"They are also hastened by global warming..."

Of course they are. Everything bad is, at least when you want some grant money to investigate it.

"What many people do not realise is that some of the worst extinctions in the history of life on Earth occurred because of a process very similar to this. In the biggest of the lot, the Great Death of the Permian around 252m years ago, an estimated 95 per cent of marine species were wiped out – rugose corals, nautiloids, armoured fish, trilobites – never to be seen again."

Sorry, in what sense is a transient reversible change to less than 1% of the marine environment comparable to a global extinction? You're reaching here...

"What triggered it is still a scientific mystery..."

Then you have absolutely no reason to link it to the current crop of dead zones.

Your mark: B for facts, F for scaremongering. You need to go back and take some more lessons from James Hansen and Al Gore.

Interesting article Julian.

< The solution to this unsettling problem is quite simple and even technically feasible: it is to recycle our nutrients. >

That’s a very large part of it, but not the whole story. We also need to stop the pressure being exerted on these places from continuously increasing or to strive to reduce it. ie; to deal with population growth.

In places like the Peel/Harvey Inlet in WA, right next to the rapidly growing city of Mandurah, the impact just continues to increase for obvious reasons.

Even if we were really quite successful at recycling nutrients in these places, we wouldn’t be able to do it to more than a certain degree, and the continuously increasing input from increasing population would work directly against it, and either dilute our efforts, cancel them out or completely overwhelm them.

So it’s not good enough to just work on recycling nutrients. We need to take a more holistic approach than that.

“Death and all his friends” (Coldplay)!

...“And in the end we lie awake and dream of making our escape”

That is all very well Julian, but of course mixed in with those
nutrients are also the 83'000 chemicals which you mention. How
adding those back into the food chain will affect it, nobody knows.

Of all the issues mentioned by Julian the one that actually matters is over-fishing, and that's had a major impact. Never mind nutrient run-offs, which have nothing like the effect which Julian fears. Over-fishing has knocked over gigantic fisheries.. as in closed them down completely because the fish aren't ther any more. The example that comes to every one's mind is the grand banks fishery in Canada. If you search the net you will also find serious suggestions that all fisheries will be closed by 2050 due to over-fshing.

It is typical of this sort of material that the author recommends a hugely expensive solution that addresses the wrong problem. In that respect the article may be even harmful.

What to do about over-fishing? One solution often proposed is to give fishermen (fisherpeople?) a commercial stake in their fishery, which seems to be the Australian solution but I'd have to look harder myself to work it out.

There is very little awareness of the problem let alone any proper communication to the public about required solutions, and this article does not help.

I don't think you can get more 'holistic' than recycling nutrients, Ludwig.
For years now, I have been advocating farmers should treat their land as if it were a vessel; for sustainability inputs must equal -or exceed- outputs.
This means all the 'chemicals' leaving farms -in the form of beef, lamb, chicken, pork, eggs, milk, vegetables, grain...- must be replaced by (hopefully cheaper) chemicals coming back to the farm.
What could be cheaper than that which is described as “waste”, which currently costs money to get rid of?
This attitude can and should be applied not only to farms, but also to individuals, communities, nations and continents.
Imagine starting from scratch in an enclosed arcology with strictly limited resources. It would be absolutely vital that those resources not be lost or wasted. Everything, including dead bodies, would need to be recycled. If any resource was lost, the carrying capacity of the arcology would be reduced.
The population of living organisms would need to be reduced.
Now all we have to do is get people to understand we are living in just such an enclosed arcology.
It seems a lot of people just can't get their head around the fact that, no matter how big the world is, it is still finite, and resources can still be utterly wasted and lost.
Rest assured, Ludwig, your preoccupation with population density will inevitably resolve itself.
The question is, how painful will the resolution be?
Changing the common mindset concerning recycling resources is part and parcel of population density, in a finite world.
BTW, excellent article, Julian Cribb

Please excuse my intrusion into this thread!

Yes, this is truly an excellent article, a worrisome one, but what of the gigantic dead-zone that will be created when Israel nukes Iran?

