Era of 'Biological Annihilation' Is Underway, Scientists Warn (theguardian.com) 359
Tatiana Schlossberg reports via The New York Times (Warning: source may be paywalled, alternate source): From the common barn swallow to the exotic giraffe, thousands of animal species are in precipitous decline, a sign that an irreversible era of mass extinction is underway, new research finds. The study, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, calls the current decline in animal populations a "global epidemic" and part of the "ongoing sixth mass extinction" caused in large measure by human destruction of animal habitats. The previous five extinctions were caused by natural phenomena. Dr. Ceballos emphasized that he and his co-authors, Paul R. Ehrlich and Rodolfo Dirzo, both professors at Stanford University, are not alarmists, but are using scientific data to back up their assertions that significant population decline and possible mass extinction of species all over the world may be imminent, and that both have been underestimated by many other scientists. The study's authors looked at reductions in a species' range -- a result of factors like habitat degradation, pollution and climate change, among others -- and extrapolated from that how many populations have been lost or are in decline, a method that they said is used by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. They found that about 30 percent of all land vertebrates -- mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians -- are experiencing declines and local population losses. In most parts of the world, mammal populations are losing 70 percent of their members because of habitat loss.
The planet will survive (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The sun's getting hotter, it might not be billions of years, we may have just screwed the pooch by both increasing CO2 and killing enough life that was the balance to deal with that.
We may well have just rocked the boat for the last time, the planet isn't going to last forever.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Since this is all about habitat loss, which is mainly caused by people clearing land to make way for farmland, we already have a well known proven effective solution to minimize the need for all of that: GMO. Unfortunately, groups like Greenpeace and pretty much every European government have dashed all hopes of that ever seeing global adoption, and the Democrats in the US figure it would be awesome if we made agriculture even less efficient and more wasteful than what we have now by pushing for everybody t
Re:The planet will survive (Score:5, Informative)
Since this is all about habitat loss, which is mainly caused by people clearing land to make way for farmland, we already have a well known proven effective solution to minimize the need for all of that: GMO.
There's another solution: Population control. Growth cannot be sustained indefinitely, and yield increases in food is only postponing an inevitable, and ensuring it is worse when it happens. Until we stop breeding as rabbits and depending on population growth to pay for our debts, GMO and similar "solutions" are like peeing your pants to keep warm.
And if you had bothered to read TFA, you would have realized that GMOs kills biodiversity. We end up with fewer and fewer plant species, and fewer and fewer animals who can survive as other plant species have to give way. That's putting all your eggs in one basket. There's nothing to fall back on if the crops fail due to e.g. new diseases. Because all we have are a few GMOs, because it's the only thing profitable. Potato Famine 2.0 will happen one day. And it will be worse, because we have no biodiversity to fall back on.
Re:The planet will survive (Score:5, Informative)
Until we stop breeding as rabbits
We already did: http://data.worldbank.org/indi... [worldbank.org]
The continued population growth is because people are living longer, but it's levelling off. We are on target for about 10-11bn by the end of the century, which is sustainable with modern farming methods. The main issues now are all to do with the politics of handling the increase.
Re: (Score:2)
The smarter move is GMO algae only. Fully genetically customised kelp, as the food source. Pretty much near anything is possible, with customised flavour, texture and trace elements, designed to grow in low light conditions. Large, multi story growing tanks, producing very high volumes of food, with hugely reduced land use and largely recycling water. Don't think stupid soylent green, think customised leaves large, plate sized, thick, with adjusted flavour and texture, peel and you have a steak. Storage pod
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Since this is all about habitat loss, which is mainly caused by people clearing land to make way for farmland, we already have a well known proven effective solution to minimize the need for all of that: GMO.
There's another solution: Population control.
That solution is already in place and is being improved on every single day. One only has to look at our exiting laws to blatantly see that.
Think governments care about preventing death? Fuck no. The legal status of a product like tobacco that kills over 400,000 Americans every year, ten times more than all other illegal products, paints a clear fucking picture as to its role in population control. Same goes for alcohol.
