
Biodiversity falls below ‘safe levels’ globally - upen
http://sciencebulletin.org/archives/3219.html
======
flippyhead
This is indeed very depressing. A very excellent book about the scope of this
problem is "The Sixth Extinction" [1]. One crazy anecdote from the book: the
author explains how rare it should be to witness _any_ extinction of a species
within one's lifetime. The average "background" rate of extinction is
something like one per one thousand years. During the course of writing the
book, the author _personally_ witnessed something like five species go
extinct. It some ways this is an incredible time to be alive, but in many it's
the most depressing time one could imagine... ever?

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sixth_Extinction:_An_Unnat...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sixth_Extinction:_An_Unnatural_History)

~~~
radiorental
While I completely agree we are in unprecedented times of our own[1] making...

I will call into question the idea of a 'background extinction rate of 1
species /1000 years'.

We currently have a deeper understanding of our planet's ecosystem compared to
any time in our recorded history. If someone from 1000 years ago observed an
extinction, it does not mean there were not many other species coming to a
natural end.

[1] We are a product of nature, the current imbalance of primary predator over
the food chain is a product of both our intelligence and growth. It's a well
understood predator/prey cycle. You cannot have who were are without what we
cause, as much as we'd like to think otherwise.

The issue, fundamentally, is 7 billion humans on the planet. Doing something
about that number would no longer make us human.

Fasten your seatbelts, there's some turbulence ahead, putting your trays in
the upright position will have little effect on the outcome.

~~~
mbenjaminsmith
> Doing something about that number would no longer make us human.

I really struggle with this. Apart from "evil" countries like China we do very
little to try to steer the reproductive outcome / health of our own species.
We aggressively breed domesticated animals and plants but apart from class
stratification we do almost nothing to ensure a positive genetic future for
ourselves.

Why not? I'm not suggesting we prevent certain people from having kids (who?
who decides?) but awareness of really basic concepts like "kids are expensive,
have fewer or none if you're poor" simply aren't out there or are ineffective.

My wife and I (I'm an entrepreneur and a software engineer, my wife is GM of a
company in architectural design) very deliberately decided to have one child.
Our nanny on the other hand has three (grown) children. They're all in the
same income bracket as she is and all having children of their own.

It's pretty well known that smarter / better educated people have fewer kids.
That means that our current 7 billion is mostly those least equipped to raise
the next generation and also those most likely to increase its size.

Again, I'm not suggesting we have the government try to regulate reproductive
rights. (Governments rapidly accumulating power via technology is another
problem we have to deal with as a species.) But what about global awareness?
Or what about incentivizing the poorest people to have fewer children via
social programs, education, etc.

And, just in case: No, you can't compare what I'm suggesting to Nazi Germany.
This has nothing to do with race. I don't think race is even a meaningful
concept when discussing humans. This is about us taking responsibly for our
future and the health of the only planet we'll be able to call home for the
foreseeable future -- by raising awareness of our collective responsibility to
future generations, our strengths and weaknesses as custodians of.

[Edit]

Was really hoping to spark a meaningful discussion here. I think this is the
elephant in the room wrt our future as a species -- as important as curbing
CO2 emissions or detecting / destroying the next killer asteroid.

1\. Just for the record, no, I did not call China evil. I thought that was
self evident. I guess not. If I thought Chinese people were evil my son
wouldn't be half Chinese.

2\. Yes, there are a number of reasons poor people have more children than
they should. None of those negate what I am saying. I'm suggesting we need to
educate the poor on choices that will benefit themselves, their children and
the human race as a whole.

~~~
fsloth
_Apart from "evil" countries like China_

I know you put 'evil' in quotes but I still find this trivializes the
governance of a country of over billion people and three millenia of
continuous government (yes, the communist party may not be called a dynasty
but if you look at it from historical perspective it's a direct continuation
of the bureaucratic autocratic system that's dominated the area before Plato
and Aristotle ).

 _Or what about incentivizing the poorest people to have fewer children via
social programs, education, etc._

IMO, there are two main reasons for high birth rates: 1. lots of children are
a form of capital in capital poor areas 2. there is very little else to do
than breed in the evenings. 3. these two create a behaviour pattern in society
where having lots of children is the social proven option.

If one does not want to go the china way then one needs to affect these causes
directly. For 2. I suppose giving entertainment would lower birth rates. For 1
- well, I have no idea what to do with that apart from supporting economic
growth.

