0:02

From the Center for

0:02

the Advancement of the Steady

0:05

State Economy, this is The

0:05

Steady Stater, a podcast

0:08

dedicated to discussing limits

0:08

to growth and the Steady State

0:12

Economy.

0:17

Welcome to the

0:17

show. I'm your host Brian Czech,

0:20

and our guest today is Dr. James

0:20

Christopher Haney, President and

0:24

Founder of Terra Mar Applied

0:24

Sciences, an ecological and

0:28

economic research company

0:28

devoted to science-driven

0:32

solutions for land or sea. Chris

0:32

has been a Pew Marine Fellow at

0:36

Woods Hole, a wildlife faculty

0:36

member at Penn State, and a

0:40

forest ecologist at the

0:40

Wilderness Society. But I met

0:44

Chris somewhere around 2002,

0:44

when he was in Washington, D.C.

0:48

as the Chief Scientist for

0:48

Defenders of Wildlife. I know

0:52

Chris to be a creative

0:52

scientist, who happens to be an

0:55

outstanding communicator, a

0:55

talented administrator, and a

0:59

great mentor to students and

0:59

early career professionals.

1:03

Chris Haney, welcome to The

1:03

Steady Stater.

1:06

Thank you, Brian. It's good to be here.

1:09

It's great to have

1:09

you in. Hate to do this, but I

1:11

want to put you on the spot

1:11

right off the bat. Which of

1:15

those places the Woods Hole,

1:15

Wilderness Society, or Defenders

1:19

of Wildlife? Which one was your

1:19

favorite?

1:22

Well, there's

1:22

without a question. It was Woods

1:24

Hole, because I love the sea.

1:24

And not only was my office a

1:29

block away from the ocean, I

1:29

lived in a small cottage that

1:32

overlooks Sippewissett Marsh and

1:32

a beach. So you know, I was

1:38

around the sea every day for

1:38

three years. And it was pretty

1:42

hard to beat that.

1:43

Oh that sounds

1:43

wonderful. A lot of our

1:46

listeners have some familiarity

1:46

with government agencies, and

1:50

nonprofit organizations, and

1:50

colleges, and universities. I'm

1:54

guessing that far fewer know

1:54

much at all about consulting

1:58

firms, and especially the type

1:58

of firm you run. Let me read the

2:02

first sentence from your website

2:02

-- Terra Mar Applied Sciences,

2:06

LLC, conducts ecological and

2:06

economic research in the public

2:11

interest, then applies it

2:11

creatively using principles of

2:15

civic responsibility and

2:15

environmental stewardship. You

2:19

guys almost sound like a federal

2:19

science agency with a statement

2:23

like that. But give us some

2:23

examples of what you actually

2:27

do, Chris?

2:28

Sure. Well, we work

2:28

very, very closely with federal

2:32

agencies. In fact, our core

2:32

suite of projects encompass

2:36

advising and sometimes field

2:36

research on behalf of such

2:41

agencies as the Bureau of Ocean

2:41

Energy Management, the US

2:45

Geological Survey, US Fish and

2:45

Wildlife Service and the

2:49

National Oceanic and Atmospheric

2:49

Administration. So we do this

2:54

often in partnerships that

2:54

involve other entities besides

2:58

the federal government, but we

2:58

include them and also may

3:01

include such things as

3:01

universities and research

3:05

institutes. So it generally

3:05

means that the public interest

3:09

aspect of our portfolio means we

3:09

deal with environmental issues

3:14

that are largely driven by what

3:14

the public can benefit from, not

3:19

necessarily what private

3:19

business benefits from.

3:23

Okay, well, one

3:23

thing I know about your career

3:26

is that you've been able to meld

3:26

a good deal of ecological

3:30

expertise and economic insight

3:30

into the programs you've run.

3:34

And now you've got a new book

3:34

hot off the press called Woody's

3:38

Last Laugh - How the Extinct

3:38

Ivory-billed Woodpecker Fools Us

3:43

Into Making 53 Thinking Errors.

3:43

Chris, before we delve into the

3:48

contents of this very unique

3:48

book, I'm really curious, what

3:52

was the impetus for taking this

3:52

on? And who is your target

3:56

audience?

