If one is alive, then there’s a possibility that one will suffer either an injury or death. That’s the reality of this planet, and it’s been the reality for over 3.8 billion years, that is, for as long as the planet has supported life. Individual death and species extinction are the way of the world. Why should I tell you this?
I recently read a statement online that is attributed to a disgruntled person concerned about his own demise after the recent presidential election: “I’m going to die from climate change. You and your friends let this happen, which is going to cut 40 years off my life expectancy.” Now, I’m not going to argue against the speaker’s feelings. They were, no doubt, genuine. The guy, speaking at a DNC post election meeting, is clearly concerned that climate change will kill him. But there are some realities he needs to consider.
According to David M. Raup,* the fossil record indicates that on average a species survives for about four million years. The history of life also suggests that on average about ten species become extinct yearly (108).
Let’s take the average extinction rate and run with it for a moment. Ten species extinctions per year would mean that 38 billion species have kicked the bucket! That’s a bunch of dying out. Of course, new species emerge; that’s the reason we might currently share this planet with anywhere between four and 40 million other species. No one knows how many species have come and gone, just as no one knows the exact number of species alive today, but the number is, by any reasonable estimate, big. So, there are many species from which to pick ten losers, ten that find this year to be their last. “Goodbye, Unlucky Ten. You’ve had your run. Hello, Lucky New Species, hope you make it through the next four million years. But you newcomers should be aware that we’re talking averages here, not absolutes. Nevertheless, enjoy your stay because four million years go by like—well, just ask those ten whose tenure was revoked.”
A background extinction rate for species means nothing to the individual members of that species, of course. Individuals come and go in a blink, even for the long-lived bristle cone pines, the redwoods, sharks, and turtles. The background rate also means nothing in the context of the big extinction events. There have been five of those at least—possibly six if we think we are in the midst of another. The one at the end of the Permian Period was so significant that it has been called the Great Dying. The famous one at the end of the Cretaceous Period knocked off all the dinosaur species—all of them, no exceptions unless you count the birds as their progeny.
And now the guy worried about being killed by climate change: Just how will that work? Regardless of whether or not humans are contributing to a warming trend, we should all realize that climates have always undergone changes for a variety of causes. Think, for example, about the “Ice Age”—really a sequence of cooling and warming trends over about the last two million years. The ice came and went. Earth cooled and warmed. People weren’t involved in the cycles of cooling and warming until about 200,000 years ago, and the use of carbon-dioxide-releasing fire probably goes back no more than to our relative Neandertal species who lived 500,000 years ago. Lots of individuals kicked the bucket in the interim, and many species went extinct because of natural phenomena that had nothing to do with people.
Again, back to the guy’s concerns. He probably won’t live to see warming to the degree that occurred 55 million years ago. Earth was hot back then, really hot. The Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum was toasty. And species who loved the cold probably—no, make that “without question”—went extinct. So, what in climate change is going to kill the guy? What is worth his anxiety? Does he think the rise of the oceans, a rise that has been in progress since the last continental ice sheets melted eight to twelve thousand years ago, will inundate him? Will he suffocate in carbon dioxide while plants thrive?
Dying from climate change is possible, but picture the scenario or the newspaper story: “Ocean rises three mm this year. Man trying to run up the beach is caught by the water and drowned.”
Okay, you want to pose stronger hurricanes or tornadoes or longer droughts as lethal consequences of climate change. “Look at the American Southwest’s current long drought,” you say. You know those events are local or regional, don’t you? Remember “We Are the World” sung to raise money for people in droughty Ethiopia? Before you stockpile a millennium’s worth of food and water, realize that even when it is short term, climate change is a long, complex, and fluctuating process. The American Southwest has seen centuries-long droughts before; just ask the Pueblo.
So, let’s think about extinction a little. We don’t even know the relationships among the physical players in the game of extinction that wiped out 38 billion species. Carbon dioxide? Methane? Comet impact? Volcanism? Orogeny? Sea level? Viruses and bacteria? Genetic penchant? Mitochondrial collapse? Whatever. Extinction is inevitable, just as death is inevitable for individuals. But those now lucky enough to inhabit the planet after so many predecessors have died should cut back on anxiety about the inevitable. No species beats the odds of extinction.
Again, I empathize with the guy worried about his demise at the hand of climate change. He’s been told that “the” climate is changing, whereas, in fact, climates have always changed and changed back to what they were before they changed. For individuals and species alike such change can be devastating. Someone should explain to him that even if humans had never burned a lump of coal or gallon of oil, some natural phenomenon or phenomena would alter climates.
So, Earth’s surface temperatures appear to be warming. What if the human contribution to warmer temperatures actually meant a postponement of another natural cycle of cooling (and freezing)? Regardless of what we do or don’t do, someone’s going to die cold or hot, and if this year is average, we’ll all say goodbye to some ten other Earthling species—that is, if we don’t succumb first.
