I tell my philosophy students on the first day of each semester in every course I teach that my job consists of helping them to become better thinkers. And in my studies of philosophy, I am often returning to the ancient Greeks, the creators of the first systematic rational philosophies as well as of the world's earliest known democratic society, and there are some basic considerations in that part of history which are really the topic of this latest summary about wolf and wildlife education.

Democracy does not merely thrive and benefit from participation. It actually requires participation. And it must be active and ongoing. Apathy is precisely what kills a democratic organization, far more effectively than a hostile competitor or differing ideology could ever hope for. And this applies to all aspects of a democratic group: politics, policies, beliefs, and economics.

On the topic of economic interests, consider this: seven years ago I went on a wildlife safari to the equatorial African nation of Kenya. Now I will not compare that ecosystem to Alaska's, nor its wildlife to Alaska's: vastly different climates, topographies, and species occupy each region. But what really stuck out, as we eagerly took to the field twice a day to look for the larger creatures, was the fact that during that trip I learned about a policy of the KWS, the Kenyan Wildlife Service, which is that country's national agency for protecting and managing wildlife.

Field agents of the KWS are allowed to shoot poachers: on sight, without offering any warning. And when they shoot, it is not to scare or intimidate, but to kill. It is actually humans hunting other humans, legally.

How could this possibly be justified? you might wonder. This strong policy is based on Kenyans reaching a simple realization, in two parts: first, that Kenyan elephants, zebras, giraffes, lions, leopards, cheetahs, crocodiles, wildebeests, warthogs, rhinoceri, buffalo, hippopotami, various species of antelopes, and other "game" species are literally worth more, financially, alive than dead, and second, that the reason they are worth more is because people from other countries are willing to pay to visit Kenya for the specific purpose of seeing these creatures in their own habitats.

Thus, there is no more legal trade in that nation in animal pelts, or horns, or, in the case of the elephants, in ivory. When the poaching policy was first instituted, the KWS invited CNN, the BBC, and the other major international news media to broadcast a live burning of millions of dollars worth of elephant tusks, to show that the organization was serious. That ivory could have been sold through the black market. It could have been turned into a hard currency, like dollars or pounds or yen, which might have gone quite a long way in a country which is considered part of the "third world."

So why would I share such a story with those of you who have already indicated at least a passing interest in Alaska's wolves? I am not actually recommending that Alaska adopt a similar no-holds-barred approach to poaching intervention (although one might imagine that poaching would dry up rather quickly if we did, and yes, poaching does occur in Alaska). The reason for such an extreme measure is that a nation like Kenya is rather financially poor, and it needs the hard currencies brought in by visitors who are able to spare their disposable income on wildlife interests, while Alaska is instead part of the world's wealthiest nation.

Rather, I relate the background of the KWS to point out one key detail: in Alaska, "our" wildlife is likewise worth more alive than dead. And this means all of it, not just the bears, or the moose, or the caribou, or the marine mammals, or the eagles and fish, but the wolves as well. With that in mind, there is an essential principle at work here which must be reiterated, since it keeps being ignored or glossed over by politics and the taking of sides, and which is non-economic even though it has economic considerations. The principle is this: an ecosystem must have predators.

No, it is not inherently desirable or undesirable to have predators, whether you happen to love or hate the individual species which hunt. Our individual wishes are wholly irrelevant here, so it bears repeating one more time: an ecosystem must have predators. They exist to keep prey species healthy. Prey species outnumber predators by huge ratios, typically about 400 to 1 among the larger animals, and when their populations are unchecked, they have a troubling propensity to reproduce at extreme rates, whether they are rabbits, fish, moose, or caribou.

Is that principle proving difficult to believe? Here is another case in point, from America's own Yellowstone National Park, which became famous (again) in late 1995 for the reintroduction of gray wolves, which had been captured in various parts of northwestern Canada. This was an attempt to reintroduce an extirpated species, and the problem was that the Park had a history of poor decisions. This was the first national park, in any nation, and no one was really quite sure of how to proceed. The only general mandate was to preserve its natural beauty for human visitors, but no one really understood how to accomplish this.

