Wild Souls: Freedom and Flourishing in the Non-Human World

by Emma Marris

From an acclaimed environmental writer, a groundbreaking and provocative new vision for our relationships with-and responsibilities toward-the planet's wild animals.

Protecting wild animals and preserving the environment are two ideals so seemingly compatible as to be almost inseparable. But in fact, between animal welfare and conservation science there exists a space of underexamined and unresolved tension: wildness itself. When is it right to capture or feed wild animals for the good of their species? How do we balance the rights of introduced species with those already established within an ecosystem? Can hunting be ecological? Are any animals truly wild on a planet that humans have so thoroughly changed? No clear guidelines yet exist to help us resolve such questions.

Transporting readers into the field with scientists tackling these profound challenges, Emma Marris tells the affecting and inspiring stories of animals around the globe-from Peruvian monkeys to Australian bilbies, rare Hawai'ian birds to majestic Oregon wolves. And she offers a companionable tour of the philosophical ideas that may steer our search for sustainability and justice in the non-human world. Revealing just how intertwined animal life and human life really are, Wild Souls will change the way we think about nature-and our place within it.

Genres: Nonfiction, Nature, Science, Animals, Philosophy, Environment, Biology

352 pages, Hardcover

First published June 29, 2021

Reviews

[fleshy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I kind of want to burn down a zoo now. That is, of course, after freeing all the animals and relocating them to sanctuaries in appropriate areas.

To me this book is about the responsibility humans have to bear from both altering the world to suit our needs and being better positioned to interfere in the existence of other living things. To this end we are shown different situations nonhuman animals find themselves in, and the humans who care about them, or exploit them, or both.

I enjoyed the writing style and imagery, though this is a chiefly expository piece. I learned a lot about how divergent both conservationist theory and practice are. And how many animals die in order to protect animals of higher value to the conversationist.

I'm not sure what to think about all of it. I decided to become a stricter vegan halfway through the book, then a breatharian, then I realized nothing I can do individually will reduce the number of farm animals on the planet, but I still don't want to be party to the removal of their autonomy.

Just...spay and neuter your pets, and make sure your ship doesn't have any rodent stowaways.

[L.G. Cullens · Rating 4 out of 5]

Somewhat interesting reading to me, but being the book is more of developing philosophical ruminations relative to the human/nature dichotomy, I found the "intellectualizing" a bit wordy and sterile.

At length, there are good points made, and I did like the author's inclusion of some indigenous perspectives in the ruminations.

It does have the potential to leave one with a much broader understanding of a Margaret J. Wheatley quote: "Probably the most visible example of unintended consequences, is what happens every time humans try to change the natural ecology of a place."

That, taken together with considering new genetic techniques begs an Albert Einstein quote: “Technological change is like an axe in the hands of a pathological criminal.”

Amidst all the author's ponderings my thoughts are that the heart of Nature is change, striving through evolution towards some productive balance of biodiversity in an ever changing environment. All creatures alter their habitat, and those that have the greatest impact imperil not only untold others but themselves.

[Shirleynature]

This engaging read will be especially helpful to readers who haven't yet reckoned with human impacts to our natural world; nonfiction narrative infused with experiential memoir and anecdotal storytelling.
I look forward to recommending this book and perhaps also a bookclub read! Thanks to Bloomsbury and Netgalley for access to review in advance, published June 29. 2021.

[Ryan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Seemed like a collection of essays and articles the author wrote for various magazines strung into a book. While there was an overriding theme - the philosophy of wildlife conservation and more broadly how we relate to animals and the compromises we have to make in tackling practical conservation issues such as island extinctions, the individual chapters were largely standalone pieces. In a way this builds on her first book on how change in nature should be the only constant and we should let species adapt and change to the world we are changing so rapidly without judgment or undue interference.

The low rating is due to my low level of interest in philosophizing about animal well-being, and the jumbled organization of the book, not a critique of the author's writing skill or style, which was quite engaging mostly.

[Travis · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you imagine merging a David Attenborough nature documentary with The Good Place tv show (i.e., approachable, heartfelt, episodic moral philosophizing), plus a dash of Tiger King and Bear Grylls, all distilled into book form... You might have a pretty good conception of the experience of reading Wild Souls. It framed really difficult ethical questions with fascinating science, loads of facts and figures, and a series of personal vignettes and interesting characters. I read this book over two days straight, and it held my attention the entire time. (I actually listened to the audiobook version while driving and doing house projects, and it very much held my attention despite the multitasking.)

Especially considering how dense, dry, and depressing the material could be (moral philosophy, climate change, species extinction, etc), it's delightful and thought-provoking. Highly recommended!

