By Ravi Chellam on The Hindu Folio By the time you finish
reading this issue of Folio, perhaps one more plant or animal
species somewhere in the world would have disappeared. Gone
forever, never to come back. Extinction is forever. What is the
significance of this pithy little phrase, oft used in
conservation circles? Why should it concern us as humans?
Anyway, is extinction not part of nature? Extinction by
definition means that no live individual of a particular species
exists anywhere in the world, either in its natural habitat (in
situ), or in captivity (ex situ). Dinosaurs today exist only in
reconstructed models and on film screens. But conservationists
do not easily accept the fact that a species has gone extinct.
By the strictest definitions for officially recognising that a
species has gone extinct, it takes numerous intensive surveys
spread over many years, before one can come to this conclusion.
In some cases species believed to be extinct will "reappear"
after decades . . . remnant populations tha