Think we're really doing something about the obesity epidemic? Fuck no. We're mere
Re: (Score:2)
Until we stop breeding as rabbits
We've already stopped breeding like rabbits. Virtually all the developed world now has sub-replacement fertility. So do less-developed countries like China and Brazil and Indonesia and Bangladesh, while India is pretty close to replacement. About the only place left that currently breeds "like rabbits" is sub-Saharan African. Allow for a few more decades of development, and their birthrates will probably plummet as well.
WHEN ? - Demographic Transition. (Score:2)
Remember WHERE and WHO is reproducing at an alarming pace. Just a hint: Not first world countries.
Depends if you add a "WHEN" question, then you hint gets completely wrong.
When meds and industrial agriculture where developed in what you now consider "First world countries", those pesky westerner also had a huge demographic explosion (because they kept their old habits of reproducing like rabbits on the ground that most of their children won't even reach adulthood).
But eventually we got wiser and adapted.
And the same adaptation is currently happening in nearly most of these other countries you allude to.
Re: (Score:3)
Aside from my earlier post about GMO actually being able to increase biodiversity, Greenpeace, who is behind every talking point you've ever made on this topic, has blatantly lied to you, multiple times.
https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com]
Greenpeace also likes to hold two opposing arguments at the same time about GMO Bt, depending on which side best fits their pre-conceived narrative (without doing any actual research) on that particular day:
http://www.slate.com/articles/... [slate.com]
Further reading where Greenpeace hol
Re:The planet will survive (Score:4, Insightful)
Again this idiocy. There is no shortage of food. There is an excess of population growth and rampant capitalism. GMOs only solve the cash problems of some corporations.
Food shortage : complex. (Score:2)
There is no shortage of food.
Depends on how you consider the details :
- Indeed, there's no shortage of food, if your target is just to feed the population and keep it alive.
The planet can more or less roughly procude enough food to keep everyone alive.
We *currently* are not at risk of becoming Soylent Green movie.
- BUT if every single human being decided to eat as much (both in terms of volume, caloric intake, composition (meat vs. veggies), etc.) as the typical westerner, and use as much resource for everything else, you'd need about
Re: (Score:2)
Re: The planet will survive (Score:2)
The vast majority of farmers already buy seeds every season, Monsanto or no Monsanto.
It's simply the most efficient way to do it.
Re: (Score:2)
It's simply the most efficient way to do it.
The most effective way to produce seed is to grow seed crops, not to try to save some percentage of seed from normal crops. But the corollary is that the cheapest seed crop ain't one that you've paid someone else to grow.
Re: (Score:2)
No farmer has unlimited land available. You also need to rotate crops for maximum yield, and it gets exponentially harder the more different crops you need to grow.
Can you grow seed crops slightly cheaper yourself? Probably, but that is also one field that doesn't create any profit for you. It is cheaper to grow crops for consumption on every field, and buy seeds from someone who specializes in growing seed crops.
Re: The planet will survive (Score:4, Informative)
Can you grow seed crops slightly cheaper yourself? Probably, but that is also one field that doesn't create any profit for you. It is cheaper to grow crops for consumption on every field, and buy seeds from someone who specializes in growing seed crops.
That someone else is making a profit on the same activity in which they would engage. It doesn't use any more or less land when someone else does it. Maybe their farm is so small they don't have room for that activity, in which case if they're not already making a value-added product from their crop, they might as well bend over and kiss their own ass goodbye because their days as a farmer are numbered, and the number is small.
Re: (Score:2)
Sort of... the carboniferous period isn't going to happen again now that there are enzymes to digest lignin, so any future life will be much worse off than us at developing the tech needed to leave Earth.
Also, if we wipe out too many higher organisms, the lower ones won't have as much time to evolve as the first time around. The sun is getting older, and is past its prime. In terms of a human lifespan, Sol is now in early retirement age. Life on Earth has been around for longer than the time until it bloats and starts eating up the inner planets.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:The planet will survive (Score:4, Insightful)
The planet is a rock, I don't care if it survives unless it turns out that it is an intelligent rock. I care that we survive, or failing that that our successors survive. And I care that some of our art survives: some of the beauty we have brought into the universe should be remembered, for a time.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Earth will survive. If we are dumb enough to destroy everything, then maybe a more intelligent lifeform will thrive. Or if we do not get entirely extinct, Darwinism will be the rule once again. Only the best will survive. Only those who can adapt.