[Corey Schuck · Rating 4 out of 5]

'De onderlinge verwevenheid van levens waar de milieuactivist in mij zo van houdt, is onopzettelijk ontstaan door evolutie, in een volstrekt amoreel proces dat toevallig een wereld heeft voortgebracht die zo mooi is dat je hart een sprongetje van vreugde maakt. Deze wereld is gebouwd en gevoed doordat materie en energie uit de atmosfeer en uit het zonlicht van het ene organisme naar het andere stromen, in een kringloop van dood en eten en sterven en rotten. Die stroom zelf is al iets waardevols.

De dood zorgt ervoor dat energie doorstroomt en is dus noodzakelijk en waardevol voor de kerntaak van de natuurbescherming: laat de stroom vloeien, houdt de relaties levend, houdt de evolutie gaande.

Voor individuen zorgen is het tegenovergestelde. De essentie van zorg is het sturen van energie en materie naar één lichaam, om het levend te houden. Als ik voor mijn kinderen zorg, voed ik ze met de energie van andere lichamen, van andere levens. Zorg gaat over het samenbundelen van energie en stoffen in geliefde individuen, niet over het in stand houden van de stroom.

Op een fundamenteel lichamelijk niveau is het onmogelijk om voorrang te geven aan de stroom én voorrang te geven aan het individu. Je kunt niet voor alle individuen op aarde tegelijk zorgen, omdat het voeden en in leven houden van de één betekent dat je die weghoudt uit de maag van de ander, die daardoor verhongert. Als wij onszelf benoemen tot de verdelers van alle materie en energie op aarde, nemen wij een last op ons die te kolossaal is om te kunnen begrijpen, laat staan om hem te dragen. We zijn niet waardig en ook niet capabel genoeg om beheerder te zijn van alles op aarde.

Daarin zit de spanning die ik voortdurend probeer op te lossen: tussen mijn respect voor de waarde van het individu en mijn meer mystieke ontzag voor wat ons als dieren verbindt met alle andere levensvormen, een ontzag dat centraal staat in mijn liefde voor de niet-menselijke wereld.

"Elke samenleving die individuele levensvormen hoog in het vaandel heeft staan, zal moeite hebben met de pijnlijke aspecten in het verhaal van de voedselketen." De enige manier om deze twee uitersten op te lossen, is om "de wereld en onszelf tegelijkertijd van twee kanten te bekijken'".'

[Corvus · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

This is gonna be a long one as I have so many thoughts. Emma Marris' Wild Souls is an important exploration of our relationships with the more than human world. I have been looking for a book with this approach for some time. I often find myself divided between texts that examine hierarchy and control of other animals but are often limited more to domestic species or that do not tackle certain ecosystem conflicts in enough detail and other texts of science or journalism where in wild animals are treated as homogeneous categories, disposable when necessary, that humans know best how to control. Marris' decision to focus on ecology and non domesticated species for the most part while also examining anthropocentric control and framing of the natural world puts this book into a niche category that blends various points of reference and analysis.

I found most of this book to be honest and inquisitive about all of the gray areas that go into our relationships with other animals. The sources that Marris draws from are ones that I recognize from all sorts of fields including philosophy, ethics, biology, ecology, and so forth. She spends time speaking with various people and groups including visiting remote indigenous tribes and discussing their relationships with nature and other animals.

One of Marris' central questions is about the value of "nature" and what actually is "natural." It is often taken as fact that what is labeled as natural is best in terms of how humans should interfere in the lives of other animals. Yet, the definition of "natural" is often changed to suit whoever is making the decisions. What is wildness when we've altered things so much that even wild animals depend on or are destroyed by us more than anything else? How fuzzy is the binary between domestication and wildness? When should we intervene in a species adaptation to a threat we caused?

I appreciated her examination of zoos and other entertainment industries in far more honest ways than most folks writing about conservation do. Zoos are businesses with some of the best PR on the planet. I have seen people who are normally caring and cautious be duped by dishonesty and misdirection. Marris discusses how many "conservation" programs began as rebranding of an abusive industry and currently exist to increase captive populations for the purposes of profit making entertainment. Zoos encourage animal ownership as ornaments or forced companions while letting people think such exploitation is helping animals. She acknowledges what some research has shown- that the "education" zoos provide is not most visitors reason for attending nor is it effective enough to outweigh the harmful indoctrination that wild animals belong in zoos and as possessions. If children required zoos to learn and care about a species, dinosaurs would not be so prevalent in their upbringing.

Actual conservationists (some of whom will utilize the resources from zoos) support preserving wild populations while zoos breed them for domestic life and entertainment. The AZA- who many zoo defenders claim is the gold standard for "good" zoos- even used to revoke accreditation to zoos that would send elephants to sanctuary when they were old. They regularly have opposed sanctuaries as they believe they take away breeding populations for zoo attractions. Is it really conservation if it's done to deliberately deprive the individuals of freedom?

