Laudator Temporis Acti

Raymond B. Cowles (1896-1971), Desert Journal (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977), p. 119:

Since those early experiments the ecological role of the predator as a necessary sanitizing agent has become well known. The capture and quick removal of abnormal individuals within a group of gregarious animals aid in the prevention of the spread of disease, either from illness or infected wounds that could introduce sepsis into scratches on their neighbors. Another plus is the removal from the breeding stock of individuals with obvious genetic impairments. In other words, with the defective phenotypes eliminated, they will not breed and multiply and thus burden their own kind. I believe that no exceptions have been found to the role of predation as a useful influence for the good of the group and successive generations, no matter how harsh it may be to the one removed. To our sentiments of sympathy, even this role of a predator seems brutal and emotionally hard to accept. It is but one example, however, of the fact that the group, and this includes not only the present, but innumerable future members, is far more important than the welfare or security of any single transient individual. This may seem like the antithesis of our present philosophy of the "sanctity of life" and the "dignity and rights of the individual"—and it is.