People liked seeing the elk and bison, so the park managers opted to kill off the wolves and bears, as well as disallow Native American hunting rights. But then the elk increased in such numbers, with no checks, that they consumed all the vegetation they could reach, including the trees used by the beavers. The beavers, in turn, were the ones managing the lakes and streams in the park, and when their trees were gone, so were they. And when these water managers were gone, the native fish populations dried up.

Then there were problems with trying to reintroduce fish, as non-indigenous species were sometimes used, which competed with native species.

And finally, there was also a policy of total fire prevention, before park managers comprehended that occasional fires are actually necessary to wooded ecosystems, and if they are not allowed to burn periodically, they will eventually burn and then burn so hot that the ground is likely to be sterilized, turning the area into a wasteland which can last for centuries.

Even this more recent Yellowstone wolf project has not been without its difficulties and controversies. Rabies afflicted one pack and its remaining members had to be killed. The state of Wyoming came close to deciding the project was more trouble than it could ever be worth, but Canada would not have the wolves returned, so the wolves would have all been hunted down and exterminated. Fortunately for the wolves, public outcry was sufficient to let them remain, where they have continued to thrive, as well as bring in visitors and their money who wish to specifically try and see them. And the other Yellowstone species have also thrived since the wolves were reintroduced. Raptors and coyotes often finish off the remains of wolf kills, and the weak, old, sick, and injured members of the bison and elk and deer herds are being thinned out, which is precisely how an ecosystem is supposed to work.

This example of Yellowstone Park reveals something else, which some are likely to find disturbing. I'm entitled to hate wolves, you might say, or equally entitled to love them. Are you indeed? After all, in a democratic tradition, do we not all have the right to our own opinions? Actually, the truth is, no, we do not. Opinions must be earned, else they are empty, meaningless, illogical, and mere ego defenses. If you truly have a right to an opinion, then you are able to give plausible reasons for holding it. It does not mean you are automatically right or wrong; it simply means you have done your homework about the information leading to that opinion. That is what having a right means: that you have traded something in order to receive the object of that right. Opinions entail responsibilities.

So, if you are going to institute a plan which kills wolves, then you are logically, legally, and morally required to supply plausible reasons for doing so, else your policy is based on nothing but empty words. Prior to the wolf reintroduction, the misguided policies described above in reference to Yellowstone were examples of such empty words. The park managers felt they had the right to their opinions, which led them to believe they had the right to behave in certain ways pertaining to the park. They may not have intended to do wrong; indeed, they may have genuinely believed their decisions would help, but you can assess the effects and consequences for yourself.

And finally, we reach the Alaskan wolves themselves, and those who both love and hate them. And it's essential to remember here that loving, like democracy, requires active participation, while hating, though simple, is always destructive, as well as interferent with long-term plans. Simply put, hunting creatures which are not even responsible for the problems they are accused of perpetuating is an act of cowardice as well as unfounded hatred. However, it is equally cowardly to sit at home and pretend that problems do not exist when they in fact do.

Strong words, these are: fightin' words. And that is the point: there is a time for diplomacy and education, and another time when you might have to yell and express anger. There is no such thing as "balance" in the natural world, any more than there is within human societies. Species thrive, evolve, and get replaced by other species. So do societies. Individuals attempt to thrive on a smaller scale. But the conflict never ends. There is no perfect hunter's paradise, in Alaska or anywhere else. The moose and caribou do not sit around waiting to be shot; they go about their lives, and the survival struggle continues. And what affects the populations of prey species, everywhere in the world, are, in order: weather, human interference, and predation.