Sure, we need to deal with nutrients, etc, but the most pressing need in the world today is to stop Nutty Yahoo from attacking Iran which will reciprocate big-time and most likely begin a process that will end up in WW3 and Armageddon.

The world seems able to deal with low to moderate priority issues but ignores the deranged elephant in the room which is preparing to charge!

Let's deal with life and death issues first! Ring your local member today. Ask why the Australian Government has made no warning comment about Israel's madness or offered any criticism.

Well researched informative article!
Yes, it's a mystery, why we pay ever increasing prices for hydrocarbon based fertilizers, all while we pour millions of tons of it annually out to sea, to the endless detriment of the marine environment!
When we could, given little more than the political will, convert all of it to energy, plus thoroughly sanitized organic fertilizer and soil improving carbon!
[The only reason algae contribute to this problem, is because they basically run out of nutrients and then die of starvation!]
Aussie innovation has created a smell free sealed two tank system, that converts, high rise/village, suburban biological waste into methane, which can then power a stationary engine or, [more Aussie innovation,] ceramic fuel cell(s), which not only silently converts the methane to energy, creating mostly water vapour in the process, but endless free hot water.
[Adding in food scraps and wastage, creates a saleable surplus of energy; or, power for residents' electric vehicles!]
The by-products include carbon rich fertilizer and reusable nutrient loaded water, which would support algae farming, which would provide an endless source of oil!
Some algae are up to 60% oil.
Algae are able to absorb 2.5 times their bodyweight in Co2 emission. Under optimised conditions, where the nutrient keeps on coming, they can double that bodyweight and absorption capacity every 24 hours.
A process that continues as long as their nutrient rich water supply does!
We pour millions of tons of the stuff out to sea every year, exponentially adding to the alluded to problems!
Looking at the problems or outcomes, you'd be forgiven for thinking, if our "Leaders" had an active brain between them, it'd likely be very lonely.
Rhrosty.

Interesting that a couple of comments on the article linked to, tore the whole thing, & it's methodology to pieces.

When will these greenies learn to tell the truth? I'm sure there is some in that piece, & this one somewhere, but it is lost, when the whole thing is discarded due to the exaggeration.

Greens, if you want any credibility, particularly in the wake of the global warming fiasco, tell it as it really is. As soon as you start embellishing your fact with fiction, you loose me, & so many like me.

Make sure what you are going to say checks out, every time, & you'll get much further.

Very sorry to hear you've been 'loosed' hasbeen. Imodium, perhaps?
Or somethink like that.

David G wrote:

>>but what of the gigantic dead-zone that will be created when Israel nukes Iran?>>

LOL, you really are obsessing about this aren't you?

Unlike the problem of dead zones this one has an easy solution. If Iran ceases its nuclear weapons development program (subject to verification of course) and leaves Israel alone it will not get nuked.

Problem solved.

However I do not think the Israelis plan on nuking Iran for now. They may try and defang the country with a conventional attack but I do not think that would succeed. However an attack on their nuclear sites coupled with an attack on their oil and gas export infrastructure may do the trick. The Iranian government gets 80% of its revenue from hydrocarbon exports. Cutting off your enemy's financial cojones is a good way of winning a war.

I think a nuclear war in the M-E is likely; but not yet.

Well, at least we both agree that Israel will nuke Iran, Steven.

The problem is that the religiously-inspired Dead-Zone inside the heads of the Israelis and their belief that some mythical God is encouraging their imperialism does not lead to rational behaviour.

Israel is capable of anything. A nation of fearful deranged people with an arsenal of nukes is TROUBLE!

Bombing Iran will ignite the fuse of Armageddon!

*Bombing Iran will ignite the fuse of Armageddon!*

Well it could be worse, David G. Iran could get the bomb, in
which case Saudi Arabia will do the same. With those two armed,
every tinpot dictatorship in the ME, will want the same and they
have the oil money to pay for it.

So with a whole host of ME countries, all with their finger on
the nuclear trigger, your armageddon might well happen!