3:57

Well, you know, I'll start with my target audience, Brian. It's almost

3:59

anyone who wants to think more

4:03

clearly, who wants to make

4:03

better decisions, and who wants

4:08

to be less -- I guess --

4:08

influenced or biased by one's

4:13

own mind, but also the attempts

4:13

of others. So it's really

4:17

something for almost everyone.

4:17

If you're interested in American

4:21

environmental history, if you're

4:21

interested in conservation,

4:25

biology, wildlife biology,

4:25

science, I think it will also

4:29

interest you. How did I get

4:29

involved in it -- it was it was

4:33

a rather long path. I became

4:33

fascinated in 2004 by how crazy,

4:40

nutty, confrontational, and

4:40

downright mean people were about

4:46

this bird, especially after its

4:46

putative discovery and

4:50

rediscovery in 2004 and 2005, so

4:50

that was part of my interest.

4:54

The other thing that piqued my

4:54

interest was it seemed like

4:58

there were contradictions about

4:58

the basic life history of the

5:01

bird. And these two things,

5:01

pulled me in and hooked me. And

5:07

I couldn't make sense of it

5:07

until -- I remembered some time

5:11

that I spent with economists

5:11

back in my fellowship days at

5:15

Woods Hole. And they used to

5:15

teach me about heuristics, about

5:19

these mental shortcuts that we

5:19

take. And so I started an

5:22

exploration into cognitive

5:22

psychology, reading books that

5:26

might be standard in economics,

5:26

like Kahneman's Thinking, Fast

5:30

and Slow. But these ideas are

5:30

really not so well-known inside

5:35

natural science. And as I

5:35

discovered conservation biology,

5:40

and especially about

5:40

ivory-billed woodpecker, we make

5:43

lots of little mistakes.

5:46

Well, you

5:46

definitely took a deep dive into

5:48

human reasoning and cognitive

5:48

bias and the use of those

5:53

heuristics. Actually, let's

5:53

start with that. Because the

5:56

word and concept of heuristic

5:56

trips a lot of people up I

6:00

think, so please tell us, Chris,

6:00

what exactly is a heuristic?

6:05

Sure, Brian.

6:05

Heuristic is simply a shortcut,

6:09

a mental shortcut that we take.

6:09

And when we do, they help us

6:14

make decisions quickly. And so

6:14

that's the good side of them.

6:17

The bad side of heuristic, or a

6:17

shortcut, is our decisions are

6:21

often inaccurate, incomplete, or

6:21

biased in a particular

6:27

direction.

6:28

So what would be an

6:28

example of a heuristic that's

6:31

commonly used in wildlife

6:31

conservation, then?

6:35

Well, there are

6:35

lots of them in biology,

6:38

unfortunately. One of the ones

6:38

that I've been most worried

6:41

about stems from our neglect of

6:41

probability. And in the case of

6:46

wood, claiming extinction for

6:46

various wildlife or plants, we

6:51

often err on the side of

6:51

declaring a species gone or dead

6:56

too soon. That bias comes from

6:56

something called base rate

7:01

fallacy. That is to say, we

7:01

ignore a background rate in

7:06

nature that we ought to pay

7:06

attention to. And we think that

7:09

our reasoning is infallible,

7:09

that we know the answers all the

7:13

time, and we simply don't.

7:15

And that base rate

7:15

fallacy, is that what leads to

7:18

this type of error that you

7:18

wrote about the Romeo error? And

7:22

why is it why is it named Romeo

7:22

error?

7:25

Yes, exactly. So

7:25

Romeo error is named for the

7:29

Shakespearean tragedy, in which

7:29

Juliet wakes up to see that

7:34

Romeo has already killed

7:34

himself, because he thought she

7:39

was dead. And then when she sees

7:39

him dead, she takes her own life

7:43

as well. So it's almost a double

7:43

tragedy here. And so in

7:46

conservation biology, when we

7:46

declare an animal or plant gone

7:51

too early, we might back away

7:51

from protections, we might back

7:56

away from conservation practice,

7:56

we might stop any kind of

8:00

protection that might have been

8:00

in place, and that can lead to

8:03

even further tragedy. So it was

8:03

given the name Romeo error in

8:08

the early 1990s. And it's kind

8:08

of stuck.

8:12

It's a lose-lose.

8:12

Do we have any clues about the

8:15

prevalence of this Romeo error?

