"People would treat Earth differently if they saw it from space" – ESA astronaut

[The Noose]

I'm not so sure we should be "inspired" to do what's in our best interests. When I wash my clothes, clean my house, and go to work. I do these things because they are necessary, not because I'm inspired in some way. There are vital tasks that humans need to engage in as a species, these things aren't always cute and frilly but still need to be done. The care of this planet is a collective effort that at times seems extremely daunting but the thought of future generations inheriting a world that's livable should provoke something in most humans.

Many people have seen the diagrams but do they know what they mean? Do they understand their place on this world and how it could be affecting the balance?

All true.
But most people are taught about ecosystems in school. Yet they dont really give a ****. They know about why they should look after the planet, but they dont give a ****. Most of us just live day to day and assume future generations will be fine. That things will sort themselves out and scientists will fix everything.
Education is one thing, but a big smack in the face helps, and that can come in the form of something like seeing the whole planet. (obviously that isnt very practical). Im just arguing that seeing the planet probably would make people care more.

We often need inspiration just to stir our desire to want to be educated.

[1bad65]

Again, I see you didn't even bother reading the post. You want to be blind, your a sheep. Go away........

Yes, I read it. That's how I was able to give a rebuttal you can't refute. They altered and deleted data, and tried to hide those antics and you cannot refute that fact. I also see you were not able to cite the Scientific Method as asked. You're too easy.

As to being a sheep, yes, that describes you. While I'm debating the data itself, you're entire argument is now the Appeal to Authority fallacy. That's how sheep think, so it fits you like a glove.

[The Hammer]

MASS EXTINCTION UNDERWAY

http://www.mysterium.com/extinction.html

A majority of the nation's biologists are convinced that a "mass extinction" of plants and animals is underway that poses a major threat to humans in the next century, yet most Americans are only dimly aware of the problem, a poll says.

The rapid disappearance of species was ranked as one of the planet's gravest environmental worries, surpassing pollution, global warming and the thinning of the ozone layer, according to the survey of 400 scientists commissioned by New York's American Museum of Natural History.

The poll's release yesterday comes on the heels of a groundbreaking study of plant diversity that concluded than at least one in eight known plant species is threatened with extinction. Although scientists are divided over the specific numbers, many believe that the rate of loss is greater now than at any time in history.

"The speed at which species are being lost is much faster than any we've seen in the past -- including those [extinctions] related to meteor collisions," said Daniel Simberloff, a University of Tennessee ecologist and prominent expert in biological diversity who participated in the museum's survey. [Note: the last mass extinction caused by a meteor collision was that of the dinosaurs, 65 million years ago.]

Most of his peers apparently agree. Nearly seven out of 10 of the biologists polled said they believed a "mass extinction" was underway, and an equal number predicted that up to one-fifth of all living species could disappear within 30 years. Nearly all attributed the losses to human activity, especially the destruction of plant and animal habitats.

[D-MiZe]

MASS EXTINCTION UNDERWAY

http://www.mysterium.com/extinction.html

On the other hand, we're still discovering new species.

Consider this: They say we're losing species faster than any time in history before but what if there were millions of species lost and went undiscovered.


Also, we've only explored a small amount of the world's oceans something silly like 2%. We might see something like;

- Polar ice caps melt because of global warming
- Sea level rises
- Further destruction to the environment increases sea levels even more
- Countries begin to flood, islands are lost underwater
- Jar Jar Binks and his boys take over the world.

[The Hammer]

Consider this: They say we're losing species faster than any time in history before but what if there were millions of species lost and went undiscovered.

No doubt, when rainforests are removed, undiscovered species become extinct.

We know after the first people arrived in Madagascar and burned down the rainforests and hunted the giant lemurs about 2000 years ago they became extinct, but there were probably thousands of smaller species that were wiped out too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archaeoindris

http://news.mongabay.com/2005/11/hum...to-extinction/

[Cuauhtémoc1520]

Yes, I read it. That's how I was able to give a rebuttal you can't refute. They altered and deleted data, and tried to hide those antics and you cannot refute that fact. I also see you were not able to cite the Scientific Method as asked. You're too easy.

As to being a sheep, yes, that describes you. While I'm debating the data itself, you're entire argument is now the Appeal to Authority fallacy. That's how sheep think, so it fits you like a glove.

Yup so you didn't read it and didn't read my response. Way to go. Now go away...

[D-MiZe]

If anyone is interested, timeline of recorded animal extinctions;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_extinctions

It's crazy to think that an animal that might have had 100k, 200k, even millions etc population and a single one doesn't exist any more.

[Weltschmerz]

It's sad how we exterminate wild animals. People should be more aware of this. And it is even important in terms of the future of mankind.

[The Hammer]

It's crazy to think that an animal that might have had 100k, 200k, even millions etc population and a single one doesn't exist any more.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eskimo_curlew

The Eskimo Curlew was one of the most numerous shorebirds in the tundra of western arctic Canada and Alaska, with approximately two million birds killed per year in the late 1800s.

Eskimo curlew is now considered extinct

http://www.chron.com/life/article/Es...ct-3394556.php

The plight of the Eskimo Curlew reminds us to never take spring bird migration for granted.

A shorebird similar in size and shape to the whimbrel, the Eskimo curlew once converged every March and April on Texas coastal grasslands.

Nineteenth-century naturalists John James Audubon and Elliott Coues told of Eskimo curlew flocks numbering in the thousands. Others told tales of the birds covering tens of acres of Midwest prairies during spring migration.

But hunting for sport and wholesale slaughtering for meat markets plus the loss of prairie habitats to agriculture devastated Eskimo curlew populations within two decades following the Civil War.

I think about the Eskimo Curlew this time of year, not because I expect to find one but because I know never to take for granted even the most abundant of migratory birds.

[1bad65]

Yup so you didn't read it and didn't read my response. Way to go. Now go away...

Pay attention. I did read it, and said so.

AGAIN, that's how I was able to offer up a rebuttal you still can't even try and address....