Expanding upon this, Marris explores ecology and general environmental concerns about preservation of threatened species. Is the genetic "purity" of a species more important than the survival of individuals who may benefit from hybridizing as an adaptation to human encroachment into their areas? Hybridization is sometimes characterized as a net negative for species "fitness" but this is not always the case. For instance, polar bear and grizzly bears hybridizing may provide an advantage to shifting climate and habitat. Is the treatment of introduced species- often with extreme violence and deplorable suffering for an existence that humans force them into- helpful in the long run? How does that affect humans relationships with other animals and how they see them? When is it defensible to kill one animal to save another? Is it okay to breed and feed rodents to birds of prey and a sanctuary? Is it defensible to kill cats to save native birds? How often are we choosing the easy way out only to find that it is ineffective or less effective than something that takes longer?

Marris does mostly well and discussing some of the ways that oppression ingrained in humanity affect our relationships with other species. For instance anthropocentrism, toxic masculinity, appeal to nature, speciesism (which she does not name but describes,) etc. However there are times where she does contradict herself in the text in frustrating ways. This would have been a five-star book hands down if it weren't for the weird rant she goes on in the middle about hunting, vegans, and animal farming all of which she selectively ignores information about- including in her own book- to shallowly analyze her family. It was as if all of her beliefs and assessments went out the window in order to mimic what the hunters and fishers in her family told her.

It starts off good. She discusses how remote indigenous tribes such as the Matsigenka seek to exist within an ecosystem and how this affects their hunting and views other animals. Indigenous ecosystem management is also an important topic she explores. Colonial "ownership" of land is much easier to corrupt if it isn't corrupt and ineffective from the start and less hierarchical forms of management by those who live within a space are often going to be more effective and respectful. Moving forward to indigenous people who are more integrated into cities and such, she does sometimes fall into tropes that uses the beliefs of some specific indigenous people or tribes to excuse overall anthropocentrism. I assume her intention was to show respect and not push colonial thought, but it's also colonialist to frame all indigenous people as magical Disney princesses that animals consent to lay down their lives for.

This is not to make value judgments about sustainable, and especially subsistence, indigenous hunting. This is again a massively diverse practice that has had a variety of effects and has also changed over time. The introduction of guns among other things has imbalanced ecosystems across the board and accelerated decline of many species hunted by anyone with motor vehicles and weapons. Indigenous people hunting was and is not the same across the tribes nor continents and some tribes have used cruel and wasteful methods. Some practices still today are not considered in line with ecosystem respect nor cultural tradition by other indigenous people. Some indigenous people in climates and habitats that allow for it have chosen more plant based styles of eating, even if their ancestors had not, due to the modern state of farming of other animals and reduced habitat of hunted species. Some indigenous groups, especially in the arctic, must hunt to survive whether one wants to or not. Modern day indigenous folks living in the author's neighborhood and hunting with guns are very different than the Matsigenka people residing in forests who farm crops and do not use guns nor arctic indigenous folks whose closest store charges $50 for a pound of rotting produce. Extinctions have also followed humans pretty much everywhere they migrated to when they first left Africa. People were just trying to survive much of the time with the limited information that they had. We don't need to rewrite that impossibly difficult struggle for it to be real and culture to be important. Some of these things are discussed near the end of the book which is another reason this weird section doesn't fit. Most importantly, all of these groups are very different from the author and her family and that's where this diversion gets most frustrating.

Marris portrays herself and her family's hunting as in opposition to the horrors of animal agriculture- as if she and those who hunt are all vegan outside of hunting, something I've only encountered in one single primitivist in decades of taking to people and reading hunters' words. More annoyingly, Marris then goes into the ways that she respects vegans soooooooo much for various reasons, but then details extremely ignorant taking points on the speciesism bingo card as if they counteract the positives: Vegans also kill things! Crop deaths! Forced veganism! All of course wrapped up in a ribbon of indigenous tokenization.

She does not mention that said hunting caused countless extinctions and loss of biodiversity, including leaving only 200 white tail deer left at one point. Only with extreme taxing and regulation were SOME of the many species destroyed by hunting brought back. Deer are now imbalanced in the other direction by urbanization, habitat loss, feeding/baiting, and HUNTING of their predators as well as humans choosing to kill the biggest trophies of their species leading to evolution in reverse. She does not talk about how most of the agriculture of plants, and thus crop deaths, exist to feed farmed animals to be slaughtered for meat eaters. She does not talk about how animal agribusiness is one of the top things that pushes indigenous people off of their land, disrupts their hunting practices, and turns many into climate refugees. She does not talk about how settlers bringing over farmed animals to the Americas was one of the biggest causes of disease that wiped out massive amounts of indigenous people. All of the previous discussion about lead ammo wiping out vultures doesn't make a single appearance in discussion of her family's hunting and eating of animals. She of course did not mention that if everyone stopped consuming farmed meat today and hunted instead that the entire wild world would cease to exist in about a day or two if it even lasted that long. She portrayed her husband and the rest of her family as making balanced pacts with nature.

