Scientists undercount trees by 2.6 trillion, but assure us animals going extinct

Every so often you will see articles warning that some species is going extinct. And usually it's not really a species -- you never hear about "leopards" going extinct, usually it's "purple dotted left handed bisexual Nepalese leopards" or some subvariety. We are assured they are going extinct because fewer have been seen recently.

But the Earth is so big, how can we really be sure that some subspecies is going extinct just because we see fewer of them? After all, only three percent of the land mass of the Earth is urbanized. Animals could easily be hidden in the other 97%.

This fallacy becomes clear when scientists reveal that they have undercounted the number of trees on the earth--by a mere 2.6 trillion. Formerly scientists believed there were 400 million trees. Now they believe the number is slightly higher, in the range of 3 trillion trees.

The 3 trillion figure is seven and a half times more than the previous estimate of 400 billion trees worldwide as of 2005. That estimate, which translates to about 61 trees for every person, was made by a professor of environmental studies at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, based on NASA satellite images.

How could they make such an enormous error? Trees can't hide. Trees can be viewed in satellite photos. Trees can't move around. And yet, they made such an enormous error.

Now, animals are much more difficult to count, because they can hide, they do move around, and they cannot be found by satellite photos. So the next time you hear that some left-handed New Guinea green spotted tree frog is on the verge of extinction, take it with a grain of salt.

Two comments:

The missing animals are hiding in the previously uncounted trees.

And, I wonder if this unreckoned biomass, which takes up enormous amounts of CO2, throws off the disaster calculations of carbon-dioxide driven global warming (not that the true believers would ever admit that).

I just wish the people who make the decisions would take some of these “scientific findings” with a grain of salt before they do something stupid that affects the rest of us. That was some big “mistake” in the counting of those trees. How big is the margin of error in certain other “scientific findings”? Like climate change,icebergs melting,polar bears disappearing,etc.,etc.

Like Bigfoot. We know they're there because they've been seen for hundreds of years; we know they're rare and cautious because they are seldom seen; but going extinct? Actually their range appears to be increasing unless there are a whole big bunch of hoaxers out there!

Formerly scientists believed there were 400 million trees. Now they believe the number is slightly higher, in the range of 3 trillion trees.

Bad typo here from the American Thinker Blog - s/b 400 BILLION as shown in included quote. Easy error but bad editing.

That being said, 400 billion to 3 trillion is such an underestimate as to be head-shaking. That is an error of counting 1 for every 75 that are there between 2 studies a decade apart, in other words a real whopper! Especially when the referred article also mentions 15+ billion trees cut every year, a rate that would deforest the planet in 27 years without replanting.

Of course in the article there is the obligatory hand-wringing about how horrible humans have been to the trees; "In fact, the study concludes that the global number of trees has fallen by roughly 46 percent since the start of human civilization." Does a tree grow in Brooklyn?

The original source of all of this is "Mapping tree density at a global scale," published Wednesday (09/03/15) in the journal Nature.

Well, I do recall our lord and master President Obeyme DID declare it was time to put science in its rightful place not too long ago (”rightful place” being solidly in defense of government edicts and declarations, which is as it should be, if those guys really want their grant money). File under “Who you gonna believe”.

... the next time you hear that some left-handed New Guinea green spotted tree frog is on the verge of extinction, take it with a grain of salt.

That's silly.

The only way I eat left-handed New Guinea green spotted tree frogs is with much more than "a grain" of salt.

FMCDH(BITS)

The author needs to check his math or data.

If there are now 3 trillion trees rather than the previously thought 400 million, the undercount is 2.999600 trillion.

My guess is the previous count was 400 BILLION.

how can we really be sure that some subspecies is going extinct just because we see fewer of them?

The method of enumeration is not a reliable method to arrive a a conclusion by induction.To arrive at a true conclusion by induction one must determine a proven causal relationship between entities that necessitates the conclusion.

The author needs to check his math or data.

If there are now 3 trillion trees rather than the previously thought 400 million, the undercount is 2.999600 trillion.

My guess is the previous count was 400 BILLION.

But you don't really expect an academic "scientist" to keep track of all those zeros do you?

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