Diversity

The evolutionary mechanism is not a linear process of ever-increasing increasing complexity (as is unfortunately still sometimes depicted in textbooks with this classic linear human evolutionary sequence) but instead produces a tree of increasing genetic diversity.

Speciation occurred because genetic diversity is beneficial for survival. Environmental shift can cause the extinction of any single population; if there are two different populations, though, there is a greater chance that one of them will survive. The diversity of species is a device for protecting the continuity of life on Earth. Certain species may not be able to withstand catastrophic flooding, meteorite impact, or climate change as well as others, but throughout Earth’s history there has always been some species capable of continuing the community of life. Complexity is a product of this genetic diversification, but greater complexity does not have any more inherent “goodness” to it.

Diversity is the fundamental good.