~~~
lunchTime42
I dont trust you to hold back on the lottery tickets and not start a civil war
- so to secure my future, i got to put lots of lottery tickets into the pot.

Gametheory makes us do it.

~~~
lunchTime42
Imagine a civ where this scenario ran away- for thousands of years. Behaviour
optimized towards this.

------
Razengan
It's an scary thought: It may not be that intelligent life is so rare in this
universe, but rather that it is very rare for intelligent life to _sustain
itself_ for long enough to colonize the galaxy..

For all that we've learned and have built, we still don't have a Plan B. No
foreseeable alternative to this planet if it goes belly up, one way or the
other.

What's worse, we're still not over our politics and economics and artificial
borders; all the things that keep us rooted here and actually headed backwards
into primitivity.

Even if Elon Musk or some other zillionaire launches a successful
extraterrestrial habitation program, sooner or later it will fall prey to the
same old national interests from back home.

~~~
ekianjo
> For all that we've learned and have built, we still don't have a Plan B. No
> foreseeable alternative to this planet if it goes belly up, one way or the
> other.

It's not like it's easy either. Sending massive amounts of stuff in space
requires a lot of energy, and terraforming would require even more massive
investments if we were to settle on any other planet even close to us.

~~~
hvidgaard
Which is exactly one of the most compelling reasons to speed up fusion
research. Near unlimited power changes everything.

~~~
drjesusphd
The fact that fusion is not ready yet might be a good thing. We still don't
realize how precious our remaining fossil fuel reserves are, and we'd probably
squander the energy that fusion provides.

I've always said that fusion won't save us from the coming global energy
crisis, because it's coming too soon. Maybe that's good; we'll learn to
appreciate it when we have it.

~~~
Razengan
Maybe we can look into exotic sources like lightning, even if it may not be as
conventionally usable according to our current understanding.

Say, send up baskets of some materials in a balloon into storm clouds, have
the immense burst of power in lighting strikes fuse them together into some
form of fuel that we can then tap for energy.

~~~
nitrogen
I think you are being downvoted because lightning has very high power but very
low total energy, and is way too unpredictable (apart from a few special
places) even if it did have enough energy to be useful.

~~~
Razengan
Yes, that's why I offered that maybe we could think out of the box to harness
it in an indirect manner. Considering how it forms fulgurite [1], what if we
used to form something that can be "burned" for energy?

I find it hard to believe that this awesome force cannot have any applications
for man.

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fulgurite](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fulgurite)

~~~
nitrogen
So the awesomeness comes from the _power_ [0], measured in watts. We like
_power_ , as evidenced by our (humanity's) building ever-larger power plants,
but what we really need is lots of bulk _energy_ [1]. _Energy_ is the integral
of _power_ over time, measured in joules. Think of _power_ as how concentrated
_energy_ is into a small amount of time.

Lightning bolts may deliver up to 10GW of _power_ , but the total energy is
still only ~1GJ (based on a bit of searching[2][3]; I'll note that some
"napkin math" estimates by some bloggers drastically overestimate the duration
of an average lightning strike). According to [3], "all the lightning in the
entire world could only power 8% of US households. At best." You also have to
consider how incredibly expensive it would be to build a lightning rod and
capacitor bank at every single possible lightning strike site.

So even if lightning's awesome _power_ can melt a few rocks, it still can't
run our cars or heat our homes, because there's not enough _energy_.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_(physics)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_\(physics\))

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy)

[2] [http://hyperphysics.phy-
astr.gsu.edu/hbase/electric/lightnin...](http://hyperphysics.phy-
astr.gsu.edu/hbase/electric/lightning2.html)

[3] [http://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2012/05/could-we-
harnes...](http://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2012/05/could-we-harness-
lightning-as-an-energy-source.html)

------
mcarlise
Numerous reports over the past several years have elluded to the 'sixth'
extinction. We with this paper, and others there seems to be a lot of evidence
that many species are rapidly reaching extinction.

