robyn;88490 said:
There is an emerging branch of mathematical ecology attempting to answer exactly these sorts of questions. From memory I think its called elasticity analyses.
I'd be quite interested in references and recommendations for particular papers... I'm hoping to get some time to do a google scholar search for this stuff, but if you have some specific recommendations, that's also good, particularly if you know some that are good for a "well-read intellectual, but ignorant computer scientists who hasn't taken too much hardcore biology and had to pick up a lot of terminology on the street" level reader like myself.
This also seems like the sort of thing that Fugisawas Sake would like, but he hasn't been around much lately.
I should also clarify a bit: I didn't in any way mean to criticize the conclusion that "zebras" shouldn't be collected and imported, certainly not in the overzealous, irresponsible, and unregulated (and greed-driven) manner that people are describing. I just am wary of over-extrapolating the details, but it's pretty damn clear that the current practices are unethical, unacceptable, and unreasonable.
My only intended point is that collecting endangered animals is not a "one-size fits all" problem, and it's the sort of thing where frequently there is a great deal of complexity, so to try to address it sometimes requires a lot of open-minded-cynicism, so to speak. But it's clear that the "zebras" were doing a lot better before a bunch of jerks started to spray cyanide at them to make a quick fortune selling them to rich idiots in American LFS stores, so stopping that seems like a great idea. My comments are mostly in the theoretical domain of "will they bounce back" and "in what ways is this similar to or different from other examples." I understand that Greg sees a lot of similarities between them and other "exotic pet" animals, and certainly in terms of the "human side" of the behavioral and economic examples, I agree, but in terms of reproduction, ecology, and whatnot, I think it's intellectual thin ice to say that a ceph that probably breeds a large brood about once a year is going to respond to pressures in a way similar to boas or tasmanian tigers. However, there's no doubt that if these collectors remove a large fraction of the wild population, it will be an unacceptably horrible thing for the population, so it's the details, not the big picture, that I'm wanting to get into.