Does my careful capture of a beetle, which I carry outside and set free to find its fate there, cancel out my hanging up of flypaper which binds and thus kills dozens of gnats? Am I guilty of fractional insect-cide if I wave my hands near tiny flies that are resting on the wall, so that they take off and then are likelier to land by chance on the flypaper? If I cover or put away food, so the little bugs can't eat it and then starve, how much does that count as killing them?

(cf. BitsOfConsciousness (21 Jan 2000), BabySquirrel (6 Nov 2002), ...)

TopicLife - 2007-02-10

(correlates: SlipAway, MetaForestry, AirFlow, ...)