True - well, up to a point. I think it is a misunderstanding to think that "Darwinism" (ie. evolution by natural selection) doesn't rule human evolution just because we are better at controlling diseases etc. Humans and their civilisation are part of nature, just like ants and termites with their complex societies are. Natural selection doesn't care by which means we survive - we have found ways that include technology, that's all; we are still under natural selection. And "the fittest" are not necessarily
Re: (Score:2)
Survival in ecological terms is mainly about chance. Your personal traits influence the chances, but they don't warrant anything. And traits that are advantageous in one situation might reduce your chances in other situations. Being flashy might help you find a mate, but it does
Re:The planet will survive (Score:4, Funny)
No shit. I particularly appreciated this though:
"Dr. Ceballos emphasized that he and his co-authors, Paul R. Ehrlich and Rodolfo Dirzo, both professors at Stanford University, are not alarmists"
Ahahah. Nice joke.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Wasn't funny even when George Carlin Said it (Score:3)
I’ve found this reasoning specious ever since it was part of a George Carlin skit. The Earth is essentially a large rock that happens to have a thin coat of delicate living goo on it. The rock of course will go on. Now if that thin goo is reduced to just some kind of primitive microbial mat, well then yes the Earth and life has gone on, and evolution will kick in to start the climb again. But the whole “Earth will go on” statement seems to imply Earth and its ecosystem are just too big
Re: (Score:2)
Oh how profound of you. A man made mass extinction is underway and we should just sit back and enjoy the show cause "Darwinism"? That's not even of coherent thought.
Re: (Score:2)
It questionable in what way Homo is superior to Neanderthals. The Homo may only have the advantage of being able to survive on a lower-calorie diet.
Homo is a genus, to which both modern man (Homo Sapiens) and neanderthals (Homo Neandertalensis) belong.
Homo Neandertalensis could even interbreed with Homo Sapiens, so some even classify the two as subspecies: Homo Sapiens Sapiens and Homo Sapiens Neandertalensis.
Re: The planet will survive (Score:2)
Genus names are capitalized, species names are not. "Homo sapiens", not "Homo Sapiens".
For extra pedantry, use the initial letter for the genus after introducing it, except that would be ambiguous. "On our time travels, we saw Homo sapiens, H. habilis, Hadrosaurus foulkii, and Homo neandertalensis. H. neandertalensis was particularly interesting."
Re:The planet will survive (Score:5, Interesting)
Any ancestors we had with 4-color vision were probably before we became mammals. Most mammals have 2-color vision; only some primates (including humans) have 3-color vision, due to duplication and later mutation of one of the genes that support 2-color vision.
While we can't say for sure why mammals went down to 2-color vision, the standard explanation is that nocturnal animals do not need the extra color channel, and may be helped if they lose it (e.g. by having more space for rod cells). This explanation is supported by studies of modern mammals, and how one of the two common mammalian cone cells are absent or non-functional in strongly nocturnal mammals. If mammals did not have such a long small-nocturnal-animal phase, we would probably have retained more capacity for color vision.
And it won't stop (Score:2, Insightful)
until we extinct ourselves.
Re: (Score:2, Offtopic)
until we extinct ourselves.
No, Mr. Little, the extinction of species will continue as long as there are species and change. We don't need to be here for it to happen. At least that's what Rexamundo, the T-Rex I keep in my basement, tells me. He speaks quite fondly of his boyhood chums Dippy the diplodocious and Pterry (who was a star on Pee Wee's Playhouse.)
Naming suggestion (Score:5, Funny)
They haven't decided whether to call it the "Holocene extinction" or "Anthropocene extinction".
How about the Covfefecene extinction?
Re: (Score:2)
the beauty of science ... (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I don't think we have the imagination to come up with the dog, for example.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't think we have the imagination to come up with the dog, for example.
Sony AIBO.
Or even more ideal, the pet rock.
Re: (Score:3)
the beauty of science ... (Score:2) ... is that what we destroy, we can replace.
by swell ( 195815 ) Alter Relationship on 07-12-17 21:18 (#54798469)
The beauty of not beginning a comment in the subject line is that repliers don't have to hack all that shit out to quote you. Asshole.
