It's happening now, much faster than previously expected, and it's entirely our fault, according to a study published Monday. The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History By Elizabeth Kolbert Over the last half a billion years, there have been five mass extinctions, when the diversity of life on earth suddenly and dramatically contracted. Populations and species extinctions have severe implications for [human] society through the degradation of ecosystem services. What are the consequences?Potentially enormous. How many species are endangered?There are 26,500 species threatened with extinction, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), a global network of some 16,000 scientists. Only five times before in our planet’s history have so many species and so much biodiversity been lost so quickly. The sixth, which is ongoing, is referred to as the Anthropocene extinction. But whether this constitutes a sixth mass extinction depends on whether today's extinction rate is greater than the "normal" or "background" rate that occurs between mass extinctions. Only 3 percent of the original populations of the heavily fished Pacific bluefin tuna remain in the sea. The second option is cloning — famously attempted in 2009 using the DNA of an extinct Pyrenean ibex and its closest living cousin, the common goat. "We are sleepwalking toward the edge of a cliff," said Mike Barrett, executive director at WWF. • Describe the geologic history of extinction "There are examples of species all over the world that are essentially the walking dead," said biologist Paul Ehrlich. "It was into such a biologically diverse world that we humans evolved, and such a world that we are destroying.". The past 20 years have brought a 90 percent plunge in the number of monarch butterflies in America, a loss of 900 million, and an 87 percent loss of rusty-patched bumblebees. A third of insect species are endangered, and the total number of bugs on Earth is dropping by 2.5 percent every year. When one species in the ecosystem disappears, it erodes the entire ecosystem and pushes other species toward annihilation. But 99 percent of Earth's species are invertebrates, and 40 percent of the species known to have died off since 1500 were land snails and slugs. Is a mass extinction underway?Possibly. Earth has supported life in some form for about 4.2 billion years. By … The researchers also said the current coronavirus crisis shows how the recklessness with which people treat the natural world can backfire badly. The Sixth Mass Extinction, also known as the Sixth Extinction or the Holocene extinction event, is an ongoing extinction event perpetrated by human beings. "Even though only an estimated 2% of all of the species that ever lived are alive today, the absolute number of species is greater now than ever before," the scientists said. Students collaboratively investigate our planet’s five mass extinctions and the possibility of a sixth mass extinction. Five watershed events in the deep past decimated life on earth, hence the designation “Sixth Extinction” for today’s ­human-propelled crisis. Vertebrate species have, however, been closely studied, and at least 338 have gone extinct, with the number rising to 617 when one includes those species "extinct in the wild" and "possibly extinct." Many of the species that are endangered or at the brink of extinction are being decimated by wildlife trade. The ‘Sixth Mass Extinction’ Species are becoming extinct 100 times faster than they would without human impacts. This time, we're the asteroid.Viewers like you help make PBS (Thank you ) . "This is far more than just being about losing the wonders of nature, desperately sad though that is," the WWF's Barrett said. As increasingly accepted theories have argued—and as the Science papers show—we are now in the midst of the sixth great extinction, the unsettlingly-named Anthropocene, or the age of … The previous five, spread over a half-billion years of geological time, accrued from combined natural causes — cataclysmic meteor strikes, volcanism and atmospheric shifts. It would be catastrophic, widespread and, of course, irreversible. The loss of species can have catastrophic effects on the food chain on which humanity depends. But the world, Meet the women racing to save a species from extinction, Bumblebees are going extinct because of the climate crisis, but there are easy ways to help, Vanishing: The Earth's 6th mass extinction, A lab in a remote Namibian city is saving the cheetah from extinction, urgency with which the world needs to act. , however, isn ’ t caused by humans there have been five mass extinctions, modern... 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