The 6th extinction is underway... are you worried yet?

[silverweb]

"Every 20 minutes we lose an animal species. If this rate continues, by century's end, 50% of all living species will be gone. It is a phenomenon known as the sixth extinction."

Source article: http://planetgreen.discovery.com/travel-outdoors/sixth-extinction-worried.html?campaign=daily_nl

[MH1]

1. Nah, ya know those emails showed it was all a hoax.

:eyes:

:sarcasm: just in case it's not clear

[kestrel91316]

2. Don't worry. It's just because the sun is getting hotter like it frequently does.

Go buy a Hummer.

[GliderGuider]

3. Not any more.

1. Anger
2. Denial
3. Bargaining
4. Depression
5. Acceptance

I'm a proud, relieved and happy denizen of Stage 5. However, the first four were a cast-iron, gold-plated bitch.

[The2ndWheel]

4. Isn't that the goal?

Keep the human-defined productive animals, get rid of the rest, create technology as a substitute, creating jobs in the process, give ourselves more room, and throw whatever species are left into a zoo so we can feel better. How is that not the point of everything we do?

[stuntcat]

5. beyond worry. I am sick

huhmans wiping out so many other whole species is the most dirty evil think I can think of in the universe. It makes me give up, it really does, I just try to laugh, and not think of the extinctions I'll see before I die.
Glad I'm 40, that's all.

[tavalon]

8. The way it's going, we'll be one of the species to exit in this sixth great extinction

I'm sad about the other species but I'm really unsure if we should stay around. We're like a cancer.

[stuntcat]

17. For the sake of every other species,

, the sooner we burn out, the better.
Some amazing beautiful animals are threatened, they're the ones I'm pulling for from now on.

[guardian]

6. I'm I worried yet? .... Not a bit.

Just more alarmist claptrap. Ohhhh the poor honeybees. Funny how you didn't mention how they have made a come back. But the GW Believers have essentially become a doomsday cult. So they focus only on bad news and alarmist predictions. They just feed off one another in this perverted 'group think.' Below is just one example why you are wrong:




Honeybees Have Returned, but Has the Media Noticed?
July 07, 2008 by
Kirby Warden

Since 2007, honey farms all over the country were stricken by the sudden disappearance of their resident honeybees. After much speculation, it was decided that it was due to Colony Collapse Disorder, also known as Vanishing Bee Syndrome. However, scientists were never in complete agreement if this was really the case or if something else entirely was at work.

Never missing a beat, Hollywood jumped on the fear-mongering bandwagon with the production of "The Happening" (read the synopsis at www.imdb.com/title/tt0949731/ at your own risk; it is full of spoilers), which had previews making specific mention of the honeybee disappearance, and we were also greeted with the children's CGI film "Bee Movie" which showed what might happen if honey bees were suddenly absent from their natural task of pollination. Experts all across the country made sure everyone understood how the absence of honeybees would affect agriculture financially.

For about a year the missing honeybees was a hot topic, then suddenly; the media lost interest.

Now, it seems that the honeybees are making a comeback, and the media is largely silent on the phenomenon. Apparently good news just doesn't make the sell in today's modern news broadcast. Fortunately, some beekeepers and other observant nature watchers are communicating the return of the honeybees.

There is still no scientific consensus on why the honeybees disappeared, or where they might have went; did they suffer a massive die-off or did they migrate somewhere for a season? Nor is there any consensus on why they have returned.

Mysterious natural phenomenon such as the disappearance and return of honeybees are things that should be reported on by the media. These are things that affect our lives. In spite of our modern technology and ever-widening gap between us and the natural world, we are still subject to its well being; a symbiosis that we would apparently rather not admit, but one that is inescapable.

It is a sad thing when a random search for current conspiracies uncovers one of the first public discussions regarding the return of honeybees.

[silverweb]

7. One article about bees disproves everything?

Talk about claptrap!

[guardian]

9. Typical response from a "Doomer"

[silverweb]

13. Typical misdirection from a denier.

[GliderGuider]

10. Do you know the phrase "confirmation bias"?

This is a textbook example.

[guardian]

15. The great thing for doomers is that

all events are "confirmation bias". You don't have to exclude anything. Isn't confirmation bias an actual credo for doomers?

* it's cold - global warming doomsday
* it's hot - global warming doomsday
* it rains - global warming doomsday
* there is a drought - global warming doomsday
* its cloudy - global warming doomsday
* its sunny - global warming doomsday
* a particular species is increasing - global warming doomsday
* a particular species is in decline - global warming doomsday
* Pam Anderson gets bigger breast implants - global warming doomsday

You'd probably whine about the return of the Hale-Bopp comet brings destruction. But that isn't set to be back in the solar system to around 4390. And the Mayan calendar is to too soon to be useful. Doomers always need to keep their doomsday predictions a good solid 20-50 years out. Soon enough to alarm people and get the grant money, far enough out to change to different doomsday prediction (or be retired) before you are proved wrong.

[NickB79]

11. Your assertation is full of crap

First, you didn't even post a link to the article you quoted.

