The word for animal is Dou Butsu.

Buddha teaches ecology.

This teaching is so fundamental that not only is biological ecology a natural consequence of this teaching, but so is ethical ecology, spiritual ecology... If we understand this way correctly, then we can understand all relationships, including our relationship to our environment, which means not only ground, water, air, sky, trees, plants, and animals, but also each other. In view of the Buddha's teaching, a question merely of human survival is a mistake. This goal already separates human beings from the rest of this world. It is not enough to love this world so that human beings can survive. That is not true love, because true love is unconditional.

In China, long ago, a zen master came into the dharma room of his temple, where several hundred monks were fighting about a cat. The congregation was suddenly silent. The master picked up the cat, and demanded, "Give me one word. If not, I will kill this cat!" Everyone was silent. The zen master killed the cat.

This story is about love. When the master challenged his students, he wanted to see if they loved the cat, or only desired the cat. If you had been there when the Zen Master demanded one word, how would you have saved the cat? What is the meaning of his action? If the meaning becomes clear to you, then love becomes clear. To attain true love is to emulateand achieve Buddha's ecological correctness in our relationship with other organisms.

From, Ecology of Mind by Zen Master Wu Bong.

Insects are animals. This fellow here is an animal. He's also a virtual insect. That's because he exemplifies Koop's Dictum in word and deed. That makes him a virtual bee in the nostril of some. Possibly you don't remember Dr C Everett Koop. He believes that knowledge is the best presciption. But knowledge about certain things is not prescribed, but rather proscribed. So, as happens all too often in the Scylla and Charybdis of public opion in that most enigmatic of all places, American society, people who should be admired and respected are instead the objects of ridicule and derision.

Dr Koop was forced out of his job by right wing morons because he tried to publish a pamphlet which accurately described the epidemiology of a politically sensitive disease. He meant well and tried to improve lives by education. But alas, in America competing groups with a different Weltanschauung turned his efforts into an exercise in futility.

Dr Ehrlich faces a similar challenge. It's the price a big picture person in present day America must pay. So far though, his tenure is secure in his post at Stanford. We don't know how long he will last if he keeps telling it like it is.

Several decades ago the core ecology course of UC California was taught by three professors simultaneously instead of just one professor. It is noteworthy that the practise of using three professors to teach the core ecology course has since been discontinued even though the importance of a rigorous understanding of ecology has increased. Material presented in lecture included exerpts from Dr Ehrlich's most famous book. It was suggested that although the time frame of some of his predictions probably required adjustment, the basic premise that humans are overpopulating the earth and are severely damaging the ecosystems of its bioshpere causing greatly accelerated rates of extinction and mass reductions in flora and fauna is sound and correct. Nationalistic spinmeisters are vehemently in denial and instead would throw the baby out with the bath as it were. The consequences arising from even a hint that what Dr Ehrlich says is realistic are publicly unacceptable to these semper fie, defenders of the faith. Several decades ago we weren't aware of the extent to which the principles of ecology would be distorted by politics. But what a circus it has become.

As human numbers pass the six billion mark, humans exhibit a pattern of sensory adaptation towards species extinctions which is at best a ho and a hum, at worst outright denial and ignorance.

Buddycom's response to the questions and comments of Vigdor Schreibman, Director of the
Federal Information News Syndicate
Dear Mr. Schreibman;
We'd like to take this opportunity to address your comments and questions regarding biodiversity.
Yes we must be really dumb, misguided fools. We're idiots. We're the Biodiversity Buddies. Well said.
Biodiversity buddies. How stupid can you get?
There is not a more stupid cause to champion in this entire anthropocentric world. It is not a losing cause, it's a lost cause. Rates of extinction estimated to be between one hundred to one thousand times the basal rate of extinctions can be continued for many more years. Estimates average in at 135 species extinct per day. Multiply 135 species x 7 days x 52 weeks x 10 years and whaddya get? About the same as loading sixteen tons. Another day older, deeper in debt and half a million fewer species. We could continue this for another eight to ten decades, after all there are several million species left to eradicate according to ESA estimates. Check recent news articles. The term expendable speciesis being used in a cavalier manner with greater frequency.

SANI values are becoming more and more microscopic. SANI, Species Absolute Numbers Index, values are the present numbers divided by the beginning numbers. For an example the SANI value for American bison, including pastured, domesticated numbers, would be (30,000,000/ 200,000)x 100 = 0.67.
The broadway tune says ya gotta accentuate the positive. Biodiversity buddies don't know how to do that for biodiversity. But everyone else does. Even in this case it would be difficult. Would it be better to say the glass was 99% empty or 1% full?

Some put out numbers which look large and positive. Like the 500% increase in California condors in a recent decade. But what do those stats really mean? Twenty five became 125. Still just north of a genetic min V pop of 100. After spending untold millions directly and tens of millions indirectly. And why? Because people know in their hearts that humans are overpopulated and are compelled to try to prove otherwise. Or at least try to create the illusion that it isn't so. In this regard, it is as if the real job of ecologist radio device fitters is to prove that humans are not overpopulated however ridiculous the cost or means. Until there is no more need to do so, ie, until anthropocentrification is complete and absolute. Because then, of course, it will be moot. In the overall scheme of things entry into heaven demands just such a trance state. Ecologists serve the valuable function of providing hope via a technological excuse for not doing anything about the disastrous ecological problem of human overpopulation.

You could sanitize the SANI values by choosing a shorter more recent time frame. Instead of 300 years you could selectively use a more recent time frame in which the numbers are less divergent.

Or just ignore SANI values altogether. Most humans think that that's really the best option. Focus on extinctions. Ridiculous as it seems, people ascribe more significance to extinctions than they do to the massive reductions in SANI values. Thirty tigers are still left in Siberia. Well below the min V pop. But they are not completely extinct and until they are, their existence is regarded as supporting the absurd ecological fantasy that humans have not overpopulated the planet. At present the overall panspecific estimates for SANItization are in the 60-65 percent range. If you just adjust your time frame to the last decade, you could sanitize that stat to approximate a ten percent loss. So with 90 percent of the biodiversity left, who would say that human overpopulation is a problem. Creative statistics are quite handy in this case.

You are quite right. Humans could use some disentrancement. We didn't ask for this task. It has been thrust upon us, could one say, by default? The job of saying what needs to be said sometime, somewhere by somebody about the senseless evil destruction of biodiversity has not been accepted by leaders of society, religion or education. Especially not by tenured individuals in universities whose function, ostensibly, is to inform and at least make an attempt to stimulate discussion. Dr Paul Ehrlich is an exceptional individual although he is routinely shouted down. David and Marcia Pimentel, E. O. Wilson, and Peter Raven don't shy away from truth. One mustn't forget Jaques Cousteau. Human overpopulaton is the world's number one problem for humans and for all life forms! Every professor of ecology knows it very well without a smidgen of doubt. Precious few will risk their tenure or grant money to say it publicly though. Human overpopulation and the trance-like mental state which perpetuates it is the main tool which have been found to be effective in destabilizing countries around the world in the name of choice, democracy, and the national interest of the United States. Therefore it is considered by most to be in the national interest to be quiet about human overpopulation.
Even if it is causing horrendous ecological damage.

We just say phooey on that.

When we think of biodiversity, we often think of the song, Guantanamera.