8:18

We do. A paper

8:18

about -- oh I guess almost 10

8:22

years ago now -- found that in

8:22

the last century and a quarter,

8:27

we have refound somewhere

8:27

between 350 and 400 species of

8:34

animals that were thought to be

8:34

gone, but were rediscovered.

8:37

Wow.

8:38

Yeah, it's a large

8:38

number. In fact, that number is

8:41

just increasing. So we're

8:41

actually getting an acceleration

8:45

in the rate of these

8:45

rediscoveries. Those animals and

8:50

plants that are refound are

8:50

called Lazarus species. Because

8:56

they can that -- from a

8:56

distance, it looks like they

8:58

were dead and then resurrected.

8:58

Of course, we know that's not

9:01

the case. But it's prevalent in

9:01

mammals, birds, reptiles,

9:05

amphibians, and fishes, as well

9:05

as lesser known invertebrates

9:10

and plants.

9:11

What other kinds of

9:11

mental pitfalls influence our

9:15

beliefs about wildlife

9:15

extinctions? And does that mess

9:18

up our approach to the economics

9:18

of conservation, too?

9:22

Yeah, so let me try

9:22

to draw a direct parallel

9:25

between wildlife conservation

9:25

and economics. Suppose that we

9:29

have a belief about how

9:29

something affects our economy,

9:33

just like we have a belief about

9:33

how it might affect a species

9:38

prospects for survival or

9:38

extinction. If we fail to

9:42

incorporate new information when

9:42

it comes in -- that is to say we

9:47

stick rigidly to our original

9:47

beliefs -- we fall to a bias

9:52

called Bayesian conservatism, or

9:52

-- put another way -- a lack of

9:57

Bayesian caution. In other

9:57

words, we become anchored --

10:01

that's called an anchoring bias.

10:01

Your listeners might recognize

10:05

this when they go in and lease a

10:05

car, buy a car, and the car

10:09

salesman tries to anchor you on

10:09

a higher price that you don't

10:13

want to pay. And then when they

10:13

come down 1000 or 2000, you

10:16

think you've got a bargain. But

10:16

when we don't move our beliefs

10:21

enough, we're guilty of two or

10:21

three biases, including

10:25

anchoring and Bayesian

10:25

conservatism.

10:29

What's the one

10:29

where -- I think you talked a

10:31

little bit about if a species is

10:31

merely out of sight, yet we call

10:36

it gone forever? Isn't that like

10:36

what babies do? And their mother

10:41

leaves the room, they conclude

10:41

that she's gone for good?

10:44

Yeah, exactly,

10:44

Brian, and this is one of the

10:48

most fascinating ones for me,

10:48

and it's ubiquitous with the

10:52

ivory-billed woodpecker, and

10:52

frankly, other birds and some

10:56

mammals that disappear from our

10:56

site. We are like young

11:00

children. When a species is

11:00

gone, we declare it extinct just

11:04

because we can't see it. That

11:04

bias is a cognitive one that

11:08

usually we grow out of as

11:08

infants. It's called lack of

11:12

object permanence, meaning that

11:12

if something isn't there, we

11:16

think it's gone forever. And

11:16

that -- object in constancy is

11:20

another term -- is more

11:20

prevalent in some of us as

11:24

individuals than others. That is

11:24

to say, you might have less of

11:28

this problem than I would. So it

11:28

varies among individuals, but it

11:32

is a contribution to why we

11:32

declare animals and plants

11:36

extinct too soon.

11:38

Okay, well, we've

11:38

got some more questions for you

11:41

here. But first, we need to take

11:41

a short non-commercial break

11:45

with James Lamont. And while

11:45

we're on break, Chris, I wonder

11:48

if you can track down an audio

11:48

recording of an ivory-billed.

11:53

Meanwhile, take it away, James.

12:01

Hello, listeners,

12:01

we hope you're enjoying our

12:03

conversation with Dr. Chris

12:03

Haney, President and Founder

12:06

Terra Mar Applied Sciences. We

12:06

at CASSE just want to take a

12:10

moment to thank everyone

12:10

listening for their support

12:12

during 2021. We also want to

12:12

wish you all a safe,

12:15

sustainable, and steady-state

12:15

holiday season. And if you

12:19

should bump into Santa

12:19

delivering lumps of coal, show

12:22

him our position statement on

12:22

economic growth. It would surely

12:25

make his Christmas a lot less

12:25

stressful. And now, back to the

12:28

show.

