For the billions of years during which life on earth has existed, individual species have been continuously disappearing Existing species or entirely new ones soon take their place. But there is enormous creativity and complexity emerging from the ceaseless struggle - you only have to find out a little about a coral reef, a mangrove swamp or an ancient European woodland to understand this. A genuine ecologist will tell you that ecosystems are in constant flux rather than balance. While species can have extraordinarily complex and co-operative relationships, for the most part their interactions are utterly ruthless and consist of eating or being eaten.Nature seems very careless with its own.

We continue to find new uses for species or chemicals within them - why damn this stream by wiping them out?But for me, all the best arguments are moral and aesthetic ones. Many greens talk about the billions of species on earth living in harmony in the great web of life, and the planetary dangers of upsetting a fragile balance. This is actually unscientific bunkum; the Lion King view of nature. If you are an atheist, you can argue that we have a powerful self-interest in slowing the great wave of man- made extinctions now gathering pace all over the world. You would say that we have discovered thousands of useful products such as drugs and food additives in wild species, and, of course, all our farm animals and crops come from the wild. Why bother? It is a fair question: today the Government publishes plans to conserve the diversity of Britain's plants and animal species.

Most of us can feel quite passionate about the harm that humanity's persecution or recklessness has done to the charismatic otter, red squirrel or golden eagle. But who, beyond a few dozen specialists in museums and university biology departments, really cares about the hundreds of small, utterly obscure plant and animal species in Britain which are declining or are endangered because of our activities? Why should we make sacrifices or spend money on their behalf? If you believe in a divine Creation, then answers are easy We have no right to wipe out what God made. One of Britain's rarest fungi is found only in the dung of New Forest ponies. Several colleagues greeted this information with derision when my little article about plans to conserve this species, the nail fungus, appeared in Monday's Independent. The best guess is that big audiences will still gather around high-quality programmes, and the BBC will still be the sheet anchor guaranteeing the uniquely high-quality of British television.This long hot summer of "sizzling sport" will stand as a reminder of why we need digital broadcasting - freed from the hegemony of the programme controller for ever.. And with that they satisfied themselves that the future of British broadcasting was safe. Phew!The significance of the imminent digital revolution is largely passing our legislators unheeded.

Some commentators fear wall-to-wall rubbish, others celebrate the prospect of the best always on offer. Some worry if any one station can assemble enough viewers to fund good programmes. Was is it to insert stronger guarantees of quality, to deter a world of 500 stations of trash or to ensure that all domestic satellite services be obliged to carry the BBC as well? No. The only thing that really ignited public debate was sport - again. The Lords said that the "Crown Jewels" of television should be preserved for terrestrial channels for ever What did they regard as sacrosanct? Eight sporting events. We are no longer the same people who sat down together as a nation obediently watching Sunday Night at the London Palladium - and lumping it.During the passing of the Broadcasting Bill which lays out the legal framework for this extraordinary new digital world, the Lords rebelled.