this post was submitted on 21 Nov 2023
126 points (90.4% liked)

Asklemmy

43746 readers
1381 users here now

A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions

Search asklemmy πŸ”

If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!

  1. Open-ended question
  2. Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
  3. Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
  4. Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
  5. An actual topic of discussion

Looking for support?

Looking for a community?

~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de~

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
126
submitted 11 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) by bestusername@aussie.zone to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml
 

I'll just edit instead!

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] root@aussie.zone 100 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Bed bugs.

Positive outcome would be no more having to burn contaminted possessions (or wash them in very hot water many times).

[–] athos77@kbin.social 25 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I was going to go with the rabies virus, but bedbugs is a solid choice as well.

[–] theKalash@feddit.ch 24 points 11 months ago (2 children)
[–] TonyTonyChopper@mander.xyz 13 points 11 months ago

Viruses aren't even alive in the technical biological sense

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] Stoneykins@mander.xyz 15 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Yeah I think any human-specialized parasite is an easy choice. Head lice? Fuck em.

[–] Taiatari@lemmy.world 57 points 11 months ago (2 children)
load more comments (2 replies)
[–] hanni@lemmy.one 45 points 11 months ago (11 children)

I know you said that we shouldn’t say humans but I’m gonna say it anyway:

Humans.

Sorry.

[–] CameronDev@programming.dev 24 points 11 months ago (3 children)

Would be interesting to tally up the negative impacts of removing humans as well.

Culls of invasive species would no longer occur, which would be detrimental in those ecosystems.

A fairly significant number of endangered animals probably only exist today due to human intervention and breeding programs (i am well aware that we probably made them endangered in the first place)

Cross breeds would be done as well, Ligers and Mules require humans for breeding. Although in fairness they are definitely not natural to begin with.

Many animals we have domesticated would be done for as well, most smaller dogs are completely, reliant on humans for food and grooming. Many cats would be okay, but some breeds are likely dead ends as well. Jersey cows would probably have a bad time as well, without milking, sheep might have issues as well?

Interesting thought experiment.

[–] Deebster@lemmy.ml 13 points 11 months ago (4 children)

Yeah, this is a good topic. I can add a few:

~~Short term, pets in houses, farm animals, etc will need to escape and start fending for themselves otherwise they'll starve (or dehydrate).~~. Oops, I'd somehow missed an entire paragraph of your post πŸ€¦β€β™‚οΈ Sheep need us to trim their wool, because we've bred them up grow fair more than they need. They'll get too hot if they don't have problems with defecation first (an actual thing farmers have to worry about).

Medium to long term, when dams and dikes aren't maintained they'll eventually fail, flooding vast areas including the Netherlands.

I guess that the world will continue heating for a bit even once we're gone, so we wouldn't be around to theoretically use our tech to help. Obviously, we're the reason it's happening in the first place, but nature's not equipped to deal with change that's this rapid.

load more comments (4 replies)
[–] Taleya@aussie.zone 9 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Life After people. Whole series exploring this

load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments (1 replies)
[–] uphillbothways@kbin.social 9 points 11 months ago

Humans are the only species that would ask a question like this with ecologically damning effects. So, yeah.

load more comments (9 replies)
[–] greedytacothief@lemmy.world 40 points 11 months ago (4 children)

Ticks.

They seem to just make everything worse, and I don't think anything only eats ticks. Not to mention the diseases they carry.

[–] Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 points 11 months ago

Ticks and mosquitos.

[–] lyam23@lemmy.world 9 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Possums eat ticks. It's a sacrifice I'm willing to make, ticks are awful.

[–] LastYearsPumpkin@feddit.ch 24 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Possums don't live exclusively on ticks, they don't even particularly have a penchant for eating ticks. There was just one study that showed they could eat ticks and potentially have a resistance to some diseases.

Edit: sauce - https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34298355/

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (2 replies)
[–] phorq@lemmy.ml 29 points 11 months ago (16 children)

Canadian Geese, the animal that Canada stored all its rage inside and sent to battle the United States

load more comments (16 replies)
[–] Caligvla@lemmy.dbzer0.com 28 points 11 months ago (2 children)

I hate to say it, but getting rid of mosquitos would probably have bigger consequences than that. The females are the only ones sucking blood, the males on the other hand help pollinate plants, exterminating them could potentially affect our food production lines...

... But not gonna lie I'd still genocide the fuckers, ecological damage be damned.

[–] Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca 13 points 11 months ago (3 children)

You don't need to eliminate all mosquitos, just the ones that bite people.

There are dozens of different species of mosquitos, and not all of them bite people. If you get rid of the ones that bite people the others will likely still fill in as pollinators for those that are no longer competing with them.

load more comments (3 replies)
load more comments (1 replies)
[–] BonesOfTheMoon@lemmy.world 26 points 11 months ago (4 children)

Bedbugs. That's a terrible thing to happen to anyone.

[–] Mathazzar@lemmy.world 13 points 11 months ago (1 children)

A wave of them swept through my old apartment once almost six years ago. I still freak out at the smallest itch or bump.