*Extinction: Bad Genes or Bad Luck (1991), W.W. Norton & Company.
I recently read a statement online that is attributed to a disgruntled person concerned about his own demise after the recent presidential election: “I’m going to die from climate change. You and your friends let this happen, which is going to cut 40 years off my life expectancy.” Now, I’m not going to argue against the speaker’s feelings. They were, no doubt, genuine. The guy, speaking at a DNC post election meeting, is clearly concerned that climate change will kill him. But there are some realities he needs to consider.
According to David M. Raup,* the fossil record indicates that on average a species survives for about four million years. The history of life also suggests that on average about ten species become extinct yearly (108).
Let’s take the average extinction rate and run with it for a moment. Ten species extinctions per year would mean that 38 billion species have kicked the bucket! That’s a bunch of dying out. Of course, new species emerge; that’s the reason we might currently share this planet with anywhere between four and 40 million other species. No one knows how many species have come and gone, just as no one knows the exact number of species alive today, but the number is, by any reasonable estimate, big. So, there are many species from which to pick ten losers, ten that find this year to be their last. “Goodbye, Unlucky Ten. You’ve had your run. Hello, Lucky New Species, hope you make it through the next four million years. But you newcomers should be aware that we’re talking averages here, not absolutes. Nevertheless, enjoy your stay because four million years go by like—well, just ask those ten whose tenure was revoked.”
A background extinction rate for species means nothing to the individual members of that species, of course. Individuals come and go in a blink, even for the long-lived bristle cone pines, the redwoods, sharks, and turtles. The background rate also means nothing in the context of the big extinction events. There have been five of those at least—possibly six if we think we are in the midst of another. The one at the end of the Permian Period was so significant that it has been called the Great Dying. The famous one at the end of the Cretaceous Period knocked off all the dinosaur species—all of them, no exceptions unless you count the birds as their progeny.
And now the guy worried about being killed by climate change: Just how will that work? Regardless of whether or not humans are contributing to a warming trend, we should all realize that climates have always undergone changes for a variety of causes. Think, for example, about the “Ice Age”—really a sequence of cooling and warming trends over about the last two million years. The ice came and went. Earth cooled and warmed. People weren’t involved in the cycles of cooling and warming until about 200,000 years ago, and the use of carbon-dioxide-releasing fire probably goes back no more than to our relative Neandertal species who lived 500,000 years ago. Lots of individuals kicked the bucket in the interim, and many species went extinct because of natural phenomena that had nothing to do with people.
Again, back to the guy’s concerns. He probably won’t live to see warming to the degree that occurred 55 million years ago. Earth was hot back then, really hot. The Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum was toasty. And species who loved the cold probably—no, make that “without question”—went extinct. So, what in climate change is going to kill the guy? What is worth his anxiety? Does he think the rise of the oceans, a rise that has been in progress since the last continental ice sheets melted eight to twelve thousand years ago, will inundate him? Will he suffocate in carbon dioxide while plants thrive?
Dying from climate change is possible, but picture the scenario or the newspaper story: “Ocean rises three mm this year. Man trying to run up the beach is caught by the water and drowned.”
Okay, you want to pose stronger hurricanes or tornadoes or longer droughts as lethal consequences of climate change. “Look at the American Southwest’s current long drought,” you say. You know those events are local or regional, don’t you? Remember “We Are the World” sung to raise money for people in droughty Ethiopia? Before you stockpile a millennium’s worth of food and water, realize that even when it is short term, climate change is a long, complex, and fluctuating process. The American Southwest has seen centuries-long droughts before; just ask the Pueblo.
So, let’s think about extinction a little. We don’t even know the relationships among the physical players in the game of extinction that wiped out 38 billion species. Carbon dioxide? Methane? Comet impact? Volcanism? Orogeny? Sea level? Viruses and bacteria? Genetic penchant? Mitochondrial collapse? Whatever. Extinction is inevitable, just as death is inevitable for individuals. But those now lucky enough to inhabit the planet after so many predecessors have died should cut back on anxiety about the inevitable. No species beats the odds of extinction.
Again, I empathize with the guy worried about his demise at the hand of climate change. He’s been told that “the” climate is changing, whereas, in fact, climates have always changed and changed back to what they were before they changed. For individuals and species alike such change can be devastating. Someone should explain to him that even if humans had never burned a lump of coal or gallon of oil, some natural phenomenon or phenomena would alter climates.
So, Earth’s surface temperatures appear to be warming. What if the human contribution to warmer temperatures actually meant a postponement of another natural cycle of cooling (and freezing)? Regardless of what we do or don’t do, someone’s going to die cold or hot, and if this year is average, we’ll all say goodbye to some ten other Earthling species—that is, if we don’t succumb first.
*Extinction: Bad Genes or Bad Luck (1991), W.W. Norton & Company.
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