Anyway, what you said is as stupid as how you said it. It's always easier to destroy a thing than to create a thing because entropy is on your side when you break things, but you have to fight it every step of the way when you create things.
this is not nonsense! (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
What I wish to know is what they propose to do to stop this from proceeding. I hear a lot about, Oh My God, but not what to do? My 2 cents ;)
It's a little more than 2 cents, but putting a rubber on your schlong is a good start. Human population growth is the main cause of habitat loss and reduced biodiversity for other species.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Instead of like now, taxes from everyone going towards children (schools are often the biggest expense for towns), do the opposite - a parental tax.
Subsidize sterilization, birth control and abortion. Stop giving tax breaks to religions that oppose either.
In other words, hit people where it really hurts - their wallet.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
It's a little more than 2 cents, but putting a rubber on your schlong is a good start. Human population growth is the main cause of habitat loss and reduced biodiversity for other species.
The problem is that the people who are actually listening to you could have twice as many kids and nobody would notice, compared to all the people who don't give a shit.
Natural phenomena (Score:2)
So, what, humanity isn't a natural phenomena?
Re: (Score:2)
You must be new to the english language so I'll help you.
Humanity is typically seperated from the natural world in contexts like this due to the conscience nature of our actions. An asteroid or a volcano are considered natural as they are events that literally just happen "naturally" where as humans choose to do or not do things.
the highest on the food chain lose first. (Score:2)
even within a species.
not quite the same, but 1789. come to mind.
Prophecy (Score:2)
As foretold by Methus- I mean, George Carlin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Many will die, some will survive (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Many will die, some will survive (Score:5, Insightful)
This isnt a mass extinction event, it's "just a period of massive flux"?
That's exactly what a mass extinction is, you're just rewording things to make them sound more pleasent.
"It's not a tax cut for the wealthy, we're just reducing their taxes". How in keeping with the the times you are.
Want the truth (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
If the human race does not move in to space WE will go extinct.
While that's true on a long timescale, on the immediate timescale, there is not enough time to get enough of humanity off the planet in order for it to survive. The only way to make enough time is to address the environmental damage that we're not only ignoring, but actually increasing.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
>there is not enough time to get enough of humanity off the planet
Sure there is. If we discovered the Earth was doomed (say, a Mars-sized rock was headed our way but we had a few decades), we could (in theory) put a massive concrete cylinder in orbit, spin it for artificial gravity, build a city inside, have a few hundred years' worth of spares and replacement volatiles, and put a big-ass nuclear Orion drive on the back end and ship off a sustainable breeding population to an extra-solar planet.
> in
Re: (Score:2)
Oh. Well, if you're going to be THAT picky...
I really must insist on survival, and not merely shipping a container of bacteria into space with human sludge to feed upon. I mean, I still think that would be an interesting experiment, but I'm not going to pay for it.
Re: (Score:2)
I really must insist on survival, and not merely shipping a container of bacteria into space with human sludge to feed upon. I mean, I still think that would be an interesting experiment, but I'm not going to pay for it.
I'll happily pay for it. After all, something similar is my explanation as to how life appeared on earth in the first place (transported from Mars on asteroids)
Re: (Score:3)
>After all, something similar is my explanation as to how life appeared on earth in the first place (transported from Mars on asteroids)
Panspermia just moves the problem of how biogenesis happened one step further back. I also find the idea of Mars as a better warm wet rock on which life could form than Earth to be very iffy.
After all, it may not even have been potentially habitable for as long as we believe it took life to appear on Earth, a few billion years ago the Sun was a bit cooler, and we don't
We're not natural? (Score:3)
From TFS : "The previous five extinctions were caused by natural phenomena."
Why are we acting like human's aren't natural? Yes it might be our fault that this is happening, but we as a species are a "natural phenomena". We're not some extra-dimensional beings or anything special. We're as much a part of nature as nature is a part of us. We just choose to abuse and ruin it for our own means. Not to say any other species that reached our level of intellect wouldn't naturally end up doing the same.
