5 ms·

The environment has not changed much at all in the past two decades. You spuriously quote a few random cases of sudden death and claim it has been on the uptic

The environment has not changed much at all in the past two decades. You spuriously quote a few random cases of sudden death and claim it has been on the uptick but lack the holistic data of the past few hundred years to determine whether that's a true statement or not. The beached whale could be caused by shifts in Earth's geomagnetic field, which whales use to navigate: https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/weakening-earths-magnetic-field-could-sign-geomagnetic-reversal-north-south-poles-1678833 https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/weakening-earths-magnetic-field-co... Diseases are caused by random mutations of bacterial, fungal and viral sources, and have occurred since the beginning of life itself.

smallnamespace 6y ago
Holistic data across the entire animal kingdom is difficult to come by, but everywhere we look we're finding hints that there are serious issues. On just insects: > A reanalysis published in 2017 suggested that, in 1989–2016, there had been a "seasonal decline of 76%, and mid-summer decline of 82%, in flying insect biomass over the 27 years of study". The decline was "apparent regardless of habitat type" and could not be explained by "changes in weather, land use, and habitat characteristics". The authors suggested that not only butterflies, moths and wild bees appear to be in decline, as previous studies indicated, but "the flying insect community as a whole" That's not a small, random decline - 70-80% of insect mass has disappeared over a single generation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_in_insect_populations#cite_note-Hallmann2017PLoS-1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_in_insect_populations#...
- tridentlead 6y ago
  The rate of insect decline on land is less than the rate of growth in/on bodies of water. https://science.sciencemag.org/content/368/6489/417.full?ijkey=V2uhf3WniYR0.&keytype=ref&siteid=sci https://science.sciencemag.org/content/368/6489/417.full?ijk...
ianai 6y ago
We really need to be careful with dismissals such as yours. Compared to the time the grandfather post took to research, process, and write compared to how long it takes you to write a discarding message is trivial but the potential damage is great. Joe Rogan had a great interview with Barbara Freese yesterday on her forthcoming book “industrial strength denial(...)”. She discussed it at length in her interview. Basically, there are centuries of instances of interested parties using rhetoric not dissimilar to yours to deny progress on emancipation of slaves, tobacco laws, coal regulations, radon effects and etc. Its time we all dismiss the trivial dismissals of hard fought/researched truths and force informed, rational discussion. Link to interview mentioned: https://youtu.be/cP0D2_jhqPU https://youtu.be/cP0D2_jhqPU
- ars 6y ago
  That post suffers from recentisim. Mass animal die off are not actually new. Unless you find data from at least 100 years ago to compare, you can not draw conclusions. > Compared to the time the grandfather post took to research, process, and write Yes, but the only data in the post is what is found online. So while that can be used to draw attention to an issue, you can not use it to describe a trend, or say that things are getting worse.
  - ricardobeat 6y ago
    Maybe you'll trust this 2015 article by National Geographic instead, backed by studies spanning the past 70+ years: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2015/1/150113-mass-die-off-disease-animals-environment-science/#:~:text=Mass%20die%2Doffs%20are%20individual,offs%20are%20on%20the%20rise https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2015/1/150113-mass-d....
    - dmix 6y ago
      The study https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2015/01/08/1414894112 https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2015/01/08/1414894112 The scale is increasing for certain species but not all: > We show that the magnitude of MMEs has been intensifying for birds, fishes, and marine invertebrates; invariant for mammals; and decreasing for reptiles and amphibians. The causes are still largely unknown but there are some patterns: > Regardless, the increase in MMEs appears to be associated with a rise in disease emergence, biotoxicity, and events produced by multiple interacting stressors, yet temporal trends in MME causes varied among taxa and may be associated with increased detectability. Either way it's a worrying sign that environmental factors will always play a role. Even if it is mostly just widespread diseases we previously didn't have the capability to detect, or simply no one was looking (as the abstract mentions about detectability) - additional environmental stresses could amplify what was otherwise pretty normal. In regards to the Elephants in Botswana this wouldn't yet meet their definition of MMEs (90% die off), or a good chunk of the other linked examples provided by OP. Additionally rates for mammals remain unchanged.

smallnamespace 6y ago

Holistic data across the entire animal kingdom is difficult to come by, but everywhere we look we're finding hints that there are serious issues. On just insects: > A reanalysis published in 2017 suggested that, in 1989–2016, there had been a "seasonal decline of 76%, and mid-summer decline of 82%, in flying insect biomass over the 27 years of study". The decline was "apparent regardless of habitat type" and could not be explained by "changes in weather, land use, and habitat characteristics". The authors suggested that not only butterflies, moths and wild bees appear to be in decline, as previous studies indicated, but "the flying insect community as a whole" That's not a small, random decline - 70-80% of insect mass has disappeared over a single generation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_in_insect_populations#cite_note-Hallmann2017PLoS-1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_in_insect_populations#...

tridentlead 6y ago
The rate of insect decline on land is less than the rate of growth in/on bodies of water. https://science.sciencemag.org/content/368/6489/417.full?ijkey=V2uhf3WniYR0.&keytype=ref&siteid=sci https://science.sciencemag.org/content/368/6489/417.full?ijk...

ianai 6y ago

We really need to be careful with dismissals such as yours. Compared to the time the grandfather post took to research, process, and write compared to how long it takes you to write a discarding message is trivial but the potential damage is great. Joe Rogan had a great interview with Barbara Freese yesterday on her forthcoming book “industrial strength denial(...)”. She discussed it at length in her interview. Basically, there are centuries of instances of interested parties using rhetoric not dissimilar to yours to deny progress on emancipation of slaves, tobacco laws, coal regulations, radon effects and etc. Its time we all dismiss the trivial dismissals of hard fought/researched truths and force informed, rational discussion. Link to interview mentioned: https://youtu.be/cP0D2_jhqPU https://youtu.be/cP0D2_jhqPU

ars 6y ago
That post suffers from recentisim. Mass animal die off are not actually new. Unless you find data from at least 100 years ago to compare, you can not draw conclusions. > Compared to the time the grandfather post took to research, process, and write Yes, but the only data in the post is what is found online. So while that can be used to draw attention to an issue, you can not use it to describe a trend, or say that things are getting worse.
- ricardobeat 6y ago
  Maybe you'll trust this 2015 article by National Geographic instead, backed by studies spanning the past 70+ years: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2015/1/150113-mass-die-off-disease-animals-environment-science/#:~:text=Mass%20die%2Doffs%20are%20individual,offs%20are%20on%20the%20rise https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2015/1/150113-mass-d....
  - dmix 6y ago
    The study https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2015/01/08/1414894112 https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2015/01/08/1414894112 The scale is increasing for certain species but not all: > We show that the magnitude of MMEs has been intensifying for birds, fishes, and marine invertebrates; invariant for mammals; and decreasing for reptiles and amphibians. The causes are still largely unknown but there are some patterns: > Regardless, the increase in MMEs appears to be associated with a rise in disease emergence, biotoxicity, and events produced by multiple interacting stressors, yet temporal trends in MME causes varied among taxa and may be associated with increased detectability. Either way it's a worrying sign that environmental factors will always play a role. Even if it is mostly just widespread diseases we previously didn't have the capability to detect, or simply no one was looking (as the abstract mentions about detectability) - additional environmental stresses could amplify what was otherwise pretty normal. In regards to the Elephants in Botswana this wouldn't yet meet their definition of MMEs (90% die off), or a good chunk of the other linked examples provided by OP. Additionally rates for mammals remain unchanged.