My general views on this are a matter of detailed record here and in several publications, all available at http://asu.academia.edu/MattChew . (By the way, views of all my papers there now total over 3,200 – with 'The Rise and Fall of Biotic Nativeness' alone at nearly 2000 – thanks again!)
Nobody has yet published evidence to support the idea that native - alien - invasive - invasible and their ilk are actually ecological conceptions, much less characteristics of species or populations or communities. That is why, as Moles, et al 2012 (doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2745.2011.01915.x) pointed out, invasion biology's (or invasion ecology's, if you prefer) results continue to be "idiosyncratic". We very practically prefer predictability to unpredictability and stability to change—particularly to unforeseen or unintended change. Sometimes it's a matter of psychological comfort, nostalgia, regret, a sense of fairness or justice or powerlessness… and sometimes it's a matter of survival. But wanting things to be other than they are, even to the extent of organizing a majority opinion or a putative consensus on the matter, doesn't automatically mean we've agreed on the right idea. It certainly doesn't confer the ability to make any particular desired future happen. Nor does it make our intended ecological outcomes better than the unintended ones. As usual, what CAN happen IS happening, whether we like it or not. The history of biology is characterized by defaults to normative vitalistic and teleological arguments that aren't susceptible to empirical evaluation or demonstration. Ecology is still loaded with them. Even the 'more is better' and 'different is better' commitments of biodiversity-based conservation philosophy are no better grounded in reality than preformationism, evolution via striving for perfection or deterministic succession to climax communities. We haven't come much closer to 'truth' than Charles Lyell did in 1832, when he wrote (in the idiom of the day): "We may regard the involuntary agency of man as strictly analogous to that of the inferior animals. Like them we unconsciously contribute to extend or limit the geographical range and numbers of certain species, in obedience to general rules in the economy of nature, which are for the most part beyond our control.” I hope to see you in Portland at Symposium 22, "Conservation In a Globalizing World"; Session ID 7614, Friday, August 10, 2012, 8:00 AM - 11:30 AM Matthew K Chew Assistant Research Professor Arizona State University School of Life Sciences
