Radical overhaul needed to halt Earth’s sixth great extinction event

Once a widespread and dominating
predator, the tiger today is vanishingly
 rare across most of its former range.

Life has existed on Earth for roughly 3.7 billion years. During that time we know of five mass extinction events — dramatic episodes when many, if not most, life forms vanished in a geological heartbeat. The most recent of these was the global calamity that claimed the dinosaurs and myriad other species around 66 million years ago.

Growing numbers of scientists have asserted that our planet might soon see a sixth massive extinction — one driven by the escalating impacts of humanity. Others, such as the Swedish economist Bjørn Lomborg, have characterised such claims as ill-informed fearmongering.

We argue emphatically that the jury is in and the debate is over: Earth’s sixth great extinction has arrived.

Read the piece on The Conversation by a distinguished research professor and Australian Laureate at the James Cook University, Bill Laurance, and the President at the Center for Conservation Biology, Bing Professor of Population Studies at Stanford University, Paul Ehrlich - “Radical overhaul needed to halt Earth’s sixth great extinction event.”