Refusing to properly confront many humans' reliance on excessive amounts of animal killing and consumption was a major flaw that really let me down. It made it hard for me to focus on the rest of the book because up until this point she had broken with the party line of a simplistic way of looking at a relationship to other animals based entirely on extraction and anthropocentrism. THAT SAID, to be fair, the amount of text I have spent ranting about this was a choice I made in part to include information and links I wish had been in the book. The actual section is a rather small part of the entire text. If you are like me and find yourself angry with this section, I do encourage you to move forward and read the rest. She returns to the grounded explorations of our interactions with the greater than human world eventually.

I appreciated her discussions about island ecosystems and the slaughter of introduced species. In terms of dealing with species conflicts, Marris covers many practices that were familiar to me but others that were enlightening. She offers a heinous account of rat poisoning acknowledging the severe suffering as well as how many other animals, including threatened and endangered ones, are poisoned by it. On the other side of the coin, it was exciting to read about long-term plans to train native species to adapt to introduced species that were threats to them. The idea of helping to create a set of knowledge that they then pass on to future generations is one I can definitely get behind. However long-term results are very hard for people to accept, especially if success may not be seen until after we die and the next generation takes over. I really liked the way she juxtaposed the problematic culling, including celebratory killing contests and blame campaigns, of human-introduced species with other perspectives and effective ways of solving problems. Rather than attempting to return nature to a previous state- something completely impossible- there are efforts to help nature adapt, some more invasive than others and none perfect. I learned a lot here that I had not heard about before.

Marris does well to use these sections to tie things back into discussion of hybridization as being an adaptation that may be important for survival and how adherence to false ideas of genetic purity should not be seen as correct by default. She also does finally discuss extinctions of species caused by the arrival of indigenous humans and then exponentially worsened by colonialism that lead to a cascade of extinctions and irreparable ecosystem destruction- finally combating the one sided way she discussed hunting and fishing previously.

Marris does not claim to have all of the answers and I appreciate that, as much as I wish that we had them. She and I can agree on the one bit if advice she does choose to give: "Make room for other species and fight for climate justice."

Despite the nonsensical hunting vs veganism rant, out of place and in conflict with the rest of the book, I count this book as one of my favorites examining humans' intervention in the lives of other species. I enjoyed the complex discussions and the reality that there are no perfect answers much of the time- Just less harmful ones.

This was also posted to my storygraph. and blog.

[Ben Goldfarb · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was honored to be a blurber for this book. Here's what I wrote: "In this relentless masterpiece of environmental philosophy, Emma Marris interrogates every truism, cross-examines every claim, and subverts every shibboleth of modern conservation. Wild Souls brings razor-sharp reasoning and unflinching moral clarity to a field that occasionally suffers from fuzzy logic. This is a book meant to be argued with, in the best possible sense."

[Laurence Faveere · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enkele boeiende (hoofd)stukken met veel stof tot nadenken 💭 Soms wel heeeel veel namen van wetenschappers die wat onnodig worden vermeld 🙃

“Alleen al het feit dat het leven uit lijden bestaat, schept de noodzaak voor empathie”

Laatste hoofdstuk als een mooi einde 👏🏻
“We komen voort uit het leven en wij zijn het doorvoerkanaal naar ander leven”

[Cassie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wild Souls is a deep dive into the ethics of human-wildlife interrelationships. Much of this is familiar ground for me, covered in less detail (but more humor) in Noah’s Choice, by Charles Mann and my late husband, Mark Plummer. Marris speaks to the next generation, covering the scientific complexities and moral dilemmas presented by a booming human population dominating a finite planet.

[Megan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really interesting read, especially for a wild animal lover. The book was a bit more philosophical than I was expecting, which normally wouldn't be my thing, but even I enjoyed the discussions on wildness concerning condors and wolves. I will say it had me thinking about "wildness" and conservation in a different way, even if it didn't point toward straight forward answers.

[Anneloes V · Rating 5 out of 5]

Most definitely my favorite read of 2022

[Roshini · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful, thought-provoking book. This is the first time I’m reading a book that talks about the philosophy and ethics of conservation and ecology. It brought up some fascinating questions, and the case studies really got me to step away from my own understanding of many of the issues surrounding conservation. What counts as “the wild” in a world that is so impacted by the actions of human beings? We are Nature, so how can we separate ourselves from Her? Some of the best books are those that make you uncomfortable, and this definitely raised questions that caused discomfort. Would definitely recommend.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Conservation is complicated and this quote will stay with me "Our wilderness are just places where colonialism left the trees standing." Also I really want to visit the South Pacific.

[Estevon · Rating 1 out of 5]

Go read Braiding Sweetgrass!

TLDR: Author struggles for the first time with the role of humans in nature. Succeeds only in taking a crap on conservationists unfortunate enough to be in their way.

