Posted on 03/30/2005 10:29:22 AM PST by jmaroneps37
Two-thirds of world's resources 'used up'
Tim Radford, science editor Wednesday March 30, 2005 The Guardian
The human race is living beyond its means. A report backed by 1,360 scientists from 95 countries - some of them world leaders in their fields - today warns that the almost two-thirds of the natural machinery that supports life on Earth is being degraded by human pressure. The study contains what its authors call "a stark warning" for the entire world. The wetlands, forests, savannahs, estuaries, coastal fisheries and other habitats that recycle air, water and nutrients for all living creatures are being irretrievably damaged. In effect, one species is now a hazard to the other 10 million or so on the planet, and to itself.
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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Human activity is putting such a strain on the natural functions of Earth that the ability of the planet's ecosystems to sustain future generations can no longer be taken for granted," it says. The report, prepared in Washington under the supervision of a board chaired by Robert Watson, the British-born chief scientist at the World Bank and a former scientific adviser to the White House, will be launched today at the Royal Society in London. It warns that:
· Because of human demand for food, fresh water, timber, fibre and fuel, more land has been claimed for agriculture in the last 60 years than in the 18th and 19th centuries combined.
· An estimated 24% of the Earth's land surface is now cultivated.
· Water withdrawals from lakes and rivers has doubled in the last 40 years. Humans now use between 40% and 50% of all available freshwater running off the land.
· At least a quarter of all fish stocks are overharvested. In some areas, the catch is now less than a hundredth of that before industrial fishing.
· Since 1980, about 35% of mangroves have been lost, 20% of the world's coral reefs have been destroyed and another 20% badly degraded.
· Deforestation and other changes could increase the risks of malaria and cholera, and open the way for new and so far unknown disease to emerge.
In 1997, a team of biologists and economists tried to put a value on the "business services" provided by nature - the free pollination of crops, the air conditioning provided by wild plants, the recycling of nutrients by the oceans. They came up with an estimate of $33 trillion, almost twice the global gross national product for that year. But after what today's report, Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, calls "an unprecedented period of spending Earth's natural bounty" it was time to check the accounts.
"That is what this assessment has done, and it is a sobering statement with much more red than black on the balance sheet," the scientists warn. "In many cases, it is literally a matter of living on borrowed time. By using up supplies of fresh groundwater faster than they can be recharged, for example, we are depleting assets at the expense of our children."
Flow from rivers has been reduced dramatically. For parts of the year, the Yellow River in China, the Nile in Africa and the Colorado in North America dry up before they reach the ocean. An estimated 90% of the total weight of the ocean's large predators - tuna, swordfish and sharks - has disappeared in recent years. An estimated 12% of bird species, 25% of mammals and more than 30% of all amphibians are threatened with extinction within the next century. Some of them are threatened by invaders.
The Baltic Sea is now home to 100 creatures from other parts of the world, a third of them native to the Great Lakes of America. Conversely, a third of the 170 alien species in the Great Lakes are originally from the Baltic.
Invaders can make dramatic changes: the arrival of the American comb jellyfish in the Black Sea led to the destruction of 26 commercially important stocks of fish. Global warming and climate change, could make it increasingly difficult for surviving species to adapt.
A growing proportion of the world lives in cities, exploiting advanced technology. But nature, the scientists warn, is not something to be enjoyed at the weekend. Conservation of natural spaces is not just a luxury.
"These are dangerous illusions that ignore the vast benefits of nature to the lives of 6 billion people on the planet. We may have distanced ourselves from nature, but we rely completely on the services it delivers."
"I'm sorry. You don't have a clue what's going on in the rest of the world. Your biggest concern in life is probably waiting on your SS and pension checks to be delivered by the mailman and what time your going to walmart after that. We in the US have it pretty good and are insulated."
My aren't we a superior little watermelon nazi today.
Just kill all of them has been the motto of the death cultists since the early 1900s. Abort them and kill the rest of them is the religion of gloomers and doomers like you.
Next, you will be saying death to those in wheelchairs, on crutches and with other problems as the world is out of resources.
Michael Crichton in his new book, "State of Fear" does a great job of tearing Gloomer and Doomer Watermelons like you a new one with great references. I will take Michael references and insight over a gloomer and doomer watermelon anyday.
It is people like you who are bringing the cult of Euthanasia/Eugenics into America in the name of overpopulation and other watermelon lies which is my biggest concern in life. Your religion is death to people in the name of a cleaner and less populated world.
Did you cheer when they starved Terri to death as one less mouth to feed?
And when we run out of potatoes we will just sit there and starve to death ...
Oh, woe is me!
Sigh... Here we go again...we're all gonna die tomorrow... or the day after, if that doesn't work out.. or ...
This just shows liberals total lack of faith in the human race to solve its own prolems. When you run out something you find a replacement if you are not a total idiot.
Where in the heck does Euthenasia, abortion or death to "undesirables" as you put it come up in any of my post on this topic.
I'll I'm saying is the 3rd worldeers are doing a piss poor job of keeping their environments in check.
I'm not for killing anyone.
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Michael Crichton in his new book, "State of Fear" does a great job of tearing Gloomer and Doomer Watermelons like you a new one with great references. I will take Michael references and insight over a gloomer and doomer watermelon anyday.
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I just finished that last night....what a book!!
Light on Sex but plenty of Mission Impossible action scenes......
Hell of an education to those who have not been following the Global Warming Hoax threads here on Free Republic...seems like to me that Crichton has read them!!!
I've only emptied 2/3rds of my bowel and bladder. Saving the rest for Greer's tombstone.
Exactly. I hate to admit it, but anything liberals come up with, I automatically have my BS meter off the scale. It's like my favorite sweatshirt says--"Liberalism: The fear that someone, somewhere, can take care of theirself"
"Hell of an education to those who have not been following the Global Warming Hoax threads here on Free Republic...seems like to me that Crichton has read them!!!"
My son bought the book and my wife read it before I did. Both of them wondered if those of us who are anti the enviral watermelons on FR had helped Crichton with his footnotes and documentation.
Like you, I felt that he might have monitored FR for the documentation.
As I noted, this article falls into the same old scare crap re the resources are running out or the Chicken Little BS as we noted over 4 years ago during the Klamath water wars.
Hee hee.. I really get the looks from libs when I wear that sweatshirt--although some of my other ones get them wound up even more...
Should be required reading for any enviro type. The only book I've ever read where I read the entire bibliography, with the exception of Ann Coulter's "Treason".
"--"Liberalism: The fear that someone, somewhere, can take care of theirself"!"
Your statement above is one of the critical planks in the rats poliitical platform.
Michael has superb documentation to refute most of the BS that the watermelons have tried to push on us for decades.
Liberalism: the problem to every solution.
Can't. gotta admit, I get these from a favorite website where I buy my antagonistic shirts. Wish I was that witty!!
Yes, they are over the top, but there are some potentially serious problems we will have to face because of what we have done. It is not just totally BS as some here would suggest. There is a balance that can be reached between the environment and the economy. And future generations are going to have to been concerned about the number of people who can be sustained on this planet.
Well, I'm right on yer heels and I think tubebender is in our age bracket. And that's the problem! Don'tcha remember when we were 25-45 that we figured all them old fogies had a permanent brain fart and were hopelessly stuck in the past...
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