12:30

Welcome back to the

12:30

show. And you know what? We

12:34

built people's expectations up

12:34

for a sound file of the

12:38

ivory-billed. What did we come

12:38

up with there, Chris?

12:40

Well, I just sent

12:40

you a file... [sound] ...and it

12:57

sounds much like a tiny tin

12:57

horn. And it's not a very loud

13:06

sound for such a large bird. But

13:06

it is the only recording that we

13:11

have from a known ivory-billed

13:11

woodpecker ever in history, is

13:15

just this one. And it was taken

13:15

in the late 1930s by James T.

13:22

Tanner and a Cornell team of

13:22

acousticians in the singer track

13:27

of Northeast Louisiana.

13:29

The famous clip,

13:29

yes. And to me a lot of

13:32

woodpeckers sound like they're

13:32

laughing and so, you know, your

13:35

book is loaded with not just

13:35

metaphors alone, but all kinds

13:39

of figures of speech. And I'm

13:39

thinking well is that have a

13:43

little bit to do it to Woody's

13:43

Last Laugh title, but. Now,

13:48

Chris, how did you react to that

13:48

recent proposal by the US Fish

13:52

and Wildlife Service to delist

13:52

23 plants and animals as

13:57

extinct, including the

13:57

ivory-billed?

14:00

Well, Brian, I laughed.

14:03

You laughed!

14:04

I did. Because you

14:04

know, we've been declaring this

14:07

bird extinct since 1913. So for

14:07

more than 100 years, we've been

14:13

declaring this bird is gone. And

14:13

you know, the bird just doesn't

14:17

get the memo. It just keeps

14:17

popping up after long intervals

14:21

of apparent absence. And I laugh

14:21

because we are much like the old

14:27

cartoon strip that you might

14:27

have heard of from the 1930s and

14:31

40s. With Woody the woodpecker.

14:31

We are Wally Walrus, we get set

14:36

up again and again by Woody the

14:36

Woodpecker, and Woody tricks us

14:42

over, and over, and over again.

14:44

Hey, well, you must

14:44

have had a number of different

14:47

titles in mind for this book

14:47

before you settled on this one.

14:52

I did. They weren't

14:52

nearly as good, you know. This

14:57

is actually -- Brian -- I felt

14:57

this way myself. Can I share a

15:01

story of how I felt I was

15:01

tricked?

15:04

Yeah.

15:05

So as a young boy,

15:05

my grandfather would give me old

15:09

1900s -- or late 1800s, early

15:09

1900s books about birds. And

15:16

from reading them, I just

15:16

assumed that the ivory-billed

15:18

was extinct. And, you know, I

15:18

didn't think much more about it,

15:22

it just put it away, filed it

15:22

away, and went on. And when the

15:26

US Fish and Wildlife Service

15:26

completed their recovery plan

15:29

for the ivory-billed woodpecker

15:29

in 2010, I raced over to the

15:34

appendix. And believe it or not,

15:34

in its Appendix E, I tallied 100

15:42

incidents of people seeing this

15:42

bird since the 1940s. That was

15:48

when it was supposed to do have

15:48

died off.

15:50

Oh.

15:52

And I thought, this

15:52

is not how an extinct bird

15:55

should behave. And so you know,

15:55

what is this? What kind of trick

16:00

is being played here? And I

16:00

really did feel pranked. I was

16:04

kind of annoyed, actually.

16:07

Well, Chris, what

16:07

makes us so eager to declare

16:10

this bird gone, then?