>>Well it could be worse, David G. Iran could get the bomb, in
which case Saudi Arabia will do the same. With those two armed,
every tinpot dictatorship in the ME, will want the same and they
have the oil money to pay for it.<<

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGptO6j3G-U

Cheers,

Tony

To put the thinking of Israel and Iran in proper context something that is not mentioned to any great extent in mainstream media is the imagined return of the Twelfth Imam. Google it, for more information.

Geoffrey Robertson made mention of this in his presentation at the 2012 Global Atheist Convention in April this year. The video (number 16) can be viewed here and if not wanting to watch the whole speech, start at 38:46

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7C0CA45F60FD44C7&feature=plcp

David

David G

Never mind, I'm sure Israel won't nuke Iran unless they really deserve it ;-)

Atheist Foundation of Australia Inc

I have frequently drawn people's attention to Geoffrey Robinson's findings on the murder of political prisoners in Iran. I am afraid that when people's minds have been infected with the virus of anti-Semitism the facts don't matter.

For those who are interested Robinson's report is available online here:

http://www.unarts.org/H-II/ref/IMReport1988.pdf

stevenlmeyer,

I know what you mean about the mind virus problem. It is a serious mental health issue. There is, as you say, the selective anti-Semitic virus and then the Islamic, Christian and Jewish viruses of the mind. Of course, there are thousands of others.

One would think that the penny would drop with each person with a virus making them question if their own affinities to unproven concepts might be the result of a similar virus.

Such is the power of these mind viruses that folk are immune to that very logical conclusion.

And before we get the defensive mechanism coming out and blurting that atheists also suffer from a virus, I would ask how something akin to non-stamp collecting can be classed as a virus. It can’t’.

Knowing that such viruses cause incredible amounts of harm and they may end the human race and maybe all biological life, these dreadful thoughts would help in overcoming the viral effects. But, most unfortunately, they don’t.

The only cure seems to be that children should be kept well away from being infected.

David

Atheist Foundation of Australia Inc wrote:

>>And before we get the defensive mechanism coming out and blurting that atheists also suffer from a virus,...>>

Atheists may suffer from all manner of mind viruses. Stalin and Mao are cases in point. I would argue that so is Hitler although he, like Stalin, invoked Christianity when it suited him.

However atheism itself is not a mind virus. One cannot attribute the misdeeds of Mao and Stalin to atheism in the way one can truly say that the murderous mullah regime in Iran is the result of at least one interpretation of Islam.

Please do not try to tell me that being an atheist protects you from mind viruses. They are plenty of non-theistic mind viruses around.

And atheists can be pretty soft-headed. For me the breaking point with the Left came when I witnessed the reaction of so many supposedly atheist lefties to the fatwa against Salman Rushdie. Among those who seemed to blame Rushdie himself for the fatwa were Germaine Greer, John Berger and John Le Carré.

Full disclosure. I am myself an atheist in the sense that I see no evidence for the existence of the sort of deity described in any of the world's holy books. I cannot disprove the existence of some entity that created the universe but I strongly doubt such a being exists. I do not know how the universe came to be, why it exists and whether we are the reason for its existence assuming there is a reason. I do not expect ever to find answers for these questions.

stevenlmeyer,

The tyrannical dictators to which you refer had ideological mind viruses or were pathologically inclined. We all live in a different age now and if such characters tried to impost on civilisation in the same manner, atheists would be the first to oppose.

That is not saying that others wouldn't also.

Of course atheists have mind viruses as you have pointed out but I see no evidence, none, zilch, nada of any type that would destroy civilisation as a goal.

