Stanford researcher declares that the sixth mass extinction is here

Well, that certainly is ominous. Can you give any (anonymous) examples of such conclusions?

Interesting that your comment got quickly downvoted, too. There are at least some people around here who really don't like those insinuations.

That's a good point.

> I believe there are a lot of social conservatives on HN, but the same people are not necessarily technologically or scientifically conservative. This doesn't fall cleanly into left and right by US standards, but I think it's a reasonable model of HN majority predisposition.

I'm not sure what you mean by socially conservative vs. scientifically and technologically.

> Well, I thought I was taking it as literally as possible. When you said "But now, when it supposedly happens for a sixth time, it's our fault.", I got the impression that you're asserting the only reason why we correlate extinctions with human activity is because we want to blame humans.

I think there are some people who definitely do want to blame humans, for different reasons. At the conspiratorial end of the spectrum, there's population control purposes (cf. blumkvist's comments about increasing automation). At the more personal end of the spectrum, there are things like those whose careers are already invested into declaring that humans are at fault.

So when you say "we," I think you're glossing over a significant issue, that of different groups with different motivations.

> However, what's actually going on is more a collection of thousands of observations about these events, made on a case by case basis. For example, these are observations about human settlements impacting wildlife. In another area, they might be data about the results of us restructuring local flora and fauna. Or they might be analytical results pointing to correlations between human-induced contamination of water bodies and changes in the biome that characteristically follow it. It's literally a mass of thousands of data points.

Sure, no doubt some of these researchers have compiled massive amounts of data. But even if you take their historical data at face value, it does not necessarily follow that these small-scale human impacts on the environment will cause mass extinctions. The gulf between the two is enormous.

> A lot of groups are proclaiming that the opposing organizations have money and power on their side. The environmental protection movement makes the same assertion, only about letting industry and agriculture go unchecked.

Certainly, there are huge amounts of money being spent lobbying on both sides of the issue. It's not as if one side or the other is altruistic. In fact, I think that's the point that needs to be emphasized, perhaps above all else: these are less scientific issues than social and political ones. Science is being used as a vehicle to push certain agendas. It's fine to consider the science and the potential ramifications, but we absolutely must continue examining the people and agendas that are pushing certain conclusions. If we don't, we will have the wool pulled over our eyes, and possibly lead off a cliff.

> You say that you believe any such efforts will harm people, but to be honest I find that line of reasoning difficult to follow, especially considering the fact that we're mortally dependent on the integrity of our biosphere and that the measures we're putting in place are generally very modest.

Please don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying we should go around killing and burning and polluting and destroying willy-nilly. I think we should be good stewards of the planet and all of its resources, both living and non-living.

But I don't think we should put "biodiversity" above human life. The policies that are often proposed would result in real harm to real people right now. And the people pushing them either don't value human life, or they value their own (and their own wealth/power) above everyone else's. And that's dangerous.

Where I come from? I come from a country where gypsies have 6,7,8,9, more children, sucking welfare checks from the government. They occupy their spare time with laying around, marking retired, defenseless people for robberies and extortion, sending their children to developed countries to pickpocket. They view their children as a resource to exploit in one way or another. And before you make an attempt to defend them, saying that they are in an unfortunate position, I have to inform you that they are very much content with their position and do not want to change it at all. They like their lives the way they are. They think of it like culture. It certainly is one, whether it is worthy of preserving is a wholly other discussion.

So, please, come off your high horse and be a realist about the situation. I have yet to see evidence of humans, en masse, self-determine on impairment in the name of bigger picture.

Are those really the problems? That population growth and life expectancy has also helped result in increased crop yields through more workers and better technology. Since there is no global food shortage, I don't think those are the problems.

> Add to this the mess created by our fellow humans by deforestation.

In some places, forests are thicker than they were centuries ago. Some fellow humans are putting a lot of effort into reforestation. Sounds like a political/social/economic problem, not a "humans causing a mess" problem (the difference being that the latter sounds like it blames all humans, while not all humans are like that).

> Visit countries like India, countries in Africa and you can see for yourself what is happening there. To continue our way of life we are forced to under take big irrigations projects.

This is really a fascinating issue, why some parts of the world have developed and produce a surplus, while others have not and do not. Is the problem overpopulation in these places, or is the problem that they have not developed technologically and socially at the same rate they have increased in population?

> But the point in the article is no effect is without a cause, and there are interdependent causes.

I guess that's one point in the article. But when you consider the author's past, I think a strong point--implied, at least--is that we are killing the planet and need to reduce the population. And that's what I disagree with.

It sounds like a really interesting idea for a computer game: you're the president of the world, and an asteroid may or may not be going to hit the planet in so many years. Can you bring the planet's resources to bear in time to prevent it? Can you develop the technology and send the mission without bankrupting society and causing mass unrest? Can you delay that preparation and develop better technology to figure out if the asteroid will really hit?

Or do you play the villain, letting the asteroid hit, but building fallout shelters to survive with your friends while everyone else perishes? Can you do that without the populace catching on? Can you get it done in time? Can you outlast the "asteroid winter"?