Climate change could mean the extinction of our species

[Ben]

George Carlin - What would happen if we didn't have electricity

[trish]

The New York Review of Books ran a review of Elizabeth Kolbert’s newt book The Sixth Extinction. The review was written by Verlyn Klinkenborg. I haven’t read the book, but it made onto my short list today. The review was thought provoking. Here are a few excerpts (from the review...not the book).

Klinkenborg, presumably channeling Kobert eloquently describes how we have unhinged the synchronicity of nature’s dynamic processes.

“Nothing we will ever do will ever change the speed at which tectonic plates shift and continents wander. But everything we do now shifts the speed at which other natural processes occur__natural processes that once shifted at roughly geological speed. The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (and the oceans) has changed again and again in earth’s history, but almost always at a rate imperceptible to humans. The same is true of the mix of species on this planet. Catastrophes apart, species haven’t become extinct very often. They disappear at a roughly measurable, roughly steady background rate.
The way we live now__and have lived for the past couple of centuries__has accelerated climate change and the extinction of species into a wholly different dimension.”

In the second half of the review Klinkenborg takes up a question Kolbert leaves in unresolved suspension.

“...’Why should we care.’ Kolbert has compressed that chapter into... ‘It doesn’t matter whether people care or not.’ ...Caring and not caring are merely indiscernible emotional effluents emitted by the dominant species on this planet. How much we care or don’t care about the well-being of other species is overwhelmed__utterly overwhelmed__by how much we care about ourselves.
...
The general tendency of our species is to decrease diversity. We do so by destroying habitats, overconsuming natural resources, and spreading invasive species, willingly or not.
...
Kolbert is right. Whether you care or not is immaterial. The question is this: Have we arrived at this point because of something inherent in our nature? Or has something peculiar in our circumstances brought us here, something we can still hope to alter?”

Klinkenborg reports on an observation Kolbert makes in her book. By quickening the pace of processes that once moved on geological timescales, we have effectively quickened the pace of continental drift.

“As the continents drifted into their present positions, Pangaea slowly broke apart, new barriers arose and they became separated from each other.”

With the isolation enforced by the geographical barriers of this break up, species diverged.

“But species no longer need to move only under their own power. We carry them about the world with us, on planes, in the bilges of ships, unintentionally, on purpose, in business and in pleasure. It’s as though the continents have reconverged, reconstituting Pangaea. As Kolbert puts it, ‘humans are running geologic history backward and at high speed.’ "

Our activities have triggered and continue to trigger the mass extinction of species at rates unseen since the demise of Dinosaurs 65 million years ago. When we so indiscriminately prune the evolutionary tree, we not only terminate species, but we also remove them as pathways to new and diverse evolutionary experiments. We effectively clog the arteries of future evolution.

“...we’re not only altering earthly existence now. We’re also altering the very potential for earthly existence.”

[martin48]

The New York Review of Books ran a review of Elizabeth Kolbert’s newt book The Sixth Extinction.

Is this the right newt book?

[martin48]

As ecologist Paul Ehrlich put it: "In pushing other species to extinction, humanity is busy sawing off the limb on which it perches."

[envivision]

This global warming is a BYATCH, ain't it Obama kool aid drinkers?????

March 17 - 2014: FIVE INCHES OF SNOW ARE FORECAST FOR WASHINGTON DC...

BRRRRRRRRRRR! Hot - hot hot!

[trish]

January 2014 Worldwide hottest month on record since 1880. Envision the difference between climate and weather.

http://www.weather.com/news/science/...trend-20140220

[buttslinger]

In the Revolutionary War the Conservatives were called TORIES, they considered those tea party guys to be traitors to their King.
And by their King, I mean El Rushbo, who else?

[Ben]

Climate Change: Evangelical Scientists Say Limbaugh Wrong, Faith and Science Complement One Another:

http://www.christianpost.com/news/cl...nother-103470/

[Ben]

Abby Martin Interviews Guy Mcpherson: Human Extinction by 2030

[Ben]

What is Wrong With Our Culture [Alan Watts]