Second, from the USDA: http://www.ars.usda.gov/IS/pr/2009/090519.htm


"WASHINGTON--Honey bee colony losses nationwide were approximately 29 percent from all causes from September 2008 to April 2009, according to a survey conducted by the Apiary Inspectors of America (AIA) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

This is less than the overall losses of about 36 percent from 2007 to 2008, and about 32 percent from 2006 to 2007, that have been reported in similar surveys.

"While the drop in losses is encouraging, losses of this magnitude are economically unsustainable for commercial beekeeping," said Jeff Pettis, research leader of the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) Bee Research Laboratory in Beltsville, Md. ARS is USDA's principal intramural scientific research agency. The survey was conducted by Pettis; Dennis vanEngelsdorp, president of AIA; and Jerry Hayes, AIA past president."

The bee population hasn't recovered; it is merely crashing more slowly than it was a year or two ago.

[TxRider]

12. They have also figured out some reasons

Mites and parasites being introduced across continents.

[TxRider]

14. yup

Surely, but it doesn't have much to do with C02 or warming.

More to do with us taking over habitat and developing it. Population growth more than anything.

It's bad to see genetic diversity disappear, but over 99% of species that ever lived are extinct, and this extinction has been underway for quite a long time now.

As for the bees, that seems to be becoming clearer...

"The researchers said the varroa mite, which was accidentally introduced to the U.S. in 1986, is a carrier of picorna-like viruses that damage the ribosomes."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32541662/

[guardian]

16. Thanks for the link and info TxRider

I hadn't heard about the mites as a cause for the bee decline. Thanks for bringing this to my attention.

The story probably didn't get much coverage because it doesn't support the doomer cult. Oh wait, I'm sure the increase in the population of the varroa mite is due to global warming. Let's see. Warmer temperatures is causing the varroa mite to vacation at previously unvisited places. No wait, the mites are actually GLOBAL WARMING REFUGEES! Yeah. Yeah that's the ticket. As yes the picture is clear now. Is that good enough "confirmation bias" for you gliderguider?

[BeFree]

18. Actually

GW will probably be good for Honeybees... the wild ones anyway. Because as the growing zones move further north (already moved up one zone in the last 10 years) flowering species that are easily adaptable to moving - like kudzu and other highly adaptables - will expand their territories and the bees will follow.

Of course, pesticides and other ag chemicals aren't helping the bees, ya think?

Adapt or die. Isn't that how it goes?

[TxRider]

19. Actually the mites are not native

They have been brought here just like fire ants, carp, mussels, and other invasive species.

The bees where they come from in Asia likely have adequate defenses from them.

[guardian]

20. Neither are the honey bees

The commercially raised honey bees in North America are from stock originally brought from Europe. One might claim that honey bees themselves are an "invasive species" and therefore it is a good thing that nature is rectifying the man made problem of introducing the European honeybee to North America.

[TxRider]

21. Better Euro bees than African Bees

Those things have been a bit of a bother in Texas. I wonder if the mites kill them too?

Would be ironic if the killer bees interbreeding ended up being the savior for honey bees.

[guardian]

23. Killer bees are a problem.

I know there have been some efforts to try and dilute the aggressiveness of the Africanized honey bees by trying to bread in more docile traits and releasing the hybrids into killer be populations. Though I haven't heard if they are seeing any significant results.

The Japanese have had a terrible time with the better honey producing European honey bees being decimated by the Japanese giant hornet. The have been trying to create Japanese-European hybrid bees that have the ability to defend their hives from the giant hornets like the Japanese honey bee.

Sometimes using nature works great at combating other natural or man made problems. One company I worked for had a terrible insect problem in one of their old buildings they converted. They released a bunch of praying mantis which ate all the moths then the praying mantis died when the food ran out. Problem solved. No pesticides.

But introducing new species into new habitats has the capacity for tremendous problems. A few examples, rabbits in Australia, kudzu in the US, snakehead fish in the US. Unfortunately, I think the problem of species migration (primarily from artificial means) is with us to stay. With so many people and goods going back and forth around the world its only a matter of time until we see all sorts of species popping up in weird places.

Frankly, I'm still surprised we haven't seen Ebola or other viral hemorrhagic fevers becoming pandemics. All it would take is an airborne variant of the Reston ebola virus that affected humans to hop on an airplane.

Hey maybe that is the solution for all you Doomers? You are wanting to dramatically reduced the world population anyway. What's holding you back? Can't figure out how to engineer a virus that only kills the 'right' people?

[bhikkhu]

24. Deadly pandemics are quite rare for a reason

a disease that kills its host severely limits its own possibilities. One that always kills and kills quickly also runs out of hosts quickly, while mild diseases which are non-debilitating preserve intact their supply of new hosts and new environments.

[guardian]

25. That's what has saved us--so far

If you haven't read it yet, a great book on the subject is The Hot Zone by Richard Preston.

[BeFree]

22. Heh

That's pretty deep ecology there, guardian. "...honey bees themselves are an "invasive species" and therefore it is a good thing that nature is rectifying the man made problem of introducing the European honeybee to North America."

So, might one claim, too, that Europeans themselves are an invasive specie in North America, and that nature will rectify that problem?