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Many people might think something as massive as the ocean is basically unlimited and that there's no way us humans could screw it up. Not true. Take a sample o

Many people might think something as massive as the ocean is basically unlimited and that there's no way us humans could screw it up. Not true. Take a sample of seawater from almost anywhere right now and you'll find microplastics. Something like 80% of the world's fish stocks are also gone from overfishing.

standardUser 5y ago
I can't understand this perspective at all, but it seems to have been a key philosophy guiding human development for a very long time. Was it just a belief based on convenience?
- _qwfv 5y ago
  It's a story as old as humanity. There's many examples of humans exhausting their nearby resources because they thought they were effectively infinite. Whether that's a forest, a food stock, a water source, or something else.
  - notriddle 5y ago
    And every time it's happened in the past, the solution has been to leave. There's always been somewhere else to go.
    - _qwfv 5y ago
      Not every time, or at least the solution doesn't always result in everyone surviving. The Mayan civilization, for instance, is thought to have exhausted their local resources and fallen apart as a result.
      - lotsofpulp 5y ago
        Easter Island is another example.
- rolleiflex 5y ago
  Up until the time industrial revolution really started to get going, it was true. If you look at the literature, poetry or philosophy of most any culture before 1880s it’s easy to see an unwavering belief of the invincibility of Nature against mankind. Humans have always been able to alter nature, but their ability to alter Nature with the capital N is a very new thing on a geological time scale.
- grecy 5y ago
  Read the book "The Golden Spruce" to get a really good understanding of how quickly we decimated the trees in the West. The rate of forest destruction accelerated so quickly with machinery I don't think it's possible to grasp.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
cronix 5y ago
It's worse than that. It's showing up in rain and snow, and our water supply because most filtration systems don't catch micro/nanoplastics. It's in our bodies. I think we will eventually find it's also largely responsible for the tremendous drop off in birth rates and reproductive health that the world has been experiencing the last 10+ years and possibly other neurological and "brain" issues that have increased in frequency. Infertility of people in their reproductive prime is at an all-time high. We already know BPA has a lot of these side effects. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/aug/17/microplastic-particles-discovered-in-human-organs https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/aug/17/micropla... https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/05/us-birth-and-fertility-rates-dropped-to-another-record-low-in-2020-cdc-says.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/05/us-birth-and-fertility-rates...
- MarkLowenstein 5y ago
  Sorry but I can't abide the scientific ignorance being displayed all over this conversation. (1) The first article you cite "Microplastic particles now discoverable in human organs" only announces that some scientists made a technique to discover such particles. The only ones they found were ones they inserted on purpose to verify their technique. That headline leads people strongly to incorrect conclusions like you have made. That's one of the main techniques of fake news. (2) Fertility rate has nothing to do with how many people can't get pregnant who are trying. It's just a variation on birth rate. (3) Mother Jones - here cited many times as factual - shows a picture of a bird with a plastic mesh around it. That is not what "toxic" is. Maybe powerful lobbyists got Canadian legislators to pretend that plastic straws are "toxic", but again that flies in the face of scientific fact. Plastic is an amazingly inert substance that is unlikely to cause harm outside of physical constriction. In honor of this thread, I'm going to go eat a Lego. You can rest assured that I'll be back tomorrow to collect my downvotes.
  - cmrdporcupine 5y ago
    I upvoted you because I want you to come back and tell us how the lego tasted.
mediaman 5y ago
About half of the plastic in oceans is from plastic netting used fishing. And that netting causes the vast majority of ecological damage by entangling marine animals or dragging along ocean beds. The real problem is excessive fishing and plastic waste from fishing, far more than using plastic for a cup or shopping bag.
- redisman 5y ago
  What’s the other half then? I agree that industrial fishing is a giant problem
adventured 5y ago
> Something like 80% of the world's fish stocks are also gone from overfishing. Is there an estimate that goes along with that number for when 95%+ of all fish stocks will be gone? Given the extraordinarily fast depletion implied by the 80% figure (the vast majority of which has happened in the past century), it must be very soon. Within 10-20 years there would have to be almost no fish stocks left given the advance of world's population and its collective demand for fish.

standardUser 5y ago

I can't understand this perspective at all, but it seems to have been a key philosophy guiding human development for a very long time. Was it just a belief based on convenience?