16:11

Well, I think one

16:11

is that we let a cognitive bias

16:15

called anchoring fixate us on

16:15

the birds extinction. And so

16:21

there are a couple of pieces

16:21

that go into this anchoring. One

16:24

is that the story of its

16:24

extinction has been repeated so

16:28

often. And that constitutes an

16:28

availability cascade. That is to

16:32

say -- you repeat something

16:32

often enough, and people will

16:35

believe it's true, even if it

16:35

isn't. That's one thing that

16:39

sort of predisposes us towards

16:39

extinction. And another one --

16:43

and this one really fascinates

16:43

me. It's called the negativity

16:47

bias. And we're not an

16:47

instinctually optimistic

16:52

species, that is to say, our

16:52

brains, our minds, don't just

16:57

naturally go into a kind of

16:57

happy, cheerful optimism. And so

17:03

if we're presented with death,

17:03

and life, death has a whole lot

17:07

more salience -- that is to say,

17:07

it's a lot more available to our

17:11

mind, we will fixate on it. And

17:11

of course, death is a bit more

17:16

serious than life. And so it has

17:16

a greater power to kind of

17:20

influence us. So these things

17:20

contribute to -- it's really

17:25

hard for us to get out of the

17:25

mindset that this bird may not

17:29

be extinct.

17:31

Well, that's very

17:31

interesting in it -- in a way it

17:35

resonates. And yet, we have this

17:35

optimism, that's -- I would say,

17:41

plagued the conservation

17:41

community for decades now,

17:45

because it's a false optimism. I

17:45

think, you know, what I'm

17:48

talking about the win-win

17:48

rhetoric, you know, there is no

17:52

conflict between growing the

17:52

economy and protecting it, we

17:56

expose that all the time on The

17:56

Steady Stater. And that's been a

18:00

political tool, I guess, running

18:00

in the face of that tendency

18:05

toward negativism.

18:07

Well. And actually

18:07

this problem that you point out

18:10

-- this picture that the economy

18:10

can just continue to grow

18:14

without there being any kind of

18:14

serious consequences -- that's a

18:18

framing effect, Brian. It's sort

18:18

of, it's a way of anchoring the

18:23

the listeners or the viewers

18:23

expectations about a topic in

18:28

advance, and creating a story, a

18:28

narrative that's hard to get

18:34

away from, because it's sort of

18:34

put out there first. And I am an

18:37

environmental science, not an

18:37

economist. But I do believe that

18:41

this idea that economic systems

18:41

could continue to grow came

18:45

first. And so it's hard for us

18:45

to undo that. And that's a

18:49

framing effect. And that's

18:49

another bias that we have to be

18:53

very, very careful about. And

18:53

it's one that both economics and

18:58

conservation have to learn more

18:58

about in order to get the truth

19:03

out to the public.

19:05

Right. So the 53

19:05

thinking errors, most of them

19:10

are biases of one type or

19:10

another. Is that the case?

19:15

They are. Both of

19:15

these are cognitive biases, but

19:18

I also included some of the more

19:18

frequent logical fallacies. One

19:24

of my, I guess pet peeves with

19:24

the ivory-billed woodpecker is

19:28

something called the argument

19:28

from ignorance. The argument

19:32

from ignorance is a

19:32

philosophical fallacy, a logical

19:36

fallacy, basically goes like

19:36

this -- it tries to prove a

19:40

point by the absence of data. So

19:40

in the case of -- you know where

19:49

this is going in the ivory-billed...

19:51

It's going to fake news, I guess.

19:53

Yes, indeed. So the

19:53

ivory-billed is extinct, because

19:57

we cannot prove that it's alive.

19:57

And of course, the absence of

20:01

evidence is not evidence of

20:01

absence. And this is a common

20:06

error with conservation biology

20:06

and declarations of extinction.

20:12

Because it's very, very

20:12

difficult to prove a negative.

20:16

It's very, it's quite difficult

20:16

to demonstrate even with high

20:20

statistical significance that an

20:20

animal or plant isn't there,

20:25

that's hard to do.

20:27

Well, you know, the

20:27

list of 23 species that fish and

20:32

wildlife proposed for delisting,

20:32

and once again, they'd all be

20:36

delisted, due to real or

20:36

supposedly extinction. Now, 11

20:43

of them are from the contiguous

20:43

48 states, almost all in the

20:46

South and the other 12 are from

20:46

Hawaii, which of course, is

20:49

ecologically messed up with all

20:49

the invasive species especially.

20:54

But you know, what stood out

20:54

about the ivory-billed

20:56

woodpecker to me, Chris, is that

20:56

when Fish and Wildlife Service

21:00

described the causes of its

21:00

endangerment, it listed only one

21:05

cause -- and that was logging.

