The address above points to an article that appeared in the NYT Magazine last Sunday, and I find myself circling back on it: reading of deep consequence. I found it fascinating and deeply troubling, confirming much that I knew but often extending my understanding and making connections I hadn't made. It sticks in my mind. Here's the last paragraph:
"In addition to extinction (the complete loss of a species) and extirpation (a localized extinction), scientists now speak of defaunation: the loss of individuals, the loss of abundance, the loss of a place’s absolute animalness. In a 2014 article in Science, researchers argued that the word should become as familiar, and influential, as the concept of deforestation. In 2017 another paper reported that major population and range losses extended even to species considered to be at low risk for extinction. They predicted “negative cascading consequences on ecosystem functioning and services vital to sustaining civilization” and the authors offered another term for the widespread loss of the world’s wild fauna: 'biological annihilation.'"