_qwfv 5y ago
It's a story as old as humanity. There's many examples of humans exhausting their nearby resources because they thought they were effectively infinite. Whether that's a forest, a food stock, a water source, or something else.
- notriddle 5y ago
  And every time it's happened in the past, the solution has been to leave. There's always been somewhere else to go.
  - _qwfv 5y ago
    Not every time, or at least the solution doesn't always result in everyone surviving. The Mayan civilization, for instance, is thought to have exhausted their local resources and fallen apart as a result.
    - lotsofpulp 5y ago
      Easter Island is another example.
rolleiflex 5y ago
Up until the time industrial revolution really started to get going, it was true. If you look at the literature, poetry or philosophy of most any culture before 1880s it’s easy to see an unwavering belief of the invincibility of Nature against mankind. Humans have always been able to alter nature, but their ability to alter Nature with the capital N is a very new thing on a geological time scale.
grecy 5y ago
Read the book "The Golden Spruce" to get a really good understanding of how quickly we decimated the trees in the West. The rate of forest destruction accelerated so quickly with machinery I don't think it's possible to grasp.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

cronix 5y ago

It's worse than that. It's showing up in rain and snow, and our water supply because most filtration systems don't catch micro/nanoplastics. It's in our bodies. I think we will eventually find it's also largely responsible for the tremendous drop off in birth rates and reproductive health that the world has been experiencing the last 10+ years and possibly other neurological and "brain" issues that have increased in frequency. Infertility of people in their reproductive prime is at an all-time high. We already know BPA has a lot of these side effects. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/aug/17/microplastic-particles-discovered-in-human-organs https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/aug/17/micropla... https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/05/us-birth-and-fertility-rates-dropped-to-another-record-low-in-2020-cdc-says.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/05/us-birth-and-fertility-rates...

MarkLowenstein 5y ago
Sorry but I can't abide the scientific ignorance being displayed all over this conversation. (1) The first article you cite "Microplastic particles now discoverable in human organs" only announces that some scientists made a technique to discover such particles. The only ones they found were ones they inserted on purpose to verify their technique. That headline leads people strongly to incorrect conclusions like you have made. That's one of the main techniques of fake news. (2) Fertility rate has nothing to do with how many people can't get pregnant who are trying. It's just a variation on birth rate. (3) Mother Jones - here cited many times as factual - shows a picture of a bird with a plastic mesh around it. That is not what "toxic" is. Maybe powerful lobbyists got Canadian legislators to pretend that plastic straws are "toxic", but again that flies in the face of scientific fact. Plastic is an amazingly inert substance that is unlikely to cause harm outside of physical constriction. In honor of this thread, I'm going to go eat a Lego. You can rest assured that I'll be back tomorrow to collect my downvotes.
- cmrdporcupine 5y ago
  I upvoted you because I want you to come back and tell us how the lego tasted.

mediaman 5y ago

About half of the plastic in oceans is from plastic netting used fishing. And that netting causes the vast majority of ecological damage by entangling marine animals or dragging along ocean beds. The real problem is excessive fishing and plastic waste from fishing, far more than using plastic for a cup or shopping bag.

redisman 5y ago
What’s the other half then? I agree that industrial fishing is a giant problem

adventured 5y ago

> Something like 80% of the world's fish stocks are also gone from overfishing. Is there an estimate that goes along with that number for when 95%+ of all fish stocks will be gone? Given the extraordinarily fast depletion implied by the 80% figure (the vast majority of which has happened in the past century), it must be very soon. Within 10-20 years there would have to be almost no fish stocks left given the advance of world's population and its collective demand for fish.