It is always in that order. A colder winter in Alaska will automatically kill off the weaker, sicker, older, and injured caribou and moose, which in turn will automatically reduce wolf numbers, since those are the prey animals the wolves are able to catch. And when environmental factors improve, so will birth rates, of all species within the ecosystem. Human interference is likewise always the second most influential factor: development and hunting and trapping make the lives of wildlife that much trickier. And finally, predation enters the arena, and the predators account for far fewer kills than either weather or human encroachment. These fundamental rules apply regardless of individual regions or carrying capacities.

In other words, it is illogical, unfair, and unscientific to blame wolves or any other species for recent drops in prey populations in certain Alaskan Game Management Units when it is actually a combination of weather and over-hunting by humans which has caused the drops. To blame anyone other than the guilty for a problem is part of what leads to the charge of cowardice. The other part of that charge comes from the simple fact that it takes no courage at all to fire a gun at a creature which cannot fire a gun back, or to poison it or trap it. Hunting is not a "sport;" it can be done responsibly, it can be done for legitimate subsistence reasons, or it can be done to simply satisfy a human ego or as a method of finding a convenient scapegoat. Only the first two of these four reasons can be reasonably judged as acceptable.

I know Alaskan residents are opposed to all hunting of wolves when they are targeted from aircraft, and that they are also opposed to the trapping of wolves and other species. I know this because that is precisely how Alaskan voters have cast their ballots, in election after election, ballot measure after ballot measure, and it is a matter of public record. On the surface, this seems a healthy indication of the requisite democratic participation referred to earlier. However, there is a highly disturbing question in the wake of this thought: what do the participants do when their democratic participation is thwarted, and when their interests and preferences and wishes are nullified by selfishness and mismanagement?

The answer is: they make noise. They protest and they write and communicate and they become a sufficient nuisance until better actions and policies are adopted. And the price of living in a democratic nation is the simple recognition that this never ends. It is analogous to the lack of balance and harmony in the wilderness: a democratic group does not just thrive on conflict, it actually needs it for its very survival. Think back to the backlash from around the world when folks started boycotting Alaska, largely for how its wolf population was being treated. Then consider that you are sorely misinformed if you believe Alaska does not depend on outside money for its continued economic survival.

Yes, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge could be drilled, and yes, there is still gold in those hills, and Alaska's resources have tremendous potential in terms of buying power. But the human world has drastically shrunk, and the economic interrelatedness within our own nation and among all nations has correspondingly increased. In other words, boycotts matter, and they are once again lurking beyond our borders. Despite the stereotypes, there are very few Alaskan human residents who literally live off the land; we have supermarkets and shopping centers just like the rest of the wealthy nations. Granted, Alaska is not so desperate for cash that it will have to resort to practices like the wildlife managers in Kenya, but the world is still watching nonetheless. What is shared in common with Kenya, however, is that the wildlife in Alaska is literally worth more alive than dead. Our actions and decisions do have consequences.

It has never been a question of wolves being able to live near humans. They can do that, and they continue to prove their hardiness and adaptability. They still live in Finland, the Russian Federation, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine, Poland, Romania, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Germany, France, Switzerland, Spain, Italy, Bulgaria, Turkey, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Mongolia, China, Japan, Iran, Iraq, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Syria, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, Ethiopia, Canada, and all of the northern United States. This is quite a mix of rich nations and poor, developed and underdeveloped, politically stable and politically questionable, and the wolves manage in all of them.

Edwin Wollert teaches philosophy at the University of Alaska at Anchorage.  He tells his students on the first day of each semester in every course he teaches that his job through the university consists of helping them to become better thinkers.  That's it, he informs them: the full extent of his job description, and the field of philosophy is simply his chosen venue for helping undergraduates acquire the most important skill of them all: the ability to think rationally.  And in his studies of philosophy, he is often returning to the ancient Greeks, the creators of the first systematic rational philosophies as well as of the world's earliest known democratic society, and there are some basic considerations in that part of history which are really the topic of this latest work for the Wolf Song of Alaska web site.