Wednesday, August 20, 2008




Evidence mounts that we're in midst of mass extinction event

By Jonathan M. Gitlin | Published: August 19, 2008 - 03:35PM CT

It's difficult to follow the literature right now in ecology without feeling like you need a drink. Pretty much wherever you look there's bad news, and it just keeps coming. It all seems to point to one thing: we're living in the middle of a mass extinction, and we're almost certainly the cause. The irony, if such a word should be used, is that the planet has only just emerged from a mass extinction at the end of the last ice age.

All across the planet, from ecosystem to ecosystem, we're observing a massive loss of biodiversity—bat colonies being wiped out by a mystery pathogen, huge falls among common bird species, and an entire group, the amphibians, are closest to the edge1,2.


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# posted by intcoex : 1:52 AM




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