Berkeley Undergraduate Journal

The scientific community agrees that we are in the midst of a mass extinction event caused by human impacts on the environment. Amidst this alarming loss in biodiversity, conservation biology has emerged as the authoritative body of knowledge by which we come to understand mass extinction and what can be done to prevent it. Using evidence from a case study of scientific research done by conservation biologists on amphibian declines and extinctions, this paper argues that conservation biology exists in the tension between an extension and a subversion of a post-Enlightenment scientific rationality. Part I of this paper supports the claim that conservation biology is an extension of post-Enlightenment rationality that positions the conservation biologist as an agent in the continued mastery and control of nature. Part II of this paper supports a counter-narrative that conservation biology is a subversion of post-Enlightenment scientific rationality that instead positions the conservation biologist as a partner with and advocate for nature.