By the way, it is Geoffrey Robertson and not Robinson. A mistake that often happens.:)

David

Wow! Heavy stuff, people. I must write more about nutrients: it obviously brings out the big guns. Some brief responses:
JonJ: sorry, it's the chemistry that links it. Global warming is not essential to this, but the geology says it is an important driver. I trust you do not dispute that warming has occurred in the geological past...
Ludwig: I think we can recycle most nutrients. The dairy industry, for example is making great progress in that regard. So are Denmark and Holland. Oz, as usual is a decade or two behind the frontrunners.
Yabby: there are proven technologies to remove these chemicals from the food chain. Expensive maybe, but they work. It's an easy choice: cost or cancer?
Curmudgeon: you're right: overfishing is a big part of this. I didn't have room to discuss the nuances. However the solution to overfishing is aquaculture. By mid century wild fisheries will be in the same category as wild whale and seal harvests: nonexistent. Peak fish was in 2004, and the catch has been going down ever since (FAO).
Hasbeen: great name, mate. Who's a green? I'm only an old bloke who'd like his grandkids to survive and do OK.
Steven&the nukies: by all means let us worry about nukes and who has 'em. Let us not at the same time forget what is is that keeps us alive, day to day. Nutrients. Try going 72 hours without them. Let's look after them a bit better, is all. Then we can worry about nukes with a full tummy.

Atheist Foundation of Australia Inc,wrote:

>>The tyrannical dictators to which you refer had ideological mind viruses or were pathologically inclined. ... if such characters tried to impost on civilisation in the same manner, atheists would be the first to oppose>>

Oh really?

You mean unlike the atheist Stalin worshippers of the 1930s or the atheist Mao worshippers of the 1960s or the atheist apologists for Islam in the 1990s?

Or unlike the good atheists at the London School of Economics who took the Gadaffi Family Foundation's money a few years ago?

You think the KGB's torturers were somehow not as bad as the mullah's?

You think atheist North Korea is not as scary as Iran?

You haven't noticed that the atheist Mr. Putin is turning Russia into a sort of Saudi Arabia with the Russian Orthodox Church cast in the role of the Wahhabbis? Atheist dictators are quite good at manipulating religions for their own ends.

Give me a break!

As a matter of plain fact I think atheists are closer to the truth than believers on the question of the existence of a deity.

But in my experience atheism is no guarantee of virtue and belief in God does not automatically make someone evil.

And I find atheist smugness as irritating as the Christian / Jewish / Muslim variety.

>>Let us not at the same time forget what is is that keeps us alive, day to day. Nutrients. Try going 72 hours without them. Let's look after them a bit better, is all. Then we can worry about nukes with a full tummy.<<

Where's the connection between eutrophication and starvation? I don't dislike seafood - except prawns - but I don't eat it very often either. If all the fish died because the oceans turned hypoxic that would be a terrible and tragic thing. But I'd still have plenty to eat and therefore a full tummy to worry about nukes on.

Cheers,

Tony

stevenlmeyer,

Atheists are those saying they don’t know and instead are pointing out where religion is demonstrably wrong. Religionists are proclaiming they do know. Who is smug? If you don’t recognise atheism today as being a positive force for humanity but have to revert to the early 20th century to support an erroneous view grasped at by mainly the faithful, then you are distorting history and muddying the present.

It is unimportant if atheists are wrong today, the main point is that religion is observably mistaken in many of its teachings.

Show me some present-day examples of atheism today where its words or actions threatens to bring society back to barbarity. Aligning atheism today with past ideological tyrannies is mindless rhetoric without reason or sense.

It is a stawman statement to say atheism guarantees virtue. Who has said that? Atheism is pointing out the real and potential harms of religion and nothing else. Neither religion nor you have pointed out the opposite.

I would suggest you stop straddling the fence on your high horse of being on neither side.Your ‘full disclosure’ is what atheism is about except that thinking in a growing number of people leads to recognition of the actual errors perpetrated by religion. You don’t have to join those folk but you should realise why those thoughts are becoming commonplace.

Are you as an atheist, a danger to civilisation because that is what you are saying about others like you?

Start quoting from the vast amount of recent literature by atheists where there is some kind of danger to humanity.

You make me despair.

