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SPECIES EXTINCTION RATES: Googled

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 "Scientists were startled in 1980 by the discovery of a tremendous diversity of insects in tropical forests. In one study of just 19 trees in Panama, 80% of the 1,200 beetle species discovered were previously unknown to science... Surprisingly, scientists have a better understanding of how many stars there are in the galaxy than how many species there are on Earth." -  World Resources Institute (WRI).

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The following information is per The World Wildlife Fund.

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Just to illustrate the degree of biodiversity loss we're facing, let’s take you through one scientific analysis...

• The rapid loss of species we are seeing today is estimated by experts to be between 1,000 and 10,000 times higher than the natural extinction rate.*
• These experts calculate that between 0.01 and 0.1% of all species will become extinct each year.
• If the low estimate of the number of species out there is true - i.e. that there are around 2 million different species on our planet** -  then that means between 200 and 2,000 extinctions occur every year.
• But if the upper estimate of species numbers is true - that there are 100 million different species co-existing with us on our planet - then between 10,000 and 100,000 species are becoming extinct each year.

 ^{*Experts actually call this natural extinction rate the background extinction rate. This simply means the rate of species extinctions that would occur if we humans were not around.}

^{** Between 1.4 and 1.8 million species have already been scientifically identified.} 

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Unlike the mass extinction events of geological history, the current extinction challenge is one for which a single species - ours - appears to be almost wholly responsible.

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This is often referred to as the 6th extinction crisis, after the 5 known extinction waves in geological history.

So without arguing about who’s right or wrong.
Or what the exact numbers are.
There can be little debate that there is, in fact, a very serious biodiversity crisis.

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 "It's because we're using so much of the planet and we're destroying so much of (these animals') habitat."

In the report, the rapid extinction is blamed on habitat loss, over exploitation of resources, pollution and climate change.

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This is a pretty biased writing style – and some of the facts in the article I read looked iffy. Critics agree that the numbers are interestingly large and misleading, almost alarmist for political or fundraising reasons, but we have always lost species, it is a part of our biotic system. More studies need to be conducted by diverse groups privately funded – not government sponsored because the numbers would be more biased. If the party in power is anti-climate change, for example – outcomes and predictions may be skewered to favor that view. It would be like studying the ill effects of milk on babies sponsored by milk producers. It is hard to be honest when your livelihood or adherence to alternate facts is in the balance against the results.

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So, what does it mean? Between 2030 and 2050 an awful lot is supposed to happen, sea level rise, glaciers vanishing, higher temps, now loss of more species than since the last GREAT EXTINCTION. Five previous mass extinction level events have been documented. Lets hear it for moma nature – if a species gets too uppity, it kills it off and starts over. Earth. There’s no place like home.

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Personally, I worry about the microscopic biotic world – the chain is fragile and loss of one vital link and it’s over. Like bees – if they all die, we follow. If the water is totally polluted, we die. If the air goes bad or gets too hot, we fade from the map of existence. As if we did not have enough diseases and natural catastrophes to worry about: cancer, wildfires, volcanoes, earthquakes, gerrymandered elections. Now we add potential for extinction. Fiddle Me Some Sticks-How is a human supposed to catch a break!

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Homo Sapiens are resilient and creative, clever, and really smart when life-threatened. One would think that global warming as man-made would not be subject to denouncement by big businesses, rather embraced as a way to improve their products to help a earth out. I think of arson with no insurance policy. There are more bottom lines here than the coal industry, for example, going extinct. That does not sound good. The electric car by itself is not going to save us. Solar energy, water conservation, recycling – and a very long list of need to do’s would have to be global and now. All the deadlines are behind us. That sucks. The world is hoping the U.S. re-commits to limit greenhouse gases, an accord from which Mssr. Trump withdrew.

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Based on what we already know, it does not look good for us, but we have to try. I’m jus sayin’.

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Stella L. Crews

07-28-17

114p

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