To ask if you realise we are going through a sixth mass extinction of species?

[amandacarnet]

There have been five mass extinctions of life before. The most famous of which wiped out the dinosaurs. With the rate of extinction of species it is clear we are currently going through a sixth mass extinction. This is caused by climate change and human wrecking of animal habitats. And it will if not halted, lead to the extinction of humans.
It is not going to happen over night, this is not a made for TV disaster movie. But as we ruin more animal habitats and climate change gets worse, we will make living environments for humans worse. In Avery short space of time we have seen decreasing world wide fertility thought to be caused by plastics, much more frequent occurrences of dangerous weather, rising sea levels that are reclaiming land from humans, and decreasing levels of animals that are needed for human survival such as bees.

It's because there are just too many people, and the poorest places populations are still exploding.

I though we were near peak child world wide - and it's more fact that people aren't dying like they used to that's causing population rise.

www.gapminder.org/news/world-peak-number-of-children-is-now/

world population continues to grow, but the number of children in the world has now reached its peak

The reason, 40% of world population has less than 2 children per women and thus compensationg for the 18% that get more than 3 children per women.

I

@Peoplesfrontofjudith because we can see the difference between a direct emotional connection with an individual and the damage and destruction humans carry out en masse.

In the great scheme of things, one particular human, whilst personally devastating, isn't a disaster. For at least the time being, there are a few billion other humans to get on with trashing the place and causing the other extinctions, polluting, killing and generally fucking everything up for everything else.

We, as in a species, do deserve to die out. It's not right that we as a species have destroyed so much. But it's what we do. It's what happens to any species that expands to a point that they cannot be supported by its environment (or host).

That doesn't mean that we shouldn't do anything - I think we should do all we can to save as many species and biomes as possible - so they have a chance of getting along quite nicely, thank you, without us in their way.

Other than the fact they'll still be choking on all our fucking plastic for millennia until something evolves to eat it.

I care that lots of humans and animals will suffer.

I know humans are destroying the world and I wish we would fix this.

Lots of people on this thread are sneering at people who are at least trying to do something.

climatologists do actually say that within the next decade the human race will suffer catastrophically due to climate change - and worse, some say its too late for it to be now reversed.

Yes, they are probably right. And they've been saying it for a long time. But because all the world leaders refuse to do anything about it, it's pretty inevitable that humans will die out. But then again, it could all be part of evolution and we should just bow out gracefully.

Hi @amandacarnet!

Yes, I know. But it is good to have a reminder.

For me, it absolutely is not about ensuring humans carry on forever. But, we are currently set to take many other species down with us or even before us. In fact, we already have!

Apart from that, I’d like to make what remains of human existence on this planet as pleasant as possible for future generations.

We’re only an evil plague on the planet if that’s what we let ourselves become.

I wonder if we’ll all start to die off because of antibiotic resistance before climate change kills us actually.

Honestly, we need wiping out.

This is no bad thing. We have destroyed this planet. We’re an absolute parasite.

Mother Earth will cull herself and recover as she should.

If you’re worried about “the children” then advise younger generations not to have kids. Fact is, it will be their problem and we’ll be dead.

I feel sorry for the animals. But the human race will reap what it has sewn.

That being said, I try to do what I can for climate change but not for humans as a species.

@tinyteatime

I sometimes think that too. I know a good few doctors who are a lot more worried about antibiotics than cc.

Either that or we will soon have robot overlords who after studying us for their own means, will destroy us all! Every cloud 😂.

Mass immigration is the first thing that will happen. Then there will be civil wars.

Abra1de

The mess wasn't left by the protesters.

fullfact.org/online/picture-does-not-show-aftermath-extinction-rebellion-protests/

We were at hyde park on that Saturday for a picnic (not knowing the 4/20 cannabis thing was happening). We saw lots of XR going round with bags trying to pick up the litter the people at the event were dropping.

Other way around, I think, @escapade1234. Civil wars in the most affected places first, triggering mass immigration, then unrest spreading out from there. Chuck in a pandemic or two, a loon with nuclear or biological weaponry and, if done right, we'll be down to small pockets of survivors and hopefully, a lot of predators getting the better of us once we're without all our fancy weaponry and comforts.