Spy vs Spy (Score:3)
"mammal populations are losing 70 percent of their members because of habitat loss"
except I'll bet that there are more mammals today than last year. humans count too.
so it's really just that there is less mammal diversity. that's something else altogether.
and what of all of the animal species that prefer the new world climate? lowering the temperature, the pollution, and the acidity would set back the jellyfish population by decades.
So really, this is just an argument of preferring giraffes over jellyfish. So which ones do we eat, which ones clean our dirty oceans, and which ones look prettier?
Personally, I prefer it a little warmer. My country benefits immensely from global warming -- agriculture, tourism, and land. You in Florida have had your time in the sun. Now it's your turn to have the hostile seasons.
And what of solar power? Isn't hotter better? Sorry, that's the hole-in-the-ozone thing. I meant greenhouse effect. Isn't that good for plants? And therefore for agriculture? I like food. And hurricanes? Wind power, soon lightning power.
This planet has many deserts. Between arid-north, snowy south, and sandy middles, plenty of earth is hostile to humans. So isn't this just a shift? If you live at the equator, plan to move north in a generation or two. Florida will become as hot as jamaica. But virginia will become the new florida. And the arctic circle will become the new new york.
For a group of scientists looking to colonize the moon, and mars, global warming ought not seem so hostile by comparison.
Re: (Score:2)
You are a fucking genius.
Re: (Score:2)
Humans are part of the ecosystem, have developed in a way that they are conscious of what they are doing (or not...), and know that they can have an impact (tiny or global) on the planet. Now if we REALLY cause a mass extinction because of our actions, it will still be a "natural" cause.
If this extinction was caused by another species on our planet, would it be more natural? Absolutely not. it would be the exact same shit. Now let's say it would be caused
Re: (Score:2)
Re:This is a genuine tragedy. (Score:5, Insightful)
Humans = the ultimate form of pollution.
Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment; but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply, and multiply, until every natural resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer on this planet, you are a plague.
Re:This is a genuine tragedy. (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes. The human presence has been destructive ... like a virus ...
Now note that viruses (virii?) adapt. A big problem in the medical field.
And people adapt. You may have heard that we are becoming aware of our environmental impact. You may have heard that it is a matter of great concern in some circles. You may know that many people in many diverse fields of science and government and the private sector are taking vigorous action to correct our ignorant mistakes of the past.
Re: (Score:3)
Now note that viruses (virii?) adapt.
If being pedantic, the plural of virus is virus. It's a group noun like "slime" (it actually means slime in Latin), "money" and "people", which all lack a singular. You should only say "viruses" for the same reasons you'd say "slimes", "monies" and "peoples", i.e. only to refer to multiples of separate groups. Which is rarely needed.
In common parlor, "viruses" is what's used as the plural.
But if you otherwise use plurals like "fora", "octopodes" and "aquaria", by all means use "virus" as a plural too.
I'l
Re: (Score:2)
In what language is "person" not a singular form of "people?" Not only that, there also exists proper usages for "peoples" and "persons."
Re: (Score:2)
Now note that viruses (virii?) adapt.
If being pedantic, the plural of virus is virus. It's a group noun like "slime" (it actually means slime in Latin), "money" and "people", which all lack a singular. You should only say "viruses" for the same reasons you'd say "slimes", "monies" and "peoples", i.e. only to refer to multiples of separate groups. Which is rarely needed.
In common parlor, "viruses" is what's used as the plural.
But if you otherwise use plurals like "fora", "octopodes" and "aquaria", by all means use "virus" as a plural too.
I'll applaud your effort, futile as it may be.
Good post, succinct and informative, but I can't help but wonder if you're completely correct in all your assertions and word usage:
(1) If people lacks a singular then what is the plural of person? Sure, you can use persons but I'm going to suggest there's an alternative...
(2) Are you sure you intended to use parlor, and not parlance? /pedantry
Re: (Score:2)
Yes. The human presence has been destructive ... like a virus ...
Now note that viruses (virii?) adapt. A big problem in the medical field.
And people adapt. You may have heard that we are becoming aware of our environmental impact. You may have heard that it is a matter of great concern in some circles. You may know that many people in many diverse fields of science and government and the private sector are taking vigorous action to correct our ignorant mistakes of the past.
