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Scientists Say Earth Is On The Verge Of Collapse
Human-generated
pressures, at their current pace, will likely drive our planet's
ecosystems to an irreversible collapse in the coming decades,
according to a new paper in the journal Nature.
6
June, 2012
The
paper, titled "Approaching
a state-shift in Earth's biosphere,"
is the work of 18 scientists from Chile, Canada, Finland, the U.K.,
Spain and the United States.
Based
on a review of scientific theories, ecosystem modeling and
fossils, the researchers concluded that accelerating loss of
biodiversity, extreme climate fluctuations and a radically changing
total energy budget are precursors to reaching a planetary tipping
point that would be followed by an irreversible collapse
of our planet's ecosystems.
The
paper echoes the most recent scientific research on the adverse
effects of overpopulation, over-consumption, biodiversity
loss, energy
scarcity and climate
change on
the environment.
- The UN just published its Global Environmental Outlook, which states that humanity's path is unsustainable because of over-logging, over-fishing, water scarcity and lack of action on climate change.
- An April report by the Royal Society found that the combination of population growth in the least developed countries and over-consumption in developed countries is threatening the natural environment and human well-being.
- World Wildlife Fund's Living Planet 2012 Report found that there was a 28 percent reduction in global biodiversity between 1970 and 2008, and the world needs 1.5 years to replenish the natural resources that we consume in a single year. (WWF notes that by 2030 two earths won't even be enough to sustain human consumption and that if everyone in the world lived like an average resident of the USA, a total of four Earths would be required to regenerate humanity’s annual demand on nature).
- A recent study found that 90 percent of mammal species will lose habitat because of climate change in the coming decades.
- Here is a chart from the WWF report about our ecological footprint:
"In
a nutshell, humans have not done anything really important to stave
off the worst because the social structures for doing something just
aren't there," researcher Arne Mooers said in
a press release."My
colleagues who study climate-induced changes through the earth's
history are more than pretty worried. In fact, some are terrified."
The
study notes that the current rate
of climate change exceeds
the rate during the last extreme planetary state change that ended
the last
Ice Age, 12,000
years ago. The last
time the
rate of climate change was this high was at the end of the dinosaur
era.
The
authors recommend that world governments undertake five actions
immediately to have any hope of delaying or minimizing the
shift of the planetary state. According to Mooers:
Society
globally has to collectively decide that we need to drastically
lower our population very quickly. More of us need to move to
optimal areas at higher density and let parts of the planet recover.
Folks like us have to be forced to be materially poorer, at least in
the short term. We also need to invest a lot more in creating
technologies to produce and distribute food without eating up more
land and wild species. It's
a very tall order.
The
researchers conclude that we will reach a point of no return if we
exceed the 50 percent mark of wholesale transformation of
Earth's surface; we've already reached 43 percent through our
conversion of landscapes into agricultural and urban areas.
With
the human population set to grow by a further two billion by 2050,
we are set to exceed the 50 percent threshold much sooner than we'd
like.
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