21:05

For all the other 23 species,

21:10

there are multiple causes

21:10

identified like agriculture,

21:14

mining, road construction,

21:14

urbanization, industrial

21:18

development, reservoirs, and

21:18

even outdoor recreation. Does

21:22

this honing in on logging give

21:22

us any kind of insights into the

21:26

biases committed on behalf of

21:26

the woodpecker?

21:30

Well, yes, it does,

21:30

in both directions. And what I

21:34

mean is that we don't actually

21:34

have strong evidence that

21:37

logging harmed the woodpecker.

21:37

We've made some inferences that

21:42

that's the case. We've made some

21:42

deductions, we've made some

21:46

indirect conclusions. But the

21:46

woodpecker was nomadic, it was a

21:51

very strong flyer, and most

21:51

woodpeckers, including the

21:55

smaller ones, can move away from

21:55

areas that get logged, and just

21:59

go to other places. So that's

21:59

kind of a strange thing. I was

22:03

also amazed that the declaration

22:03

of presumed extinction for

22:08

ivory-billed did not mention

22:08

direct persecution, shooting,

22:13

hunting, collecting.

22:14

Right.

22:15

Many people believe

22:15

that was a strong contribution

22:19

to the woodpeckers scarcity. And

22:19

I don't know why that

22:24

information was left out, quite

22:24

honestly.

22:27

Maybe a little bit

22:27

of explanatory value for that as

22:32

that ivory-billed was from that

22:32

class of 1967 -- you know, that

22:36

was the first group of species

22:36

listed pursuant to the

22:40

Endangered Species Act, and that

22:40

included 14 mammals and 36 bird

22:45

species, 6 reptiles, 6

22:45

amphibians, and 22 fish species.

22:52

And I was wondering if you found

22:52

any patterns, or if you looked

22:56

at the list of 23 that was

22:56

recently proposed for delisting,

23:00

several of them were from that

23:00

class of 67. And they probably

23:06

had back then, well, more

23:06

simplified, simplistic, even I

23:11

suppose approach to describing

23:11

the causes of impairment.

23:16

Yes, I -- what

23:16

stood out to me is that in the

23:20

case of the island birds, those

23:20

that were found -- there was one

23:24

bird, I think, from Guam, and

23:24

the rest were from Hawaii, with

23:27

two exceptions, the ivory-billed

23:27

woodpecker, and the Bachman's

23:31

warbler. And then there were

23:31

several freshwater clams or

23:35

mussels, which are, in some

23:35

cases, were or are restricted to

23:39

a single watershed, a single

23:39

river system. When an animal or

23:43

plant has that local a

23:43

distribution, they're already

23:46

uncommon or rare to begin with,

23:46

just due to the fact of such a

23:50

highly restricted range. And so,

23:50

first of all, it's easier to

23:54

show that they're not there --

23:54

I'm not saying that this was

23:57

satisfactorily demonstrated in

23:57

each of those 23 species cases

24:03

-- but it's easier to tell

24:03

something isn't there, say in

24:07

one mountain range on one

24:07

island. The problem with the

24:11

ivory-billed woodpecker is it

24:11

occurred across a dozen states

24:15

in its original range. And the

24:15

Fish and Wildlife Service's

24:19

recovery plan show just between

24:19

2000 and 2010, 26 sighting

24:25

reports across about 7 or 8

24:25

states. And it's very much

24:30

harder to safely conclude that a

24:30

species isn't there when the

24:36

range is that large. So I would

24:36

say if I looked at all of those

24:40

23 species in the recent

24:40

proposal to delist, I would say

24:45

that this one is the head

24:45

scratcher. This one is the one I

24:49

believe is more problematic. It

24:49

doesn't mean that the other ones

24:52

are extinct. It just means that

24:52

the absences for sighting

24:57

reports for these other animals

24:57

is probably longer, and they

25:01

have smaller ranges. So

25:01

extinction would be more likely

25:04

just on those grounds. But

25:04

that's the big difference I see,

25:08

is that we had two birds in that

25:08

list, the Bachman's warbler and

25:12

the ivory-billed woodpecker that

25:12

had large ranges. And here's

25:15

another interesting thing,

25:15

Brian, we do not have 100

25:19

sighting reports of Bachman's

25:19

warbler since the 1940s. But we

25:24

do for ivory-billed, and that

25:24

puzzles me. I don't see a good

25:28

reason for that. Except that

25:28

maybe one of them isn't really

25:32

dead.

