Multitude of Species Face Climate Threat

          In the article, “Multitude of Species Face Climate Threat” in the New York Times, the author talks about how a group of scientists at University of California, Berkeley tested the hypothesis that a sixth mass extinction could happen in the next couple of hundred years due to global warming. This type of mass extinction has happened five times since there has been life on Earth and each time about 75% of all species became extinct. The results of the study indicate that we may be in the beginning of one of these mass extinctions because the current rate of extinction is far above normal. The scientists think that this is a result of global warming and what it does to these animals. The author goes on to cite another study conducted by Dr. Camille Parmesan and Dr. Gary Yohe, which showed that out of the 1,700 species that they analyzed, these species’ ranges were moving, on average, 3.8 miles per decade toward the poles. This is a result of global warming and how it affects the climate and makes animals migrate to more comfortable areas. Then the article goes on to give examples of certain species that have been affected by the climate change and of some possible effects that the climate change could have on animals in the future. The author states that it is hard for scientists to predict what is going to happen to the species of animals because of how the species will react the changes brought on by global warming and because of human expansion into the habitats of animals.

           

          The results from the studies in this article prove that in the next couple hundred of years, there will most likely be a mass extinction of thousands of species of animals because of the climate change due to global warming. In a study done in 2004 involving over a thousand species of animals, the scientists estimated that out of the 37% of all species that were part of the study, 15% of those would become “committed to extinction” by 2050, thanks to climate change. The results of this study and many others are warning the people of the world to be environmentally conscious and aware of their carbon footprint. If global warming causes the climate change to continue for the next couple hundred of years, animals will start to become extinct more often and eventually around three quarters of all species will become extinct, just like what happened during the last five mass extinctions. The results of the research shown in this article prove that many species of animals will become extinct if nothing is changed about global warming pretty soon.

           

          This article was overall very well written. It explained everything that it was trying to talk about and gave the results of many studies that proved the authors point that a multitude of species could face extinction in the coming centuries. The author was very detailed and explained exactly how all of the studies were performed. The one thing that this author could have added to the article to make it even better was a paragraph or two about what would happen if a mass extinction happened while humans were on Earth. It would be very interesting to learn what would happen if this actually happened and 75% of the species of the Earth were extinct.

Zimmer, Carl. "Multitude of Species Face Climate Threat." New York Times. 4 Apr. 2011. Web. 6 Apr. 2011. .

Posted for R. Faselt