David

G'day Tony,
I would suggest the 'link' lies in the excessive nutrients, Not required in the oceans, Are required on land.
Currently we mine nutrients and through a convoluted digestive process, dump them at sea.
This is obviously a linear process which can only have one eventual outcome, as the mines are finite.
While a perfectly circular process is not possible (some losses are inevitable) surely a More circular process is just common sense?
Particularly when the loss of valuable nutrients is harming other parts of the ecology.
I imagine Ludwig would agree that, if we can't create a perfectly circular system, then a spiralling system -where diminishing resources are balanced against diminishing populations- would still be more rational than a linear process ending in...?
While I have no desire to join the debates on Nuclear War in the ME or another tiresome debate about atheism on this thread about nutrients, Scarcity of essential commodities is obviously a very good reason for war.
We have a very large planet which should be enough to support us for thousands, if not millions of years.
Yet we are already predicting the complete loss of essential commodities within just a few hundred.
Such profligacy can only make war inevitable. The fact that it probably won't occur within our lifetimes doesn't make it excusable.
We in the 'first world' have an unprecedented ability to talk to our great great great grandchildren.
Almost everyone can afford to make a video of themselves that their family can watch down through the ages.
Who wants to explain to their ggg grandchild that the reason they are at war is because we just didn't care?

Hi Julian. Reading through some of these posts, with their references to Atheism, religions of the book, Iran, Israel, Putin, Stalin; and or, the almost immediately imminent Armageddon?
It is self evidently and patently clear, that the largest dead zone, is between the ears of some of the posters, who as usual, are way off topic, off the planet?
Or, quite blatantly abusing the privilege extended by OLO, and using the site as a par for the course platform, for patently puerile political propaganda?
Rhrosty.

Alarmist and exaggerated. The mass extinctions on Earth have usually come from extraterrestrial sources such as asteroids etc or from vulcanism. Pesticides and man has a miniscule effect in comparison with these massive forces.

Another case of fear mongering with scant evidence. Apart from that the Earth has recovered at least 5 times from Mass extinctions from major catastrophic events so some extra of phosphate isn't going to cause a mass extinction. Calm down.

Your comment Mr Atman is valid. Certainly nutrients are not going to bring about human extinction. Global warming could, as will nuclear war.

Mr Rhrosty, you push aside the distinct possibility of nuclear war being started by Israel in the next few months at your peril. The threat is immediate and may well lead to catastrophe as you would know if you bothered to inform yourself (read some of the articles on Information Clearing House for some thoughts and observations written by prominent Americans).

P.S. Helpful Hint: Your long-winded comments are a feature on OLO but they would have much more force if they were reduced by at least 75%. Cheers.

Atman,

How can dead soil - devoid of microbes - "recover" when man persists in pouring pesticides on it? He assumes he doesn't need a living soil because he can keep sprinkling petrochemical nutrient upon it, much of which which ends ends up in the aquifers and the oceans.

Stupid and arrogant behaviour from "not so wise wise" man.

Atman - you need to read a bit of science, mate. Most past extinctinons were NOT from extraterrestrial sources. Only one that we know of was. The current one, estimated (by eminent biologists) to be eliminating >30,000 species a year, is almost entirely driven by human activity. I wrote the piece because most people do not realise we can also cause extinctions in the oceans: well we can, and that's how.

JulianC - Good article, thank you.

I am surprised by some of the comments on this thread - the side tracks on religion, nukes, middle east tensions, and arguments over global warming - and an unwitting or misinformed dismissal of the seriousness of the issues raised in the article.

Could such response be attesting to a developing antipathy towards environmental issues, or a general overload of critical issues in world affairs, of financial/resources and/or political/conflict origin, causing a 'mind fog' or 'brain blur'? We have only one complex, finite and multifaceted environment, and we ignore its well-being at our ultimate peril.

A Google search on 'worldwide oxygen production' reveals that the world's oceans and waterways produce between 50 to 90% of the world's oxygen. This fact, together with the shrinking capacity of the ocean to absorb and either diffuse/defuse or recycle all manner of humanity's waste (upon which we have relied so heavily in the past), as testified by these 'dead zones', should be ringing alarm bells - as should also the incidence of whale/porpoise beachings, unexplained fish-kills and the growing incidence of deformities and disease in our marine inhabitants.