All the stupid people who have the attitude "oh let the human race die" etc should not be allowed to breed. Morons. Within the next 50 years, OUR LIFETIMES hundreds of thousands if not millions of people will die, painful and horrible deaths, that were inflicted on them. These pricks are happy to see thousands of children starving to death because of crop failure; dying of diseases such as malaria, as mosquitoes spread into newly warmed and suitable areas, suffering high rates of cancers and other illnesses due to teratogenic, mutagenic and carcinogenic chemicals pumped and dumped into their environment. If you don't give a shit about the death and suffering of millions of people, mostly because it will be happening in poorer countries to poor people, that is on your conscience, but don't gloat about it you parasitic worms.

I am bewildered by the tone of this thread (with a few exceptions). When you say 'we deserve to die out' (etc), do you include yourself? Your children? Their children? Do you imagine how that might happen, what it might look like? Do you imagine the suffering? I can relate to a sense of hopelessness about it all but not the flippancy about the death of thousands, millions of innocent people as being meaningless.

What were the previous five caused by?

Would I blame mums from the past if my children suffered? No I would blame men in suits, the super rich who think nothing of taking a private jet by themselves, the governments of countries with high pollution levels, the men trying to colonise space and virtually everyone else but no not mums. Why do you feel women are to blame for climate change?

Humans are parasites on this Earth.

Agree with Badbilly the planet has managed its climate for the past 3.5 billion years from ice age to tropical and back and doubtless will do so for the next 3.5b years until it dies.

So who or what was the cause of the first five mass extinctions - obviously not homo sapiens.

As for human beings being wiped out, I think it's unlikely but there could be a culling which will be no bad thing.

cosmosmagazine.com/palaeontology/big-five-extinctions

Here you are @thornyhousewife

When you say 'we deserve to die out' (etc), do you include yourself? Your children? Their children?

Yes.

Do you imagine how that might happen, what it might look like? Do you imagine the suffering?

Yes.

I can relate to a sense of hopelessness about it all but not the flippancy about the death of thousands, millions of innocent people as being meaningless.

Unless people care enough to boycott all plastic, for example, nothing will change. People just don't care, so humans will suffer and die. It's inevitable.

Quoting: "When you say 'we deserve to die out' (etc), do you include yourself? Your children? Their children?

Yes."

I cannot agree that children deserve to die because of the failings of earlier generations (including ours). My children are under 5. They are beautiful and lovely. They are children and they deserve their lives, like all of us did. They did not ask to be born.

The evidence of where climate change is taking us seems overwhelming now. I agree that asking individuals to eat less meat and use less plastic and cycle more is largely pointless as a plan, and it certainly looks like huge, huge political will and massive societal changes are what is now required to give future generations the hope of a decent future. But perhaps people would be willing to accept a government mandated low meat diet, quotas on car and air travel, total ban of single use plastics, a full shift to fully renewable energies etc, if it was done equitably and for the good of all. I would.

Would I blame mums from the past if my children suffered? No I would blame men in suits, the super rich who think nothing of taking a private jet by themselves, the governments of countries with high pollution levels, the men trying to colonise space and virtually everyone else but no not mums. Why do you feel women are to blame for climate change?

I thought that on an individual level, in the western world, having children is the worst thing you can possibly do in regards to climate change? I always thought that the number one way for an individual (in the west anyway) to fight climate change was to have fewer or no children at all? Is that wrong?

I'm not gloating.

It will affect people most in other countries first, as it is already doing, but it will affect everybody in time, even the super rich and powerful.

Do I include myself or my descendants in this? Yes.

Do I think it will all be lovely and jolly, like a party in the Restaurant at the End of the Universe? No.

It's interesting how using the words 'Parasitic Worms' is supposedly an insult. It's pretty fucking accurate. We are parasites. We don't improve the Earth, we feed off it, bleed its natural resources dry in our pursuit of the newer, the bigger, the shinier. We are of no more benefit to the Earth than a fucking tapeworm infestation.

And we are going to destroy our host if our host doesn't manage to come up with ways to get shot of us first (eg, climate change, disease and the like).

I was thinking the other day that actually we need a mass culling. Science has advanced so much that the normal methods of Mother Nature culling the herd such as disease epidemic, natural disasters, infertility etc no longer works.

By 2050 there will be ONE BILLION people displaced because of climate change and the ensuing environmental chaos

I will hopefully still be alive. I remember 31 years ago like it was 5 minutes ago, I was at uni.

That's how CLOSE disaster is.

Op, I think you need to do some more research and see this is cyclical, and better understand our planet.