I struggled for a while with whether I should give Wild Souls a one star or two. I usually give poor books a three star review and chock up most of my dissatisfaction to something I was missing or a mood that I just could not get behind. But, I was surprised by how many times I would find myself shouting out loud in exasperation while listening to this book. What's more, I actually agree with MANY of the points addressed, such as the defrauded lives of zoo animals, and the penchant of people to treat pets as commodities rather than thinking/feeling beings. But the book read like the author was actively working through the problems for themselves and the conclusion was a giant chapter-long shrug. They tried to frame many of the points as if through the lens of western philosophy (maybe to get some sort of cache with the reader?), but really only succeeds in slapping down some lame quotes from widely recognized people (eg Aristotle, Kant, Wittgenstein) with the fervor of a college Sophomore. To maintain the high-brow approach many points are taken in a strained, neutral tone that leaves loopholes big enough to sail an oil tanker through. The phrase that kept coming to mind was "Ecological Nihilism." The hill they kept coming back to die on was whether we had the right to kill rats that were introduced to islands. The apparent reasoning being Humans = Nature, therefore everything we do is "Natural." "Don't worry, the island ecosystem will sort itself out in a few millennia!" (WTF?! Where was the editor?) And rats are beings just as worthy of living as we are, so we have no right to kill them... Except you're dooming entire ecosystems to extinction and the future generations of the rats to starvation due to your unwillingness to cope with the past mistakes of humans?
The number of times where topics such as "cornerstone species" should have been addressed and wasn't was enraging. Clearly, the author wasn't listening to the conservationists interviewed about rat control or simply chose to ignore them "for the purity of philosophy!" Simply, some species provide something of value to MANY others in an ecosystem and losing that ONE species would mean destabilizing the entire ecosystem.
Extinction was, thankfully, mentioned but was often just sidelined as something unfortunate that happens. Sure, more species have gone extinct than have existed in the time of humans, but maybe they should have taken a beat to sort out that galaxy-brain thought before using it to counter the need to stop extinctions now. I'm sure many readers will put more emphasis on the parts mourning the loss than those countering but not everyone will. (This is another part where an editor would have been nice.) Many readers will see that and go, "ok so this is normal and environmentalists are just being overly sensitive sissies."
I only read this book because a copy became available on Libby before the book I really meant to read: Braiding Sweetgrass. I ended up reading that book in it's entirety after Wild Souls as a cleansing chaser to the mess that was this book. That book is everything that Wild Souls isn't (ironically, it quoted Braiding Sweetgrass). Braiding Sweetgrass is not afraid to lay out its opinion. Braiding sweetgrass is written by a scientist. Braiding Sweetgrass understands that death is a part of life. Braiding Sweetgrass is willing to address the past misdeeds of humans.

If you're in the mood for nature content, go read Braiding Sweetgrass

[Cheryl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another thought provoking read that really opens the debate on the sentience of non human animals in a non judgmental way from a biological and philosophical viewpoint. Some of the ideas I have read before, but the compilation was most compelling. I think I knew that wolves and domestic dogs can breed and produce fertile offspring, but what do we do with the offspring that are hybrid? The author tells a story of a Washington state pet who decided to be a wolf for a month or so and mated with a wild wolf, and authorities ended up aborting/sterilizing the pregnant dog so they didn’t have to decide. But it shows the dilemma.

When you hear that rats have a joyful chirp/laugh, how do you feel? How do you feel when you learn it is too high for humans to hear? These thought experiments include the plight of polar bears, who are starving due to global warming but who are not in immediate danger of extinction, but a reduction in numbers is hiding the “starving bears, dying cubs, and sadness and pain for thousands of bears.” Do you think of nature taking it course as the right way (laissez-faire intuition) and we harm wild animals every day by building a new housing development, for example; or do you think we have some responsibility to try to alleviate the pain and suffering we have caused, called collective responsibility?

Looking at an activist in the Galapagos trying to rid it of introduced pests, the author talks about domestic cats killing 4 billion birds and 22.3 billion mammals every year in the US, but has not caused extinctions; on islands, cats have been a factor in 63 extinctions in Australia or islands. The activist has had tremendous success at dire costs in ridding islands from the PNW to Polynesia, but the collateral damage is acceptable depending on who you ask. If asked, what do you say? Domestic animals, cattle, pets, birds, etc. can be caught by the same poison.

Aldo Leopold founded the field of environmental ethics posthumously, the idea that species- and the ecosystems they live in- are valuable in and of themselves. Leopold sent much of his career managing wildlife, and in his essay, Thinking Like a Mountain, he explained the role of wolves in keeping the populations of deer down so they don’t overgraze; his experience of killing wolves to save deer, to create a hunter’s paradise, resulted in wolf-less landscapes grazed so heavily, all the food gone, the numerous deer would run out of food…Biological evolution has endowed us with a basic tendency to cooperate with one another. A completely selfish “war of every man against every man”- the state of nature described by Thomas Hobbes as “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”- never existed. As cultural evolution has built on what biology provided us with , the circle of moral consideration has expanded to cover larger and larger groups of pole. Today-in theory, anyway- pretty much everyone agrees that all human lives are valuable. Leopold called for us to enlarge our sense of who or what is part of our “community” and therefore morally valuable even further, to include animals, plants, and the land…that they have “a right to continued existence and in their natural state.”

