Do we need em?

I saw this article and I couldn't help but think of Karl Pilkington... again. It has now inspired me to create a reoccurring segment to this blog... "Do we want em?" Yes, it is a direct rip off from the Ricky Gervais Show with a little bit of a tweak to it. The difference is that I do not feel that "need" is a good question because I would have no idea how to answer that. See, even ideas evolve. Here's the article if you want to read it....

 http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100721/full/466432a.html

Here is also a small segment of Karl's "Do we need em?"

I think it is pretty obvious that if mosquitoes did not exist, evolution would take its course and predators would readjust their diets and the prey would just be eaten/fed on by something else. I see no good in having a mosquito around: They spread disease; they're annoying; according to the article, they are not crucial for crops useful to humans; there is no use for mosquitoes in human life. The only interaction I have had with a mosquito is to try and kill it or repel it with bug spray. Take a look at the links other have gone too...

I won't be going this far.

In short, I do not want them around; however, I do fear that something worse may take its place. The article did bring up an interesting point, that as we inadvertently drive beneficial species to the brink of extinction, such as tuna, we will never be the cause for the eradication of the mosquito. So, do we want em? (Take a vote in the side bar).   

Venus World

Non-violence leads to the highest ethics, which is the goal of all evolution. Until we stop harming all other living beings, we are still savages. --Thomas Edison

Venus World: Created and performed by the Earwigs  
(Matt Mankowski, Michael Lang, Spencer Murphy) 

The Flightless Bird

There may be no greater anomaly in nature than the flightless bird.

Designed by Committee

Did my genes make me do it?

I believe these are some interesting quotes to think about: 
(Take a vote on the left side of the page)

“we are enslaved by selfish molecules …. They are in you and me; they created us, body and mind; and their preservation is the ultimate rationale for our existence. …. they go by the name of genes, and we are their survival machines."--Richard Dawkins

"Everything in nature is the result of fixed laws." --Charles Darwin

"Everything is determined, the beginning as well as the end, by forces over which we have no control. It is determined for the insect as well as the star. Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune, intoned in the distance by an invisible piper." - Albert Einstein