There is a well known species interaction principle, which basically
summarizes to - the growth of species A is negatively correlated with the
growth of species B. This is especially well defined in predator/prey
relationships. But let's just take a simple growth pattern (logistic growth) -
which is continous population growth in an environment where resources are
limited:

dN/dt = rN[k-N/k]

r - rate of increase N - population size k - carrying capacity

'k' is my favority ecological parameter. It's the theoretical limit an
environment can hold a certain population of a species. The idea is, when a
species surpasses k, population growth will decrease and/or even become
negative until resoures are abundant again (sort of like an asymptote).

I always felt that Humans are the only species that alter their environment's
'k' through technology. For example, houses, heating, energy, etc.. all allow
us to live in environments that we might not have been able to. This allows us
to expand our population size much higher.

So are we going to surpass 'k' so high, that when we finally run out of
resources we drive ourselves and other species into mass extinction? And will
the environment be able to recover quick enough for our species population to
stablize and recover?

~~~
musha68k
We should tweak 'k' by drastically reducing our ecological footprints -
through next-gen (internet) technology:

\- less travel needed because of worldwide VR/AR presence

\- less food transports because of local/home-grown/urban farming (think
permaculture/machine-learning inspired farmbots)

And much more good stuff like that! :)

------
hedgew
I'm skeptical. Biodiversity, like cute animals, seems like one of those things
that's emotionally appealing but may not be important beyond that. That's why
scientists use terms like "ecological roulette" and ambiguous statements about
how biodiversity actually affects the world and us.

If people genuinely cared about the welfare of animals, they'd have to accept
uncomfortable truths like the fact that wild animals suffer immensely, and
that nature itself is cruel. In many cases it may actually be beneficial from
an utilitarian perspective to have some species die off. Being infested with
painful or mind-controlling parasites, and being slowly gnawed to death are
ordinary events for wild animals. They suffer some of the worst fates on this
planet.

In some cases, like mosquitoes and malaria, killing off species might be the
most heroic and useful action in the history of Earth.

~~~
soundwave106
A few things immediately come to mind on why at least some biodiversity may be
important beyond cute animals:

A) We still lean on natural processes for agriculture (for instance,
pollination plays a huge role in the production of certain fruits, and some
species act as natural deterrents to crop pests). Biodiversity ensures that
some of these natural processes we rely on are still functional and resilent
to disease and other "cruelties of nature".

(The same concern could also be said for biodiversity of cultivated crops,
although that's a bit different of an issue than what is highlighted in the
paper.)

B) Biota oriented drug discovery still is pretty big even now. Less
biodiversity means that we will have to lean more heavily on synthetic
chemistry.

------
_rpd
The paper

[http://science.sciencemag.org/content/353/6296/288](http://science.sciencemag.org/content/353/6296/288)

says "Across 65% of the terrestrial surface, land use and related pressures
have caused biotic intactness to decline beyond 10%, the proposed “safe”
planetary boundary."

How is "biotic intactness" defined?

~~~
mturmon
That is from the abstract. From the paper:

 _We asked how much of the Earth’s land surface is already “biotically
compromised” (exceeds the boundaries of 10% loss of abundance or 20% loss of
species)._

This measure (10% abundance or 20% species) is used throughout the full paper
and the 23-page supplementary material.

The general area of quantitative biodiversity study is in its infancy. It is
not as well-developed as other study areas within Earth system science. For
example, there are no universally-agreed-upon variables that must be
monitored, like temperature, sea level, etc., that exist for other areas. So
biodiversity-related measurements tend to be side-effects of other
measurements for other purposes. For instance, habitat loss could be
indirectly measured by classifiers run on satellite-produced ground imagery.

Here's some information on NASA's biodiversity research program:
[http://cce.nasa.gov/cce/biodiversity.htm](http://cce.nasa.gov/cce/biodiversity.htm)

------
praptak
_" We know biodiversity loss affects ecosystem function"_

This statement is so weak it's almost a tautology. What do we really know
about the effects of biodiversity loss? How sound is the "safe limit" and what
do we expect to happen when biodiversity falls below it?

