Okay, Lucky. I think you've stated your point more clearly this time around. There are a lot of really smart people on this board who understood your main point all along - that humans leave a larger total amount of bodily waste in the wilderness because there are so many more hikers than horses. I doubt if anyone argues with that. However, to put that into some sort of tangible numerical "perspective" one needs to word it effectively.
If I may, another way to state your point is that a horse leaves 12.5 times more bodily waste behind than a human hiker. You don't actually know the total number of horses in Yosemite, but it seems obvious there are more than 12.5 hikers for every horse, therefore, humans generate more total bodily waste in the Yosemite wilderness than horses do. The total amount of human waste processed by backcountry toilets in Yosemite also needs to be considered, as does the human waste carried out by mules.
Your point about total waste is well taken, has been all along, but it's a bit more complicated when trying to quantify it with numbers. Boiling it down to total lbs of waste does not consider total impact to the wilderness. Waste dropped indiscriminately into a creek or on the trail has a lot more impact than waste buried in a cathole. People like me are probably a little overly sensitive after dealing with numbers every day to make complex decisions. But your point is correct about total amount of waste.
