'Shocking' state of seas threatens mass extinction, say marine experts

[xchrom]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/jun/20/marine-life-oceans-extinction-threat

Fish, sharks, whales and other marine species are in imminent danger of an "unprecedented" and catastrophic extinction event at the hands of humankind, and are disappearing at a far faster rate than anyone had predicted, a study of the world's oceans has found.

Mass extinction of species will be "inevitable" if current trends continue, researchers said.

Overfishing, pollution, run-off of fertilisers from farming and the acidification of the seas caused by increasing carbon dioxide emissions are combining to put marine creatures in extreme danger, according to the report from the International Programme on the State of the Ocean (Ipso), prepared at the first international workshop to consider all of the cumulative stresses affecting the oceans at Oxford University.

The international panel of marine experts said there was a "high risk of entering a phase of extinction of marine species unprecedented in human history". They said the challenges facing the oceans created "the conditions associated with every previous major extinction of species in Earth's history".

[Kurovski]

1. K&R. (nt)

[villager]

2. Yes, but the pundits might get mad at us if we act on it!

n/t

[Gregorian]

3. Nothing will change until the human population decreases.

I really wish there were a way of limiting families to one child until world population was down to 4 billion.

I also guarantee regretting that I ever said that in public. It's either that or something far worse than that.

[GliderGuider]

4. We are an inherent part of the clusterfuck now.

Even when our population decreases the seas won't recover for quite a long time.
Even when our population decreases the land won't regain its fertility for quite a long time.
Even when our population decreases the global temperature won't stop rising for quite a long time.
Even when our population decreases the mineral resources of the planet won't be replenished.

What is inevitable is that our population will, one way or the other, decrease.
It's also inevitable that most of the the changes we will go through in the process will be involuntary.
It's also inevitable that we will blame speculators...

Homo sapiens(?) is the most efficient, effective entropy engine that Mother Nature ever cooked up.

[Gregorian]

5. What I find so ironic, if that's the proper term,

is looking at the overall universe. When one uses the term entropy, it relates to a specific environment with specific boundaries. We are altering our "universe" on earth in a way that is highly troubling in many ways. In terms of energy, that is. Diversity, sustainability, even plain old beauty are suffering. Contrary to that we have created something fantastic. One look at the Canon SD4000 camera shows what we have produced for the mess we have created. It's beautiful. A hunk of materials that does more than Ampex's Videofile system. All in a tiny palm of the hand. I was lucky enough to have a father who worked in the same office as Shockley. He saw tubes and then diodes, and then worked as a special product's division at Ampex, and then Applied Materials, and then some. I have watched this whole mess unfold. I appreciate what we have done.

So getting to my point, I see one pixel of minerals in space. Earth. Our disruption of equilibrium is so infinitely small it is undetectable in the grand scheme of things. It's odd that the energy in the total universe is so large that what we have done here isn't even background noise.

Maybe we're all there is. In a way that is what fuels my fears and anxieties over this. Even though we amount to essentially nothing, maybe we're everything.

And yes, the CO2 that is in the atmosphere is here for another 100 years. Stop now, and we're still in deep. And I noticed this spring that there were no butterflies and almost no bees. For me this is madness. Folly. Suicide.

[stuntcat]

6. even though..

"Even though we amount to essentially nothing, maybe we're everything." oh, what if we are it?...

It's easier for me to think of us as another of thousands, or heck billions, of life's tries. But what if we really are that special? What if we are the only life to make art and music but we're trashing our one home? Wiping out other beautiful species forever..

[Gregorian]

7. Stuntcat!

You're always there.

I love the thought of other worlds with life. I'm certain there are. I just wish I could hang out with them right not. I need some enthusiasm.

Tonight I am mostly working on being full of gratitude for the things I have rather than what I don't have. Just thought I'd share that tidbit.