Animals definitely feel emotions…as “evolutionary skills” that help a wide range of species navigate the complex problems in everyday life. The brain areas associated with emotions are evolutionary ancient and present in nearly all mammals. The idea of emotions as “skills” was somewhat revelatory to me as emotions are so common in animals that they are almost certainly adaptive.
Joy is old. Our close kin, the apes, laugh when they are tickled and at play. Wolves play and frolic when young, though they become more serious as adults. Dogs are peter pan canines, never growing up, playing for their whole lives. Baby rats play and laugh and like to be tickled. Rat laughter is a chirp so high-pitched that humans can’t hear it. Fear and sadness are widespread as well, alas, nestled into the brain right next to the systems for physical pain. Bird and mammal babies commonly make little distress calls if left alone too long. There’s no reason to believe that they do not feel psychological pain when they make distress calls, just as we do when we are lonely and scared…

Animals also arguably make art. The male bowerbirds of New Guinea and Australia dedicate huge fractions of their time and energy to creating elaborate structures from twigs, flowers, berries, beetle wings and even colorful trash. They are the backdrops to their complex mating dances…they aren’t stereotyped like a beehive or hummingbird nest. Each one is different. Many researchers think these displays are used by the females to gauge the cognitive abilities of her potential mates, but Darwin thought she was actually attracted to their beauty.

Moral particularism is a school of thought that holds that most moral people aren’t “principled.” Rather than living by maxims or rules or commandments, the most moral way to act is to pay careful attention to all the features of a particular case, develop defensible reasons for acting in a certain way, and then act. Your reasons do not have to be applied consistently from case to case, nor do you have to involve appeals to overarching moral principles. This approach leaves lots of room for context, relationships, and feelings to matter. Gruen suggests that our moral decision making should emerge from our “entangled empathy” with animals. She defines it as a “type of caring perception focused on attending to another’s experience of well being, involving an experiential blend of emotion and cognition.” The idea that this approach is “feminine” as opposed to more accepted “masculine” principle-based views of the past is unfortunate since it “further entrenches stereotypical gender roles and seems to preclude the idea that men are caring.”

It is almost as if each species has a set value, which is divided among all the individuals. Say there are 4 billion black rats on Earth. Let’s set the arbitrary value at each species at 100,000 value points. Under this math each rat would be 0.000025 apiece and each condor would be worth 200. And this valuation matches how we treat them. The rat is despised, shunned, killed without a thought; the condor is cherished, lavished with care and money. Animal rights thinker Tom Regan: “The inherent value and rights of individuals do not wax or wane depending how plentiful or how rare are the species to which they belong. Beaver are not less valuable because they are more plentiful than bison.”

I think both allowing hybridization with grizzly bears to sustain them and feeding polar bears could be ethically acceptable, if done right. A key criterion would be approval and participation of indigenous groups...and it be temporary, although it could be as long as 1,000 years. I kept imagining a day, in some future era, long after we are dad, in which climate change has not just been halted, but has been successfully reversed. The sea ice is back, and the seal hunting is good. After generations of complete dependence of the feeding stations, scientist have helped the polar bears in certain populations relearn hunting skills, they are relying less and less on the supplemental food, and the decision is made to shut the program down at long last. The humans feel good they got these bears thought the hot bottleneck period… A goodbye ceremony is performed. Local people come out with their kids; there’s cake and punch. They open the gates and gently shoo the bears away.

[Roxanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very good book about protecting wild animals and preserving their environment. It explores a animals wildness but also when is right to capture them to help their species survive. At the zoo near me a miracle baby rhino was born but the father rhino had died. This is a tricky subject because so many animals are poached or hunted until extinction so to me saving them is important.

[Yanick Punter · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was good. I agree with Emma that we should abandon some values. These are naturalness, wilderness, ecological and genetic integrity, and purity in general.

I have other values in mind, which includes: speciation, well-being, spontanity (uncertainty), autonomy (no control or completion), antifragility, resilience or robustness,  biodiversity, biomass (densities) the flourishing of evolutionary distinct species, ecological creativity, spatial diversity (disorder) and the filling and creation of niches.

[Dayton Martindale · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best books I've read in years--even where I disagree with conclusions, her process for sorting through morally complex issues regarding animals, species, and ecosystems feels spot on. Feels like a necessary push to rethink how the conservation world approaches its work.

