Science & Technology

15,000 scientists issue 'warning to humanity'

By T.K. Randall
November 13, 2017

Image Credit: (PD) NASA via Wikimedia Commons The warning, which comes 25 years after a mere 1,500 scientists issued a similar warning in 1992, has been trending on Twitter with the hashtag #ScientistsWarningToHumanity.

The campaign was started by William Ripple of Oregon State University's College of Forestry who, along with graduate student Christopher Wolf, conducted a revised analysis of each of the concerns that had been raised a quarter of a century ago.

With the exception of a rapid decline in the rate of ozone depletion, the findings were grim.

In addition to climate change, Ripple highlighted multiple environmental concerns including ocean dead zones, dwindling biodiversity, forest losses and unsustainable marine fisheries."The trends are alarming, and they speak for themselves," he said.

"The scientists around the world are very concerned about the state of the world, the environmental situation and climate change. So this allows them to have a collective voice."

Co-author Professor Eileen Crist also echoed the concerns highlighted in the report.

"We are in the throes of a mass extinction event that is anthropogenic," she said. "If we lose 50 to 75 per cent of the species on the planet in this century - which is what scientists are telling us what will occur if we continue to operate as business-as-usual. If this happens, this can not be fixed."

Source: CBC.ca

Tags: Earth, Global Warming