Those bastards cause serious trauma

[–] BonesOfTheMoon@lemmy.world 8 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I had them about a year ago. I've never been the same either. A tiny black speck on the floor that is from my socks, or a fruit fly, can send me into hysteria.

The best thing you can spend money on IMO is a bedbug proof mattress encasement and those interception cups for the legs of your bed. Nobody will ever regret doing that. It can happen to anyone, right now Paris is rife with bedbugs.

https://www.wired.com/story/paris-bed-bugs/

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (3 replies)
[–] Chainweasel@lemmy.world 24 points 11 months ago (3 children)

Most positive effects on the planet but not humans?
Cattle, they're a major source of greenhouse gasses, as are all the industries built around growing, processing, and transporting them.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] theKalash@feddit.ch 18 points 11 months ago (3 children)

Pandas. I mean, they really don't seem like they want to exist in the first place. And China get's to finally shut up about them.

[–] otter@lemmy.ca 15 points 11 months ago

they really don’t seem like they want to exist

Alternatively, they're at peace and content with their existence. At least that's what it seems like to me, goals really

[–] morrowind@lemmy.ml 8 points 11 months ago

but they cute though

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] bulwark@lemmy.world 16 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

I'm off the opinion that no animal would be beneficial to remove. In almost every instance where we have exterminated a species there has been negative unanticipated consequences. Even mosquitos and bed bugs, there are predators that eat them and subsequent predators that eat them and so on. It's kind of like the butterfly effect. It's a balance formed from eons of coexistence that is not to be tampered with. There is so many examples where scientists try to introduce an animal to exterminate another that has gone horribly wrong. Regardless of my opinion, all living things have a part in our world. I'm not a vegetarian btw, but I do use Arch.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] Blizzard@lemmy.zip 13 points 11 months ago
[–] SomeBoyo@feddit.de 13 points 11 months ago

Mosquitoes are pollinators. Sucking blood and being annoying is only a small part of their functionality.

[–] 0x4E4F@infosec.pub 12 points 11 months ago (4 children)

Cockroaches... as far as I'm aware, they don't contribute anything to the eco system, they're just pests.

Unfortunatelly, not even a nuclear war can erradicate them πŸ˜’.

[–] Catoblepas@lemmy.blahaj.zone 32 points 11 months ago (2 children)

'Cockroach' encompasses a wide range of species, the majority of which have no interest in living in a human's home, and contribute to the work of decomposition on the forest floor. Many smaller predators also eat them.

[–] 0x4E4F@infosec.pub 20 points 11 months ago (1 children)

OK, just the pest ones then 😁.

[–] Catoblepas@lemmy.blahaj.zone 11 points 11 months ago (2 children)

I'm on board with that πŸ‘

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] Chickenslippers@lemmy.world 10 points 11 months ago (4 children)

Just learned recently that there are over 3000 species of cockroaches and about 10 are invasive to humans.

load more comments (4 replies)
load more comments (3 replies)
[–] Omega_Haxors@lemmy.ml 11 points 11 months ago

If you gave any random person god like powers to do whatever they wanted, they would immediately eradicate mosquitoes as their first act.

I think I'm going to go with Africanized honeybees. My understanding is they're a man-made calamity, so pressing the delete key on them wouldn't like, upset the circle of life and piss off Mufasa or whatever.

[–] SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.ml 10 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (3 children)

Ticks and botflies. We don't need maggots making a home in our skin. Even worse is what they do to animals like sheep.

Mosquitos are mainly an annoyance to me and I can deal with them.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] GyozaPower@discuss.tchncs.de 10 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (3 children)

Hard to say. Mosquitos, is probably not one of them because even as much as we hate them, many animals prey on them, so unless other insect replaces them as a food source for those animals, them disappearing would probably affect many other species and subsequently, other species that may feed or depend in some form on those that feed on mosquitos.

My answer would probably be ticks, since I don't think there's many animals that feed on them and their only usefulness is population control, which should be doable by other species either way.

Edit: bed bugs as well, since it was mentioned by other commenters, I hate those fuckers and last I checked they weren't any animal's primary food source.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] neonred@lemmy.world 9 points 11 months ago

Tics. What's their use in nature anyway?

[–] KingJalopy@lemm.ee 9 points 11 months ago (3 children)

Chiggers. Fucking hate those things.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] Birdie@thelemmy.club 8 points 11 months ago (1 children)

The bats would miss them.

Any change to the biodiversity on our planet will have a negative effect. What is a pest to you is food for another species, or a pollinator, or any of dozens of valuable purposes.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] RampantParanoia2365@lemmy.world 8 points 11 months ago

Definitely mosquitoes.

[–] OmnislashIsACloudApp@lemmy.world 8 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (3 children)

honestly any insect that primarily feeds on blood would be good to go.

  • mosquitoes
  • bed bugs
  • tics
  • fleas

screw all of those things

load more comments (3 replies)
load more comments
view more: next β€Ί