IUCN Red List '06 coming out on Thursday...

[moonflower]

although maybe it'll wake up a few more people to the very rapidly disappearing species in this world.

the fact that polar bears are going onto it really bugs me... come on. polar bears. who was ever concerned about polar bears?! it's really sad that a good number of these animals (and plants) will in all likelihood die out within my generation... the marine mammals worry me more, at the *very* least you've got polar bears and the like in zoos across the world. north atlantic right whales do not fit in aquariums (my goal is to see one in the wild before they're gone forever).

any thoughts?

 

[rattler]

im not quite sure why polar bears are on their. i was under the impression they are numerous enough to make a real nucience of themselves in a couple areas not to mention the huge expanceses of land where there are no ppl to bug them and is suitible territory

 

[moonflower]

Quote[/b] ]
im not quite sure why polar bears are on their. i was under the impression they are numerous enough to make a real nucience of themselves in a couple areas not to mention the huge expanceses of land where there are no ppl to bug them and is suitible territory

the problem is that their territory is melting out from under them. the Arctic is being hit hard by the warming trend we've been having... entire forests are falling over due to the melting permafrost, to say nothing of the ice coverage. warmer waters also mean less oxygen and therefore less fish, which works its way up the food chain to the bears. the IUCN is predicting that if the climate continues on at the rate it's going, polar bear numbers will be drastically reduced in the next 50-100 years. they were granted "vulnerable" status... not endangered yet but still not a particularly desirable position for a top predator.

 

[rattler]

we are coming out of an ice age, that is to be expected.

im not going to argue over how much of a hand man as had in it but it is a fact that we were on a warming trend even before the industrial revolution, the Sahara was green in the not so distant past, just a fer thousand years ago. heck parts of Great Britain are still rising in responce to the millions of tons of ice no longer on them.

i dont get this though, they are putting polar bears on there cause of what might happen in the next 50-100 years? sounds like junk science and reasoning to me

 

[rattler]

yah know their website sure aint terribly user friendly

 

[moonflower]

it isn't junk science, it's a prediction based on the data that is currently available and is stated as such. a designation of "vulnerable" just means that there are factors coming into play that may endanger a certain species, and the situation needs to be monitored. also, the IUCN is a very large and influential organization (they're largely responsible for CITES)- they'd have a lot to lose publishing "junk science".

if nothing else i think it will draw more attention to global warming... whether it's human-induced or not, the earth is warming up, and politicians and the general public need to wake up to that fact before it starts becoming a real problem. i think we're just in need of a new environmental movement in general... just seems like there's infinitely more environmental damage than repair being done and nothing is happening to stop it.

 

[rattler]

nothing can be done to stop it, its a natural process, the earth changes whether we like it or not.

not going to do any good, humans as a species are ignorant and destructive. something some day will whipe us out. might be comet, might be aliens might be a virus developed in some lab but at somepoint we will be knocked off our pedistal and things will continue on as they have for the millions of years before we were walking on this planet

 

[rattler]

even if its just cockroaches, Utricularia tricolor and freaking Drosera capensis to start the whole process over again dang weeds................................::

 

[Ozzy]

There was a song a few years ago that had the lyrics "We're bringing Mother Nature to her knees" I always disagreed with that statement. Nature is all about balance. When one species starts overpopulating, destroying a habitat or what ever happens, nature brings that species back in line. It's either disease or starvation, but that species thins out, the strongest survive and nature goes on like it's always have done. Humans have delayed this check because of our large brains, we have found solutions to to all of the this that have come at us so far. We won't be able to out run this forever. Something will get us sooner or later. So we won't bring Mother nature to her knees, she'll bring us to ours.

 

[moonflower]

lol i'm not worried about earth in general at all... all mother nature has to do is burp and we're gone, problem solved things like the tsunami, hurricane katrina, and avian influenza tend to everybody a wakeup call and remind us that nature can be downright terrifying when she wants to be. but overall, it appears that life is not easily extinguished once it is established. heck a cockroach might make a better president anyway!

but it does make me sad that things like right whales and lord knows what else will probably die off within the next century, and a lot of that is due to human intervention (it's hard to shift the blame for overhunting). it might balance out... ok it will balance out eventually, but it's such a loss in the short run. i mean, imagine seeing the last living specimen of anything. that's what bothers me.