Knowing about something, and fucking doing something about it, are worlds apart. Greed doesn't give a fuck about anything but Greed. Those "circles" will not be heard no matter what. The continued poisoning of our planet, and governments who would rather support Greed above everything else, prove this.
The human species will ultimately learn. Unfortunately, it will be the hard way.
actually ani al do NOT reach equilibrium (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Yep, that's why the summary is completely misleading bullshit...
The previous five extinctions were caused by natural phenomena.
If by natural phenomena you mean a single species reproducing to cover the entire planet and emitting a gas that made the planet change in climate entirely, then sure. It's easy to blame humans as not being a natural occurrence, but we are. And we are not the first natural phenomena to do so.
It's so misleading to claim that we are not natural by defining natural to be everything but us.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
It's a fun quote delivered by a good actor
Which was the sole reason for its inclusion.
Re:This is a genuine tragedy. (Score:5, Funny)
Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment; but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply, and multiply, until every natural resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer on this planet, you are a plague.
(Agent Smith then proceeds to make billions of copies of himself)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:This is a genuine tragedy. (Score:5, Informative)
> Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment; but you humans do not. Y
"Instinctively develops" such a relationship? I'd say "no". Many mammals, introduced to new environment, have no means to make such accommodation and devastate ecosystems. A very classic example is the introduction of rabbits to Australia's ecosystem: others include the introduction of goats almost anywhere, since goats are notorious for cropping plants much closer to the root and destroying the plant parts of ecosystems.
The idea that all mammals "develop a natural equilibrium" ignores the cycles of population growth and decline of simple predator/prey relationships, like the well analyzed one between wolves and rabbits described at https://stanford.edu/~ajspakow... [stanford.edu] . These equilibria don't require instinct, nor does there seem to be "insinct" involved. They only require negative feedback from the environment.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Well, I'll bet he never gets killed by a whale he just freed from fishing line.
Re: (Score:2)
Yaknow, when you're quoting a genocidal slavemaster to support your argument, you're not really making a good point for your side. Just sayin'.
I had an argument? Pray tell me what would it be.
The AC post above me reminded me of that quote, so I posted it.
Oh, and that would be a *fictional* genocidal slavemaster, from a movie meant to entertain.
Re: (Score:2)
Humans = the ultimate form of pollution
In the sense of ultimate meaning final or last or most recent, sure. But not in the sense of best or greatest - in my opinion that honor should go to the photosynthesizing plants, starting with cyanobacteria, that pumped tremendous amounts of oxygen into the air, fundamentally changing the preferred biological processes for living on Earth. (Of course this also depends on what one defines as 'pollution.') Humans are altering climate and geologic features, and thereby changing coastlines and what plants and
Re: (Score:2)
I call bullshit. Everyone knows you don't scale a coelacanth. You skin them, and then separate the drumsticks.
Re: (Score:2)
Dinosaurs went extinct in a mass extinction that had 70% of species dies off that almost ended all life on earth. ELEs are scary. And that happened, what, once in the history of earth. The dodo was massacred by humans.
But, yeah, say how non-plused you are. It definitely makes you sound mature/intelligent, and not like a idiot.
Re: (Score:2)
Dinosaurs went extinct in a mass extinction that had 70% of species dies off that almost ended all life on earth. ELEs are scary. And that happened, what, once in the history of earth.
Five major extinctions happened, only one of them had an external cause (asteroid). For the others, climate change was one of the main reasons.
Re: (Score:2)
How many of those climate changes were caused by humans?
Re: (Score:2)
The climate change in this one is much, much faster than that of any previous extinctions.
Re: (Score:2)
If you think about Darwin and the evolution of species, it's based on adaptation and natural selection, which implies that those species that are not well adapted -- go EXTINCT because they all die.
That's irrelevant when cataclysm or just the rate of change messes up the spreadsheets.
Ehrlich the big mouth (Score:5, Insightful)
Ah, thank you. Amongst Ehrlich's funny predictions
"By the year 2000 the United Kingdom will be simply a small group of impoverished islands, inhabited by some 70 million hungry people." ..."
" I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000."
