They don’t think so much. In fact, we like them that way. We understand them like parents understand their own children.

Environmental biologists talk about biodiversity and ecological harmony. They say various species coexist in a delicate balance. We all know about the food chain. One animal lives off another that lives off yet another, all the way down animals that feed off of plants.

Some animals are eat meat exclusively, while others are omnivores, eating both meat and plants. Still others eat only plant foods, and for animals this basically means veganism. Many bird species, most insects, and even a few mammals eat only plant food. Naturally, plant foods are the most abundant.

There are benefits to keeping up the number of species on our planet. If one species is pushed out of its habitat, it either goes somewhere else or it dies off all together. Birds, with their…