World could face mass extinction. What do you think of this article?

Favorite Answer

Alarming indeed! And also deeply embarrassing, because of our participation in a society that so pollutes the Earth, destroys plants and animals, and superheats the atmosphere. We are not forced to participate, we are lured into complacency and spoiled by trivial distractions. Who is sitting on the steps of the capitals demanding an end to taxpayer subsidy of the oil and coal that are the cause of most of the damage?

We have the technology and the capacity to stop damaging the Creation.

24 August 2010-- The White House unveiled a new report, "The Recovery Act: Transforming the American Economy through Innovation," which says that because of the Recovery Act’s $100 billion in investments, the U.S. is now on track to achieve four major innovation breakthroughs, including cutting the cost of solar power in half by 2015 and doubling U.S. renewable energy generation and manufacturing capacity by 2012. Report estimates said that the cost of utility-scale solar power is expected to drop from $0.13/kWh in 2009 to $0.06/kWh in 2015, which would bring the cost of generating solar power down to the cost of electricity from the grid, according to the report. "

http://www.powergenworldwide.com/index/display/articledisplay/0263104144/articles/powergenworldwide/Business/Policy/2010/08/ARRA-renewable-funding.html

Yet, we still continue to subsidize the production of more coal, oil and natural gas, and the carbon dioxide levels continue to increase steadily. In 20 years my grandchild will ask incredulously, 'You mean that the US sent soldiers to Iraq to keep the oil flowing and not to stop it?"

Isn't your question, can we do anything to slow or halt it the extinction?

Of course we can. In the 1980s, it seemed entirely possible that the US and Soviet Union would set off a nuclear winter that would kill us all, but now nuclear weapons stocks are being reduced. Citizen activists got organized.

Have you written your government this week, demanding it stop supporting fuel that overheats the Earth and instead help the clean energy industry?
Have you met with your friends and neighbors, planning activities for 10-10-10 ? (See 350.org)

Websites that have accurate information and letters already written: http://greenpeace.org or http://pirg.org. or http://nrdc.org or http://1sky
http://globalchange.gov is the US government information site on global warming.
Lots of books out now:
Guy Dauncey's book, Climate Challenge, 101 Solutions to Global Warming has great ideas and excellent, up to date, scientific explanations. ($12 on Amazon)
Stephen Schneider Science as a Contact Sport
Lester Brown Plan 4.0 Mobilizing to Save Civilization
Nicholas Stern The Global Deal
James Hoggan Climate Cover-Up
James Hansen Storms of my Grandchildren

Thank you for joining the rescue plan....Show more

It makes little difference in the end. The planet has existed for about four and a half billion years. It has supported life from virtually the word "go", and an absolute profusion of life from the Cambrian explosion, about 500 million years ago, onwards.

If you represent this whole period with the span of your out-stretched arms, from the tips of your fingernails on one hand to those on the other, the period of human existence would be represented, on the same scale, by the number of cells lost to a couple of strokes of an emeryboard! A mere flash. Nothing!

During this whole time the Earth has experienced the effects of five major extinction events: the Ordovician, Devonian, Permian, Triassic and Cretaceous. The real whopper, the Permian, which ushered in the age of the dinosaurs, also removed about 95% of animals from the fossil record. It was the closest the planet has ever come to total obliteration. The last, the Cretaceous, wiped out 70 - 75% of species.

According to the British Museum - who are attempting to establish a DNA record of all the species now left on the planet, even any extinct ones for which DNA still exists I believe - the Human Race itself, in sheer numbers-of-species terms, has already exceeded this last, gruesome benchmark. Making global capitalism itself in that sense, the biggest mass extinction event since whatever occurred at the KT boundary 65 million years ago. And all in less than two shakes of the emeryboard!

What all this indicates to me, is that the planet will not really suffer any ill effects at all from that which incomprehensible and virtually unchecked levels of greed have 'achieved'. Which is the main thing. So it doesn't really "matter", at that level.

The only difference is that with the current extinction we are, each of us, in control.

If we were all to simply stop behaving in the greed and consumer-driven way we do, with the resulting fall in population this would imply (and related even distribution of resources) then we stop the current mass extinction.

Like it or not, face it or don't, that's the way it is mankind.

;)

Edit: Just watched the George Carlin - perfect. I love him! Just what I am saying.

Wake up mankind. Get it while it's hot and enjoy it while you can. Coz it will not be long before the next asteroid.

-|--)...Show more

Doubtful. The main point to pull away from the HATE SPEECH is that this person (dare I call him that at the risk of offending humanity, sadly, i have no other recourse of face getting reported. The Libs only believe in free-speech when it suits their endeavors) believes that the people of the South are plain stupid. As some of the posts mentioned, the creeping few inches would concievable warrant a mass exodus, but this 'genius' of the left, clearly thinks the South is too incompentent to move. Perhaps he is basing this on those who remained in New Orleans when Katrina was coming (despite the millions of warnings)? No one has ever accused a Liberal of using rational thought in their arguments, so I fail to see why any other them would be starting now. The author of that article is a racist and a hate monger. He will not be silenced or forced off the 'air" (so to speak) as we in the Right believe in the true Freedom of Speech, and that includes the idiots on the Left. Naturally, had this been a Conservative author, Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson would be petitioning this person's resignation. Besides, we all know that the global warming problem is actually a Republican Initiative to drown out the Democrat strong holds, like the Northeastern US, the Pacific Northwest and California. Duh!...Show more

I think the primary reason for many of the extinctions is that humans have transported many species to places where they weren't before. For example, Australia has seen dingos, foxes, cats, mice, cane toads, rabbits, etc. Many times these animals outcompete the indiginous animals. It doesn't have to do with our emissions of CO2. Often these introduced animals will introduce disease. For example, Cape hunting Dogs nearly became extinct after getting distemper. The Carolina Parakeet had the habit of coming to the aid of its hurt fellow birds and it was thus easily wiped out by hunters who didn't seem to care. Similarly Passerger pigeons and buffalo were slaughtered recklessly. Again, none of these had anything to do with climate. The article suggested climate change played a role but that is junk science and pandering to the least common denominator....Show more

No matter what mankind does, there is not a shadow of doubt that mankind will not exist at some time in the comparatively near future.
On the time line of the history of this planet, the human race occupies an almost imperceptible space.
The Earth has existed for the last 4.5 billion years and did not need humans to get to where it is today.
Long before the planet is sucked into the vortex of the dying Sun, mankind will have perished and there is nothing we can do about it.
We are just another mammal and like the 99% of members of that species that are now extinct, so too will we....Show more