The oceans are also a massive producer of food for millions of people, all of whom are now becoming slowly poisoned. If we continue to kill the oceans, they in turn will kill us.

It is of course not only excess nutrients but all manner of pollution, chemicals and toxins which we invest to the oceans/waterways - including nuclear waste and radiation. But nature's 'garbage dump' is reacting and revolting at this abuse. Can we not hear it screaming?

We appear to need a massive injection of holistic altruism in our life philosophies. 'Man' does not produce food or life, Nature does.

I really cannot take seriously an article that tells me I'm the cause of global warming because of an increase in the number of ocean areas devoid of oxygen because:

1. the author indicates records only began in the 1850's
2. that such a phenomenon is not new and had occurred naturally
'In the biggest of the lot, the Great Death of the Permian around 252m years ago...'

and then goes on to tell us

'What triggered it is still a scientific mystery...'

without any schintilla of scientific proof that says such a natural phenomenon isn't the cause of current hotspots ... which may have or have not occurred between 252 million years ago and the 1850's when records were first utilised.

I thought acts of faith were the realm of religious people.

Julian C - You should read what I actually said. I said USUALLY from extra terrestrial sources AND volcanoes. I didn't say exclusively from extraterrestrial sources.

1. K-T extinction- probably asteroid or comet.
2. End Triassic extinction - probably vulcanism
3. Permian Triassic extinction- probably vuncanism
4. Late Devonian extinctions - Cold snaps, probably caused by ash and dust kicked up by either astronomical impacts or massive volcanism.
5.Ordovician-Silurian extinctions- possible due to plant growth reducing the temp.

http://www.livescience.com/1752-greatest-mysteries-mass-extinctions.html

So science tell us a quite different story from yours. Extinctions didn't occur because of your so-called dead zones (whatever they are).

Poirot- you said "How can dead soil - devoid of microbes - "recover" when man persists in pouring pesticides on it?"

Well the Earth has recovered from 5 Mass extinctions and a whole lot of smaller calamities. The pesticide issue is not going to cause a mass extinction.

In fact despite the current bizarre claims of a 6th mass extinction caused by man, VERY FEW species have been declared extinct in the last 150 yrs. Many of those which have are due to habitat loss not caused by man or by natural causes such as changes to local environments.

There are up to 50 million species on earth very few have become extinct in the recent past. More species are discovered each year than actually become extinct. Hardly a Mass extinction. Our estimation of the number of species on earth is actually growing.

Julian C - Your claim that 30,000 species a year are being lost is complete nonsense. Really? What eco looney masquerading as a Biologist said that?

The UN red list lists a grand total of 801 extinct species many of which simply haven't been seen for some time or are extinct only in a local area. 801 out of 50 million??

Mass extinction?... only in your dreams

Listen, let's be clear, the Israelis, assisted by the U.S., are in charge of mass extinction!

The nutrient bomb is not as powerful as the nuclear bomb or as fast-acting. View photographs of Nagasaki and Hiroshima if you don't believe me.

Kiss your children every night. The stars are approaching the midnight hour.

Oh well, regardless of whether the science is correct (can science in an area this complex ever be "correct"? Why can't we just accept that some pretty compelling evidence points to the fact that it's a worrying trend, and do whatever we can to prevent it?), this presents an interesting conceptual phenomenon: economic development doesn't just produce obesity in individuals, it occurs on a global scale as well!

It also reminds me of a novel I enjoyed reading a few years ago - Cloud Atlas - in which, centuries from now, vast areas of the world are "deadlanded" and people are confined to small areas. Not beyond the realms of possibility.

Good article Julian, thanks.

'Scientist ' who speak of stories 250 million years ago really are a joke. If you really want to learn from history go back about 4000 years ago when all but a few were wiped out by a flood. Next time it will be fire and n ot because we don't look after the enviroment but because mankind including scientist are to arrogrant to see the correlation between our inward corruption and diaster. Instead they self righteously sprout off about being 'concerned ' for the environment as some noble cause. If man becomes clean on the inside then the enviroment will certainly be better off.