~~~
pvaldes
If we eliminate at random some parts of a machine, the machine could work for
a while but wouldn't be a surprise if a cascade of malfunctions appear. Is the
same with ecosystems. When they run smoothly people often do not notice the
advantages and that this is the work of thousands of years.

> What do we expect...?

Short answer: Nothing good. Maybe a few golden years and then less water, less
food, worst climate and war.

Long answer: Some people do not see any problem because the ecosystem is
quickly replaced for another ecosystem. This new scenery can have even more
diversity if the disturbance is mild, like if we change a young forest by a
meadow, so yes, we can breed cows in the rain forest or turn a coastal
eucaliptus forest in a weat field... but only for a few years. There is a
prize attached. Such ecosystems can be also easily disturbed and turn into a
oligoculture of the most tougher species, than are often poisonous or
unedible.

Therefore humans suffer also with the change. Sometimes entire civilizations
dissapear, like in the case of the Mayan empire; in other cases all humans can
ever be entirely eradicated, like in the Easter Island case. We have
historical registers of deserted cities all aroung the world by a greedy
management of natural resources. Desertification, deforestation or a bad
harvest by new plagues, lead typically in our species to war for the
resources. We are not much unlike lemmings in this sense. The concept of war
today is totally different to "a few people trowing spears and arrows".

------
gajjanag
If one is interested in a take on this problem by an
anthropologist/archaeologist turned epic fantasy writer, touching upon some of
the thoughts in the comments here, see: [http://www.steven-
erikson.com/index.php/commentary-endgame-v...](http://www.steven-
erikson.com/index.php/commentary-endgame-vol-1-and-2-by-derrick-jensen/).

On the downside this is a rather long essay, on the plus side it does not
require familiarity with the author's work.

------
avindroth
I wonder if experiential diversity has increased. Surely the decrease of
biodiversity is painful for mother earth, but perhaps there is greater
variation in the the experiences of all living organisms.

EDIT: Just a runaway thought: why is biodiversity important? If we are
optimizing for the general well-being of humans and living beings on earth
(which is the frame of reference I am using), then extinction of a species
while increasing experiential diversity seems worthwhile.

In addition, the extinction of a species is only sad to those who remember.
Many cultures have merged in history to become nations we see today, but
nobody misses the oh-so-glory days of a specific Northern German tribe in BC
500.

As to the beauty we experience from diversity of species (seeing them,
interacting with them), I would much rather enjoy technological experiences
over that natural experience.

Perhaps this makes it sound all too all-or-nothing-esque, but it seems that
there is a general assumption that increased biodiversity is good beyond
measure.

~~~
raytracer
> why is biodiversity important?

Healthy ecosystems can better withstand and recover from a variety of
disasters.

> Many cultures have merged in history to become nations we see today, but
> nobody misses the oh-so-glory days of a specific Northern German tribe in BC
> 500.

I assume certain indigenous people don't appreciate being conquered.

> I wonder if experiential diversity has increased.

Why do you suppose experiential diversity has increased?

------
toodlebunions
Well that is depressing.

~~~
astazangasta
Here is some light in your tunnel: biodiversity falls because the fitness
landscape has suddenly and dramatically changed. Humans have put new and
startling pressures on each and every ecosystem on this planet, especially,
recently, through the changes associated with global warming.

Some fitness gradients are impossible to climb: genetic diversity is currency,
and you need a lot of it to overcome more difficult shifts in the evolutionary
landscape. As the world changes, species spend down this genetic currency
(through death and selection). Now the world is impoverished.

But there is a solution: we, humans, can take our boots off the throats of the
rest of God's creatures. We have the capability to be good ecological citizens
of this planet, perhaps more than any other species. We can create our own
energy sources; we can refine and recycle our material inputs, producing a
tight, closed loop of biomass and energy around ourselves.