25:33

Well, yeah, of

25:33

course, those warblers. They're

25:36

so alike and hard to spot a lot

25:36

of times, whereas -- what about

25:40

the pileated? You suppose some

25:40

of these ivory-billed sightings

25:43

may have just been pileated

25:43

woodpeckers?

25:46

Well, I would say

25:46

that the likelihood of that

25:48

happening is high. But here's

25:48

the other puzzle, a conundrum,

25:53

enigma. We've been demanded to

25:53

-- sort of say -- all cases of

26:00

ivory-billed woodpeckers were

26:00

expected birdwatchers, who went

26:05

out, and we're finding what they

26:05

set out to see and they really

26:08

saw pileated. There's many

26:08

problems with that. One is we've

26:12

only allowed the similarities of

26:12

these two big woodpeckers to run

26:16

in one direction. We're expected

26:16

to have people confuse pileated

26:20

for ivory-billed. But where are

26:20

the warnings about confusing

26:24

ivory-billed for pileated. We

26:24

don't even have those. The other

26:28

thing is that the expectation

26:28

for the last 70 or more years is

26:32

the bird is dead. So people

26:32

don't knowingly go search for

26:38

dead birds. And then you have

26:38

people that have seen them that

26:42

have spent 6 or 8, 10 in some

26:42

cases, 20 or more years looking.

26:47

And it becomes rather

26:47

implausible to say that if

26:49

somebody is impetuous and hasty,

26:49

why spend 20 years proving that?

26:56

You know what I mean?

26:56

There's sort of a

26:56

synergy of these cognitive

26:59

biases, it sounds like.

27:00

Exactly, exactly.

27:00

And so what I discovered in my

27:04

book is that there's actually

27:04

something -- a predisposition to

27:08

not report, the ivory-billed

27:08

woodpecker. One, is it's dead.

27:14

Two, let's protect it. I don't

27:14

want anybody to disturb it.

27:17

Three, if you're a hunter

27:17

fisherman living in the South,

27:21

you wouldn't know who to report

27:21

this to. You're disconnected in

27:25

social space from scientists and

27:25

so forth. These and other things

27:31

predispose us if the woodpecker

27:31

is still there to actually

27:35

under-report it, not

27:35

over-reported.

27:39

Yeah, that makes

27:39

sense. I do want to acknowledge

27:42

that our very last guest

27:42

actually on the podcast, Ann

27:46

Vileisis, who you probably know

27:46

as the author of that

27:49

outstanding book on wetlands in

27:49

wetland loss, discovering the

27:54

unknown landscape. She wrote at

27:54

length, and we discussed it a

27:59

little bit in the episode about

27:59

the wipeout of bald cypress

28:04

swamps in the South. And

28:04

certainly that was sort of the

28:09

top habitat in the broadest of

28:09

terms -- top, you know, canopy

28:14

cover and feeding tree and

28:14

nesting tree, you know, habitat

28:18

at large for the ivory-billed,

28:18

so. The logging would have been

28:22

very important. But yeah, you

28:22

almost have to wonder if there

28:27

were some policy implications

28:27

that were coming into the

28:32

picture when that was listed.

28:35

Yes. And it's

28:35

interesting, if you go back and

28:38

read what some naturalist said

28:38

in the 1950s, they were not as

28:44

pessimistic as everyone else.

28:44

And they said, you know, it's

28:48

true, the heavy logging at the

28:48

end of the 1800s and in the

28:54

early part of the 1900s kind of

28:54

created a bottleneck. It really

28:59

-- I think the big unanswered

28:59

question is whether the

29:03

ivory-billed woodpecker could

29:03

have gotten through that logging

29:09

bottleneck without going

29:09

extinct. I don't know the

29:12

answer. I really don't write.

29:12

But if it did, it might actually

29:16

be facing a Southeast United

29:16

States that might have been

29:19

slapped. That is slightly better

29:19

shape today than it was that.

29:23

Right. Well, that's

29:23

true. Well, I still I just have

29:27

to ask you if you were forced to

29:27

a gambling table in Vegas, and

29:32

all these cognitive biases and

29:32

mental mishaps aside, you with

29:37

your scientific chops, where

29:37

would you place the odds of

29:41

extinction? Extinct per se.

