The way people are living is unsustainable to the environment.

The natural capital is

degrading faster that it can replenish itself. The growing population will only add to the
degradation of the natural capital and put humans in the forefront of extinction. Humans are
headed toward a population crash and the only way to stop it is to maintain our biodiversity, the
array of life forms on earth. Biodiversity provides humans with economic services, ecosystem
services, and the continuation of evolution.
As previously claimed, it can be argued that by maintaining biodiversity, humans can
harvest a variety of economic services such as medicine. Many organisms can be used to
enhance the medicine and prolong the existence of humanity. Nearly 90% of humans diseases
known to medical science can be treated with prescription drugs derived from nature (4). This
shows scientist use chemicals extracted from a variety of organisms to produce medicine. It can
be inferred that if biodiversity is not maintained 90% of humans disease would become
untreatable. This would decimate most medical practices and could potentially end humanity. An
example, scientist use chemicals in snake venom to create anti-venom and treat patients. Some
snake venom such as the Bothrops Jararacas venom can stop chronic high blood pressure (4).
Other life forms are used to make medicine like the cone snail which is used as a strong
painkiller (7), coral reefs which helps treat cancer, arthritis, and alzheimer's disease (6), and the
Madagascar periwinkle which treats the once deadly lymphocytic leukemia disease (4). Frogs is
another organism that is very important to medicine. The diverse amount of species leads to
many uses in the medical field such as antibiotics, painkillers, and pregnancy tests (8). The
diverse amount of species that are used in medicine, shown above, is a precious to humanity.
Another economic services that biodiversity provides is food. One-third of the earth food supply
comes from insect pollination (12). There is a diverse amount of insect pollinators as the
following: bees, butterflies, beetles, moths, and ants. However, some of these pollinators arent
being protected, bees are dying to colony-collapse disorder. It can be inferred this tremendous
amount of food could disappear if insect pollination isnt conserved. Fish provides food for huge
amount of people, but overfishing is reducing the amount of fish that can be caught. The last
economic service that biodiversity provides is employment/money. Fish is a source of income
for many people around the world. However; overfishing can deplete the fish population and
take away jobs for a multitude of people. Nearly 80% of the fish population has been depleted
due to the advancement in technology (12). It can be inferred that if the world's fish population is
depleted then many jobs will be loss. A massive employment rate can lead to poverty and
further destroy the environment. Without biodiversity, it can be argued, economic services- that
are vital to humanity- would be decimated.
There is two types of main ecosystems: aquatic and terrestrial. Both need biodiversity to
function correctly and in turn it provides humans with a significant amount of ecosystem
services. Aquatic ecosystems makes 70% of the earth's oxygen (13). This is essential to life and
without it people will die. Aquatic ecosystems also reduce storm damage. This is good because
it reduce damage done to building and reduces death from storms. Both terrestrial and aquatic
systems supports nutrients cycling. This is one of the principles of sustainability. It is the circle of
life and without it all organism would die including humans. Both of these ecosystems also
moderate the climate. Coral reefs and forest use photosynthesis to absorb carbon and release
oxygen called, carbon sequestration (12). This process balances the average atmospheric
temperatures. It can be argued without biodiversity essential ecosystem services would be
destroyed.
Biodiversity produces a more competitive environment for organisms except humans.
This causes them to evolve new traits through either resource partitioning or predation. This can
be beneficial to humans in a multitude of ways. It can make pharmaceutical stronger. This is a
very important aspect of evolution because the more people use antibiotics the more resistant
bacteria will become. If biodiversity is conserved then people could find more powerful
pharmaceutical to stop the resistant bacteria. The continuation of evolution can benefit humans
by making different variations of the same food. When there is different variations of the same
organism then it will be less likely that a disease will wipe it out. In the 1950s a deadly disease
called Panama disease fungus destroyed most of the banana is Asia. Evolution could stop the
deadly diseases because different variations of the same species could have resistant D.N.A.
Biodiversity is vital to evolution which benefits human medicine and preserves essential
organisms.
Non-environmentalist would say by disrupting the environment they are helping
organisms evolve. However; this is not true. Humans are currently in middle of the 6th mass
extinction (12). According to the 2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. Current annual rate
of species extinction is at least 100 to 1000 times the estimated background extinction rate.
This shows humans are killing too many organism so fast that they cant adapt to the changing
times.
As explained above, protecting biodiversity provides humanity with economic services,
ecosystem services, and the continuation of evolution. It can be argued that biodiversity benefits
humans, and, is worth preserving.

Sources
(1)http://www.apsnet.org/publications/apsnetfeatures/Pages/ICPP98Biodiversity.aspx
(2)http://www.globalissues.org/article/170/why-is-biodiversity-important-who-cares
(3)http://www.endangeredspeciesinternational.org/overview4.html
(4)https://www.rainforesttrust.org/news/owed-to-nature-medicines-from-tropical-forests/
(5)http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1636027/
(6)http://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/coral_medicine.html
(7)http://coralreef.noaa.gov/aboutcorals/values/medicine/
(8)http://www.parcplace.org/publications/herp-articles/153-will-we-all-benefit-from-the-frog-
pharmacy-one-day.html
(9)http://www.evolutionary-research.net/science/intro/why-evolution-matters
(10)http://familydoctor.org/familydoctor/en/drugs-procedures-devices/prescription-
medicines/antibiotic-resistance.html
(11)http://panamadisease.org/
(12)Ap-Environmental Book
(13)http://education.nationalgeographic.org/activity/save-the-plankton-breathe-freely/