...for it. My point is that often times people get locked into one point of view that they miss all other possibilities. It could be narrow like you said but since we're having to analyze very inconclusive data it's hard to say. Often times a 5% change can have a huge impact overall. Case in point, in the early 1900's (1916 iirc) someone decided it would be a good thing to trap and kill all the gray wolves in Yellowstone so that the Elk could thrive. Soon after the Elk population exploded, ate all the new growth of trees and killed much of the old growth of trees by eating the bark.

The lack of trees caused erosion problems with waterways and impacted the beaver population and threw them into serious decline which then reduced the number of marshy wetland areas that moose, martens etc thrived in.

The lack of wolves allowed coyotes to flourish, who in their turn, naturally suppress antelopes, small deer and foxes, who eat ground nesting birds, rodents, etc. Those changes (fewer foxes = more birds and rodents) affected how often certain roots, buds, seeds and insects got eaten, which altered the balance of local plant communities, and so on down the food chain all the way to fungi and microbes.

Now that they introduced wolves back into Yellowstone 20 yrs ago Park Rangers are finding it difficult to re-establish that natural equilibrium that existed between all the species of animals and plant life. That's been a huge overall impact that stemmed from one small change. That change came about because someone analyzed inconclusive data and decided killing the wolves was the only way to solve the problem.

I'm not saying you're wrong, just don't dismiss possibilities.