Sam Jandwich, your post-modern view that no-one can know the truth about Science while concurrently accepting internet opinion as factual and a book you read as prophetic, reflects society's real disaster. That is that now, people cannot separate opinion from fact and real experts have no greater standing than amateur, untrained people with fertile imaginations. That is truly a disaster.

Atman: the answer is EO Wilson and Niles Eldrige, who probably know a heck of sight more biology than you do. Some remdial info here: http://www.whole-systems.org/extinctions.html

>>If you really want to learn from history go back about 4000 years ago when all but a few were wiped out by a flood.<<

4000 years ago Egypt was in it's 'Middle Kingdom' period. Funny how the flood didn't seem to affect them. I suppose they were just very good at holding their breaths.

Cheers,

Tony

Atman,

The proliferation of deep-sea oil rigs, tar sands mining, the explosion of the international gas trade, the embracing of 'fracking' and suspension of regard for clean air and clean water security, the conversion of food cropping to ethanol and bio-fuel production, and the ever-increasing destruction of habitats and ecosystems in the name of progress, all should give you some idea of the desperation of the developed and developing world to avoid addressing the inevitable downward spiral on which we are so fully, illogically, unconscionably and insanely engaged.

There is only one conclusion and only one outcome. We are currently fully engaged on the manic pursuit of that which we fear most, Armageddon. (Or the birth of a new Red Planet.)

Hopefully the world will retreat from this course before it is too late, but the time to start is now!

The writing is on the wall for all to see, and it is in bold, unmistakeable, irrefutable type, such that only the willfully blind could not comprehend. Time to wake up, world. 'Curiosity' exploring Mars and maintenance of international space stations may be great science, but at home 'Rome' is burning.

Talk about shades of 'Nero', the three 'Wise Monkeys' seem to be running rampant in the halls of power, busy checking their stash of nuts or gazing at the stars. 'Sapiens Incongruita'.

TL,

That is silly, really, holding their breaths for many months!? Not possible. A far better explanation is they used the power from alien constructed Pyramids to keep the 30,000 feet high wall of water on their borders. That’s a far more sensible explanation.

Maybe runner should have a look at this video. I know it may be the work of the Devil or made by a conspiracy of scientists who are fools in their hearts, but it is still interesting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1m4mATYoig

David

JulianC - Yes E O Wilson is an eminent biologist but these numbers are high end estimates only. He is an activist environmentalist like his co estimator Paul Ehrlich. Ehrlich has been astronomically incorrect on numerous occasions so its bad company to be in. Again, I ask, how can anyone estimate these numbers accurately when we don't even know how many species actually exist?

There is no evidence for species loss in addition to known species loss other than theories and estimates. They are based on mathematical models and we know how flawed they can be.

Atman,

"...untrained people with fertile imaginations...."

Not the only thing that's fertile.

Some nice images here:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/07/pictures/110725-algae-china-beaches-qingdao-swimming-science-environment-world/

You appear to be remarkably selective, Atman.
“That is that now, people cannot separate opinion from fact and real experts have no greater standing than amateur, untrained people with fertile imaginations.”
And you are?

“Yes E O Wilson is an eminent biologist but...”
His opinion just doesn't stack up against an untrained amateur with no imagination?

“The UN red list lists a grand total of 801 extinct species many of which simply haven't been seen for some time”

You might be interested in this article published in the Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/mar/07/extinction-species-evolve

but then again, probably not. Here is a relevant extract:

“Only 869 extinctions have been formally recorded since 1500, however, because scientists have only "described" nearly 2m of an estimated 5-30m species around the world, and only assessed the conservation status of 3% of those, the global rate of extinction is extrapolated from the rate of loss among species which are known. In this way the IUCN calculated in 2004 that the rate of loss had risen to 100-1,000 per millions species annually – a situation comparable to the five previous "mass extinctions" – the last of which was when the dinosaurs were wiped out about 65m years ago.”

