Some large mammals are near extinction because of bad science - people believe that eating some of their parts enhances their sex life. While there is no evidence supporting that belief, there is neither any supporting the contrary.

Suppose there were evidence that grinded rhino horn actually harms your reproductive fitness as well as the joy of trying it? Wouldn't the WWF and other organizations gladly advertise this result?

It should not be too much of a problem to design a study which leads to exactly that result - at least in the executive summary. For example, don't make it a double-blind study but tell the participants how the drug which they test was produced - that's enough for killing any lust in most males. Publish the result anywhere and start a campaign which soon will go viral and reach even the most dumbfucking aged chinese millionaires. Rhinos saved, problem solved, next please.
-- Toto Anders, Dec 17 2014

Fight_20poaching_20with_20superstition [pocmloc, Dec 17 2014]

Sadly, if people are prepared to do things on the basis of no evidence, they have shown that they entirely reject an evidence-based approach. This rejection of the importance of evidence means that presenting them with negative evidence (or even positive evidence) will not change their conviction. What might be more effective is an evidence-free approach. For example, someone they trust (a religious or cultural figure) might say that the ghosts of their ancestors came to them in a dream and said they'd been getting it wrong all this time - it's not rhino horn you take for virility, it's seagull droppings.
-- hippo, Dec 17 2014


// they have shown that they entirely reject an evidence-based approach //

Not so. They believe in myths and legends which for them constitute evidence. We just have to tell a better story.

// The simple solution would be to infiltrate organisations //

Regarding the count of dead rangers in and around wildlife refuges I doubt the use of the word "simple".
-- Toto Anders, Dec 17 2014


To compromise science will do more harm than good. Anti- intellectuals are doing well enough without any actual ammunition.
-- Voice, Dec 17 2014


We have done this before.
-- pocmloc, Dec 17 2014


From the link, //Release a study showing that rino horn causes your wang to fall off. Fire up the photoshop and release pictures, fake inverviews and case histories etc.//
— doctorremulac3, Aug 23 2014
-- pocmloc, Dec 17 2014



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