Listen to my interview with Emma Marris here:
https://shows.acast.com/storytelling-...
or:
https://open.spotify.com/episode/35AQ...

[Richard Thompson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finding the best philosophical stance toward animals is complicated because almost every choice is filled with contradictions. It's not enough to be an animal lover if that means that you want to smother animals with love and impose a human idea of a good life on them. And what about the conservationists who participate in campaigns to kill large numbers of animals because they are deemed to be invasive? Is it right to sacrifice a thousand lives of a common species to save one life from an endangered one? How can we have protection of the environment as a value when every environment constantly evolves so trying to turn back the clock may not only be impossible but may actually do more harm than good? And how can we favor an idea of wilderness when every square inch of the planet already bears the imprint of humanity in some way? The best answer in this book seems to be to approach animals with an attitude of respect learned from North American indigeous people. We should see humans as part of a bigger web of nature, even when they are living in steel and concrete cities. Don't expect wild animals to be kind or fair. Allow hunting but limit it and practice it in a way that respects the lives that are taken. Even this perspective leads to some contradictions, so there doesn't seem to be any perfect answer, but Ms. Marris is asking the right questions, and even if she hasn't discovered any final right answers, she at least points in some directions that feel more moral and better for everyone in the long run than some others that may have been well-intended but that have consequences that can be clearly seen as being too negative when carefully considered.

[Jack · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have been vegan for over 12 years and also consider myself to be an environmentalist. Prior to reading this book, I was generally of the opinion that humans meddle far too much into the "natural" world. I felt that we are far too ignorant and full of hubris if we think that we know what is best for the environment and how we can make things better. It seems ridiculous to me that we think we can calculate or forsee how changes we purposely introduce would impact the entire ecology. That's how my gut feeling went at least, but I was interested to be able to defend this opinion my intelligently other than saying, that's just what my gut reaction is.

This book doesn't give a great answer that says humans should always do X or shouldn't ever do Y. It was a bit disappointing, but everything is complex like our planet, and it's not always so clear cut. Not to say that this book was not worth the read however. At the conclusion of the book Emma Marris does list things that Marris believes is either good or bad. There are some controversial things on the list that after reading this book, I agree with. For example, keeping things in a state that we view as "natural" is not only not ideal but not accurate. What we view as "natural" is generally the state before colonialism and therefore, managed by indigenous people (even though we don't want indigenous people in protected lands). We also value hereditary purity, especially in endangered animals. "Hybrids" generally have better survival rates and are stronger and better adapt to respond to climate change, so it's not really for the animals' or species' benefit, it's for our own. Frequently we merely prefer things to be "natural" or "pure" even though the animals or species would be better off if things weren't so.

Another point made by the author is the definition of "natural" generally being not touched by mankind. Not only is this not a desirable thing to maintain just for that reason, but also impossible. Humans have impacted the planet so completely with even just climate change not even considering resource and land overuse. Humans are a part of nature, despite us being a plague.

Some other interesting things to consider is whether an endangered animal is more valuable than one that isn't and how do you calculate that value? Is it worth it to torture and kill animals that are plentiful to save some animals of a species that are critically endangered? How about a species that is just mildly endangered? Is it alright to inflict a slow and painful death on a million individuals to save a couple of individuals that are part of a critically endangered species?

Before reading this book, I didn't realize that the topic of environmentalism (without explicitly including animals) would be so prevalent and was definitely delighted by these discussions.

At the beginning of the book the author states that she wouldn't be discussing vegetarianism, but of course, it came up during the book and was definitely a topic that I paid close attention to. Marris does state when the topic comes up that going vegetarian/vegan is better for the environment and one of the best things you can individually do to help the environment. Marris repeats that eating less meat is great for the environment during the outro of the book as well. However, then she downplays the benefits of going vegetarian by making ridiculous claims. She reasons that humans use too much land to grow food for people to eat. While this is true, and there are definitely too many people on the planet causing there to be too much land used for growing food for us... it downplays how much more land and resources are used to grow food for animals used for meat. It is MUCH more efficient to use the land and resources for humans to eat directly compared to raising animals for meat. Even if we ignore that meat comes from a sentient being who does not want to die, experience pain or have their life ended prematurely so that we can satisfy a taste preference.

Marris also could be hypocritical as she states that she has had meat that was previously roadkill, that was hunted by family members, that was fished from the wild. While this definitely has less of an impact on the environment than factory farms, Marris seems to be careful in being sure to not say that this is the only kind of meat that she eats, by just saying that she "has had" this type of food before.

One of the strongest arguments Marris makes against "universal veganism" is that it would trample on the rights and culture of indigenous peoples who have animals deeply embedded in their culture and would be forcing a Western form of veganism on these people. I would argue that meat is deeply embedded in the lives of many others, including Americans. From 4th of July cookouts to cultural dishes (sorry, struggling to come up with better examples as a vegan). Granted, I think religion/spirituality might be a better definition than "culture", but if we look at that... It's also saying that we shouldn't force our "Western" ideals and morality on religions that treat women like property and allow men to even kill their wives without punishment. We also shouldn't interfere that religions or spirituality that go to war and kill each other based on their religions or race.