“More species are discovered each year than actually become extinct.”
Yes, the operative word here is 'discovered'. These species aren't suddenly appearing or evolving to replace extinct species; we just didn't know about them or haven't yet gotten around to classifying them.
It seems a majority of 'real experts' agree that extinctions are occurring faster than evolved replacements, and there is no denying humanity has made and is still making egregious changes to many, indeed almost every ecological niche, world wide.
Since we are deliberately modifying the very atmosphere of the entire planet, how can every environment not be affected?

Continued...
“Apart from that the Earth has recovered at least 5 times from Mass extinctions from major catastrophic events...”
This quote from Atman I find the most peculiar. “The Earth”? Are you referring to the rock circling the Sun which is 2/3rds covered in water? It would survive nuclear holocaust or massive bolide impacts.
The biosphere has recovered at least 5 times, but each time it was massively altered, and significant numbers of species were gone for good, to make way for new species.
Hardly a consolation to those species wiped out.

http://www.actionbioscience.org/newfrontiers/eldredge2.html
another extract:
“Though it is true that life, so incredibly resilient, has always recovered (though after long lags) after major extinction spasms, it is only after whatever has caused the extinction event has dissipated. That cause, in the case of the Sixth Extinction, is ourselves — Homo sapiens. This means we can continue on the path to our own extinction, or, preferably, we modify our behavior toward the global ecosystem of which we are still very much a part. The latter must happen before the Sixth Extinction can be declared over, and life can once again rebound.”

This is I think is the most significant point. After Humanity causes the 6th mass extinction, will we just go away and let “the Earth” recover?
A process 'real experts' agree takes millions of years?
I think it needs to be understood that Mass Extinctions, even those caused by cataclysmic impacts, don't occur in human time frames. The geological record indicates they occur over thousands of years. Even the most recent and famous end of Cretaceous impact wasn't an overnight phenomenon. Recent studies indicate dinosaurs were already declining in numbers when the singular event occurred, as only an estimated 17% of all species were lost (including a virtual 100% of dinosaur species.)
Since we are only at the very beginning of the most recent event which will take hundreds of years to unfold, naturally the Denialist camp will say “why worry? We're alright, Jack. Not our problem, even if we are the cause.”

Correction:
for "17% of all species were lost", please read 17% of 'families'.
(a family may contain a number of species.)
Oops.

Atman said "Sam Jandwich, your post-modern view that no-one can know the truth about Science while concurrently accepting internet opinion as factual and a book you read as prophetic, reflects society's real disaster. That is that now, people cannot separate opinion from fact and real experts have no greater standing than amateur, untrained people with fertile imaginations. That is truly a disaster."

Atman, your rather transparent and undignified bad faith in misreading my comment marks you out as someone who is simply not worth engaging with - though I'm sure Julian C, and anyone else who is able to separate fact from fantasy already knew that.

Grim - In answer to your question, I am a trained person ...I have a Science degree from a prominent university in a period where facts were actually important not computer projections or alarming guesstimates from bloggers or activist/scientists. That doesn't make me an expert but it can make it easier to distinguish fact from fiction.

Secondly, You're right,I wouldn't read The Guardian as it employs unqualified eco loons such as George Monbiot to argue its Green Left agenda. As for the quote, its again all about estimates and estimates with a massive error range. I've heard quotes from 2-100 million as the estimated number of species on the planet. The error range here is over 90% therefore so will be the extinction rate error.

Your quote about the Earth is just pedantic and silly. Most people would include the biosphere when talking about planet earth, I'm not sure why you wouldn't.

The whole extinction argument is conjecture, projections and assumptions most of which are catastrophic and blamed on man. I cannot see evidence for a 'mass extinction' particularly as there are only 800 or so species documented extinction.Some were declared extinct only to be rediscovered to still exist later elsewhere. Many of the already document extinctions were NOT caused by man.

So while there are only 800 or so apparent extinctions (this also needs to be qualified) documented, we are being asked to believe there are actually 30,000 a year occurring without any actual evidence other than the projections made on estimates with a huge error rate. No thanks, I'll stick to real science not pop science.