29:44

You're putting me

29:44

on the spot here, Brian. I would

29:48

first seek to avoid Bayesian

29:48

conservatism, a lack of Bayesian

29:54

caution. And I would run away

29:54

from 100% or 0% on either one.

30:01

Okay. So I would allow that the

30:01

probability is not 100%, but not

30:10

0, either. For either extinction

30:10

or survival, it's somewhere in

30:14

the middle. And I -- if I were

30:14

to ask myself, Chris, if you

30:19

could actually know the truth,

30:19

which one would surprise you

30:22

more? To really learn that the

30:22

bird was dead? Or that the bird

30:27

was still alive? And so I think

30:27

I would probably say, it would

30:31

surprise me just slightly more

30:31

to learn that the bird was

30:36

extinct. So maybe, let's say, my

30:36

odds of survival would be 55%

30:43

survival, 45% extinction, which

30:43

is that's not that's not quite

30:47

50-50. But it's close. And

30:47

that's because I can explain

30:51

most of the nuttiness around

30:51

this bird -- the contradiction

30:55

due to cognitive bias, I can --

30:55

by the fact I can -- explain all

30:58

of it to myself, you might not

30:58

be convinced, but I am. On the

31:02

other hand, because I'm a

31:02

population ecologist, or I'd

31:07

like to be one, we've never had

31:07

good numbers for the bird. So I

31:11

could believe that anyone that

31:11

shows up would be the last one.

31:15

You know, there's no way of knowing.

31:17

Right. One of the

31:17

main points you've made, though,

31:20

I think, all along is that --

31:20

well, extinction is forever, of

31:24

course, but an extinction

31:24

listing is pretty much forever

31:28

as well, it closes a lot of

31:28

managerial and policy doors. And

31:33

that's one of the biggest

31:33

problems with the types of

31:37

outcomes from these cognitive

31:37

biases.

31:40

It is. And I wish

31:40

we would adopt the standards of

31:43

the International Union for the

31:43

Conservation of Nature, BirdLife

31:48

International. And we'd have

31:48

this in between category, which

31:52

is highly imperiled, presumed

31:52

extinct. It's not quite final,

31:58

but it's right at death's door.

31:58

And elsewhere around the globe

32:03

around the planet, that kind of

32:03

category is where we park --

32:07

birds and mammals and plants,

32:07

fish and so forth -- where we

32:11

don't know. I think that's a

32:11

more logical and more cautious

32:16

and a more reasonable place to

32:16

put our uncertainty.

32:20

Well I think that

32:20

gives us a nice follow up

32:23

episode. How does that sound,

32:23

Chris?

32:26

Sounds great to me, Brian.

32:27

All right. Well,

32:27

thank you so much for being on

32:29

the show today, and we'll talk

32:29

to you down the road a bit.

32:33

All right. Thank

32:33

you, Brian. Good to be here.

32:51

Well, folks, that

32:51

about wrap her up. We've been

32:53

talking with Dr. Chris Haney,

32:53

Founder and President of Terra

32:57

Mar Applied Sciences. What a

32:57

unique and exceptional journey

33:01

he's taken us on, exploring some

33:01

of the depths of human folly.

33:06

You know, it's hard to find a

33:06

silver lining in an extinction

33:10

announcement, whether it's

33:10

correct or not. But given such a

33:14

sour ecological lemon, we got to

33:14

make some kind of lemonade

33:19

bittersweet as it might be.

33:19

We've got to take this

33:22

announcement of the ivory-billed

33:22

extinction, as yet another

33:26

warning to humanity. That's the

33:26

closest thing to a silver lining

33:30

we'll get. So we'd better take

33:30

it. Each one of these species in

33:35

the USA and in the world upon

33:35

its extinction gives us one more

33:41

chance to stop and reflect. In

33:41

addition to being a beautiful,

33:47

evolved, priceless creation in

33:47

its own right, each one of these

33:52

species is like a canary in the

33:52

coal mine. Or maybe we should

33:56

look at it like a feather of the

33:56

canary in the coal mine. How

34:01

fewer feathers can that canary

34:01

take? And where does that leave

34:05

us? I'm Brian Czech, and you've

34:05

been listening to the Steady

34:09

Stater podcast. See you next

34:09

time.