Swamps are entirely different from deserts. Swamps aren't welcoming to humans, deserts aren't welcoming to life in general. In addition a huge portion of today's deserts did not exist in recent prehistory. They also act as the opposite of a carbon sink. There is really no good reason to preserve a desert, other than "I want the fennec foxes and sidewinders to live"
If this was an example of restoring an ecosystem to the way it was before humans affected it I think that is quite an incredible feat. Altering what few natural ecosystems are left on Earth seems like a bad idea to me though.
It's impossible to say because nature is an infinitely dimensional system, but going by what scientists know:
pros: greenification has massive benefits for biodiversity, biomass, and carbon reduction via tree cover
cons: fennec foxes may go extinct
obviously it will probably have some unpredictable effects on the environment, but that goes for everything. The point is that the benefits are absolutely massive, and also the system is self-regulating (it's very hard to green the desert, it's not like introducing an invasive species)
Swamps are entirely different from deserts. Swamps aren't welcoming to humans, deserts aren't welcoming to life in general. In addition a huge portion of today's deserts did not exist in recent prehistory. They also act as the opposite of a carbon sink. There is really no good reason to preserve a desert, other than "I want the fennec foxes and sidewinders to live"
If this was an example of restoring an ecosystem to the way it was before humans affected it I think that is quite an incredible feat. Altering what few natural ecosystems are left on Earth seems like a bad idea to me though.
Thanks for the informative reply.
Is there any benefit to having some desert areas or would the world (minus fennec foxes) be better off if all of the desert became a different biome?
It's impossible to say because nature is an infinitely dimensional system, but going by what scientists know:
pros: greenification has massive benefits for biodiversity, biomass, and carbon reduction via tree cover
cons: fennec foxes may go extinct
obviously it will probably have some unpredictable effects on the environment, but that goes for everything. The point is that the benefits are absolutely massive, and also the system is self-regulating (it's very hard to green the desert, it's not like introducing an invasive species)