This section was definitely distracting, at best, and did make it much harder to hear and accept the rest of Marris's points. If nothing else, definitely made me more critical and objectionable.

This was a book that I was continuously thinking about and considering the different views and points considered. I was quoting and discussing with my wife as well quite often. This was a book that I probably wish I had suggested to be read in a book club I take part of just to stimulate for conversation and have others to talk more about this book with. If it wasn't for the vegetarian/vegan rant, I probably would have given this book a 5 rating.

[Daniel Hageman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Probably the first 'mainstream' book I've come across that takes seriously the genuine interests of wild animals, from an individual animal POV rather than that of a species. I think that Marris could have taken a stronger stance based on where many of her arguments were leading her, and for the life of me I couldn't believe that she was continually referring to Peter Singer as a preference utilitarian (I don't think she mentions hedonism by name, ever, which Singer has subscribed to for at least 10-20 years if I'm not mistaken). Nonetheless, it's great to hear her think aloud regarding such a serious cause area, and I loved that she mentions effective altruism, albeit with some oversimplified interpretations of said general community.

[Elizabeth Fiala · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book about the ethical considerations surrounding conservation and animal welfare, so needless to say it's not always an easy read. It provides multiple perspectives and different ethical stances, but ultimately ends without one clear answer--which was fine with me, as no one solution or ideology is going to solve all the world's ills. There's a lot to chew on here that had my brain buzzing, but I was left feeling that, above all, the author's parting thought--that we should be humble and share our space with non-humans--is a good philosophy to walk away with.

[Luke · Rating 5 out of 5]

Expanding the author's prior investigation into "wild" (airquoted throughout) space and rejecting the line between human and nature, she philosophically and environmentally unpacks what obligations we have to animals and species - in her view, mistaken valuing of "naturalness" and "species genetic purity" (reflecting colonial inflected categorization) rather than autonomy and ecosystem diversity - through location reporting on zoos and conservation projects, eradication campaigns and captive breeding. Well summed up in the suggestion that rather than de-extincting woolly mammoths, we coexist with nature in new ways such that we can imagine elephants able to migrate over the next ten thousand years to occupy places where they would adapt with hairy coats.

[Nicolas B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Probably everyone would agree that animals are sentient beings and that we, humans, have an impact on their living and suffering. “Wild Souls” is not about our everyday companions, such as cats and dogs, living with us in our comfy houses. It’s about wild animals, or at least what we think are wild animals. Because hardly is there any place on earth untouched directly or indirectly by us in the modern world. It can be easy to make us aware about our impact on wild animals and we can feel an urgent need for action – the polar and panda bear are probably the most iconic examples in case. Our wish to help these animals is often noble and selfish at the same time. We are not devoting the same resources to all endangered animals. We are extremely subjective about which animals we deem special enough to do almost whatever it takes to preserve them, even if it means killing other sentient animals along the way. “Wild Souls” is not dropping the moral hammer on us for our hypocrisy. It rather asks us to reflect our past decisions and show humility with our future ones. We should be aware of our subjectivity, limited resources, and potential adverse effects of saving one animal over another. We should consider that environments are naturally unstable and entire species can vanish without our contribution. We should ponder if it is really a noble effort to preserve animals just for their rarity or genetic purity. But for all our efforts to rectify our influence on wild animals in the modern world, we should not loose sight of our primary goal to let wild animals be free and flourish. Here, “Wild Souls” took a long but lively detour before arriving back at its title: freedom and flourish means that we should create an environment where wild animals can make their own decisions and live their lives as undisturbed as possible. To make this happen may sometimes require human intervention, e.g. to help animals adapt to a new environment following the human-caused introduction of new species or human-made climate change. However, we should show humility in our decisions to intervene because their impact may be unpredictable or unworthy.

[kulisap · Rating 5 out of 5]

this is one of the most thought-provoking and perceptive books i have ever read. what a privilege to have been able to read this. i can feel this will stay with me for a long time and guide me in how i approach conservation and nature in the future.

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[Kent Pierce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best book I have read all year. If you plan on getting into the fields of conservation, land management, ecology, biology, or any other environmental field this is a must read book. Life is death is life.

[Emily · Rating 5 out of 5]

i am so thankful that i found this book and decided to read it ❤️ what a beautiful journey

[Steve Sargent · Rating 5 out of 5]

More philosophical than I understood going into the book, but nevertheless, an important and beautiful read, expanding understandings of wilderness and creature-ness.

[Liew Jia Qi · Rating 5 out of 5]

10 stars!! Thoughtful research and writing about the moral dilemma of being human in the natural world.