With this light touch on the world, the negative pressure we place on the
downtrodden masses of creatures by disturbing their ecological spaces will
vanish. And the denizens of Earth will then reacquire the wealth of diversity
that is the natural reward of merely living.

~~~
Aelinsaar
I want you to name one time in the history of humanity, that we sustained a
"Light Touch".

~~~
carapace
The reign of Good King Asoka.

Also, all of human history (millions of years) before the invention of
agriculture.

In any event, today it is clearly do or die.

~~~
Aelinsaar
We're going to die.

~~~
Retra
Well, that was always true.

------
Hydraulix989
Isn't this "extinction" just natural selection? "Winner takes all" is a
feature, not a bug of natural selection.

~~~
m4x
It's not much of a feature if we destroy parts of a beautiful ecosystem as
part of "winning"

Even if you don't think it's a crime to destroy an ecosystem, it's extremely
foolish given that we depend heavily on it for our survival. If we damage or
destroy it, what will happen to us?

~~~
Hydraulix989
The word "destroy" is pretty subjective and loaded. Sure, some nations have
less than spectacular track records when it comes to being a good citizen of
our planet, but nobody is intentionally "nuking" large swaths of land and
resources for the sheer thrill of destruction either.

Instead, we're building skyscrapers and reaping the benefits of modernization
through technological progress.

I'm sure one can find "beauty" in the paleolithic era as well, but if you were
suddenly stuck living there, you'd find that free wifi is one of the last
creature comforts you'd end up missing.

~~~
raytracer
> Sure, some nations have less than spectacular track records when it comes to
> being a good citizen of our planet

Does anyone have a good track record? Isn't utilizing natural resources to the
detriment of the ecosystem as a whole a feature of human civilization?

------
kartD
Is it possible to use a form of AI to add the required diversity to genes? for
example make multiple versions of the Banana plant. I'm sure it's possible but
just very far into the future. Can someone with better knowledge confirm?

~~~
maxerickson
You can pretend that recombinant reproduction is a sort of statistical
optimization process. Variations are created and then placed in the
environment to see which are more successful.

Bananas are an interesting example. The species is quite diverse, it's just
that there's only a few cultivars that are commercially interesting. Many of
them are full of big hard seeds or fibrous or not very sweet or whatever.

Lack of pollinators is one of the explanations I'm considering for my Zucchini
not setting any fruit. Not fun to consider that in this context.

~~~
pvaldes
Start hand pollinating your zucchini plants and you will have fruits again.

This should be enough if you have only a few plants. If is not the case,
either buy some bumblebees or try with some of the parthenocarpic varieties of
zucchini that do not need pollinators. Feed well your plants, Zucchini and
pumpkins love having generous amounts of old manure

~~~
maxerickson
Yeah, I've already been experimenting with hand pollination. The plants seem
to be super healthy.

------
Reason077
Remove the apex predator and biodiversity will quickly recover.

~~~
pvaldes
Is just the opposite. Apex predators generate biodiversity and even entirely
new types of ephemeral ecosystems.

~~~
Reason077
But does this still hold true when the Apex predator is Humans?

------
bborud
Site splashed popup in my face after a few seconds. Closed tab. Annoying
begging behavior.

~~~
quadrangle
use uBlock Origin dude

~~~
the_other
That's a plaster over a wound. It would be better not to have sustained the
injury in the first place - and the reader didn't create the pop-up.

My present interpretation of pop-ups is that the author or their publisher
holds their advertisers or their subscriber list as more important than their
content: in these circumstances it's reasonable to assume the content isn't
worth reading. There are exceptions.

~~~
quadrangle
Yeah totally. Don't mean to do victim-blaming. But we still live in a bullshit
world full of obnoxiousness where you _should_ do things to protect yourself
even if that's not fair to expect ideally.

------
peterburkimsher
I read this article while listening to

Where Do The Children Play? - Cat Stevens
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7a4DCxAi020](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7a4DCxAi020)

As a young adult, what can I do to help?

