So arguing that species of animals or plants have an intrinsic value and are worth preserving for their own sake is wrong? Or does it have to be couched in their value to humans, maintaining the biosphere that feeds us, air filtration, medicine, or aesthetic value or things like that? Does that apply to other people too? Intrinsic worth vs utility?
I don't think I can agree that we can't have any say about what is good for nature. A lot of people devote their whole lives to identifying systems and patterns in the species around us. They can track numbers, identify habitats, tell when something is thriving, declining, and, with some confidence, gone. Often they can identify why. All the fields of scientific study aside, it's pretty easy at least to identify things we do that are bad for other species. If I buy hundreds of gallons of herbicide and douse some land with it, I don't think the outcome to nature is going to be unknowable, and I think it'd be hard to argue it'll be beneficial. Seems like the inverse must be true - we can identify crucial habitats and protect them, identify the characteristics of good habitats and cultivate them on damaged lands to bring them back. This is testable stuff that's already being done in real life. People devote their lives to conserving habitats.
Sorry if I'm getting side tracked because this is something I'm somewhat involved in. Maybe this is a specific point about a nuance of philosophical discussions I don't know enough about, and not an argument that humans can do whatever they want to their surroundings because the consequences are somehow unknowable or unimportant.