Study Says Global Warming May Spark Mass Extinction

[zimv20]

link (http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/science/AP-Global-Warming.html?hp)


Hundreds of species of land plants and animals around the globe could vanish or be on the road to extinction over the next 50 years if global warming continues, scientists warn.


They found that more than one-third of the 1,103 native species they studied could disappear or approach extinction by 2050 as climate change turns plains into deserts or alters forests.


They applied climate change models developed by a U.N. panel that predicted Earth's warming trend will increase average global temperatures by 2.5 degrees to 10.4 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100.

Depending on the temperature increase, the researchers found that 15 percent to 37 percent of the studied species will go extinct or be on the road to extinction by 2050. A mid-range forecast of three possible global warming scenarios would claim about a quarter of the species, they found.

[Code101]

Who cares about what the UN says. They tell lies!

[zimv20]

i'm lobbying the Union of Concerned Scientists to classify morons as a species.

[toontra]

Originally posted by Code101
Who cares about what the UN says. They tell lies!


Thanks for that considered and balanced contribution!

There is a certain irony here though. The US, rather than having the political courage to take measures and start drastically cut it's polluting, gas-guzzling ways, chooses instead to invade Iraq to secure oil supplies to enable it to carry on polluting the world into the forseeable future. Thanks.

[Desertrat]

"May" is the operative qualifier, stipulating a worst-case rise in temperature. If, during the next 40 to 50 years, the world society (as an overall group) changes its ways, the lesser numbers would apply.

Any notion of how the 5- to 10- degree rise as we left the "Little Ice Age" of recent history may have affected species? Any information of how the fairly recent desertification of the Sahel affected the number of species in that area?

Even if every vehicle on earth were powered by some now-unknown zero-pollution system, there would still be drilling for oil and gas. There would still be cargo ships and airplanes, not to mention computers and other high-tech toys.

zim, if idiots were classified as a separate species, they'd probably outlast cockroaches, rats and and coyotes...

'Rat

[kettle]

lets just give another bunch of tax spenders an excuse not to get a proper job.