"The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate
in 1970, he warned that "[i]n ten years all important animal life in the sea will be extinct. Large areas of coastline will have to be evacuated because of the stench of dead fish."
In 1968 he wrote "India couldn't possibly feed two hundred million more people by 1980." Well, you can argue about that one, since the population hadn't grown by 200 million in that timeframe, but now the populationis 800 million greater and don't look worse off than back then..
So great, in the opinion of his co-author Ehrlich isn't an alarmist. I'd call; him a hysterical headline grabber with a predictiveusefulness of zero.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
This guy has been wrong again and again for 50 years, and he is still getting government funding, and his papers still pass peer review.
Meanwhile the press is calling him "not an alarmist"
Open your eyes people. Words are cheap.
Re: (Score:2)
Well none of that rediculousness changes the fact that the population counts of most large mammals are crashing globally.
Re:He emphasized (Score:5, Informative)
Quotes from Paul Ehrlich:
***
“Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make,” Paul Ehrlich confidently declared in the April 1970 issue of Mademoiselle. “The death rate will increase until at least 100-200 million people per year will be starving to death during the next ten years.”
“Most of the people who are going to die in the greatest cataclysm in the history of man have already been born,” wrote Paul Ehrlich in a 1969 essay titled “Eco-Catastrophe! “By[1975] some experts feel that food shortages will have escalated the present level of world hunger and starvation into famines of unbelievable proportions. Other experts, more optimistic, think the ultimate food-population collision will not occur until the decade of the 1980s.”
Ehrlich sketched out his most alarmist scenario for the 1970 Earth Day issue of The Progressive, assuring readers that between 1980 and 1989, some 4 billion people, including 65 million Americans, would perish in the “Great Die-Off.”
Paul Ehrlich chimed in, predicting in 1970 that “air pollutionis certainly going to take hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone.” Ehrlich sketched a scenario in which 200,000 Americans would die in 1973 during “smog disasters” in New York and Los Angeles.
Paul Ehrlich warned in the May 1970 issue of Audubon that DDT and other chlorinated hydrocarbons “may have substantially reduced the life expectancy of people born since 1945.” Ehrlich warned that Americans born since 1946now had a life expectancy of only 49 years, and he predicted that if current patterns continued this expectancy would reach 42 years by 1980, when it might level out. (Note: According to the most recent CDC report, life expectancy in the US is 78.8 years).
In 1975, Paul Ehrlich predicted that “since more than nine-tenths of the original tropical rainforests will be removed in most areas within the next 30 years or so, it is expected that half of the organisms in these areas will vanish with it.”
***
He's awesome. Please give him more grant money for the comical art value alone.
Re:He emphasized (Score:5, Insightful)
I'll just cut and paste my responce from a post just like yours posted above.
Well none of that rediculousness changes the fact that the population counts of most large mammals are crashing globally.
Re:He emphasized (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm unsure whether you meant to claim that the numbers you gave supported him, but no, they really don't. Saying he's right on "principles" while being horribly wrong on the actual facts is the whole point. He claims the number X will happen REALLY SOON NOW - BE SCARED!, and X doesn't happen. ... and that's been the case throughout his whole career.
1) He did not mean soot from wood burning stoves in India/Africa with "smog" btw, that's where the millions of deaths due to pollution comes from. Electrify now! Doesn't matter if it's coal plants or solar for this.
2) Food supply has outstripped demand. Vitamin A deficiency is a real threat though, so make sure to hit the nearest anti-GMO protestor on his/her head since they're blocking golden rice.
3) DDT hadn't reduced life expectancy to 42 years. Neither has anything else. You can't be right "on principles" when you're so horribly wrong on the facts.
Re: (Score:3)
HA HA HA!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Population_Bomb [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:2)
So...mass extinctions don't happen? What is your point?
Re: (Score:2)
Re:More alarmist nonsense (Score:4, Informative)
Can we stop posting the exaggerated climate change and mass extinction crap that causes scientists to lose credibility with the public because of a few irresponsible people?
TFS lost all credibility with me when it described Paul Ehrlich as "not an alarmist". This is the guy who famously predicted [wikipedia.org] that human civilization would collapse in the 1980s, and that was the "best case" scenario.