A Mass Extinction In The Oceans

If the Ocean goes down, it's game over
   —Alex Rogers, from stateoftheocean.org

Kilgore: Smell that? You smell that?
Lance: What?
Kilgore: Napalm, son. Nothing else in the world smells like that. [kneels]
Kilgore: I love the smell of napalm in the morning. You know, one time we had a hill bombed, for 12 hours. When it was all over, I walked up. We didn't find one of 'em, not one stinkin' dink body. The smell, you know that gasoline smell, the whole hill.  Smelled like ... Victory
Kilgore: Someday this war's gonna end...
   — Apocalypse Now

On the heels of my three part series last week (part I, part II, part III) on what Daniel Pauly calls The Aquacalypse, a number of readers sent me e-mails yesterday alerting me to a new report on the State of The Oceans. The news is not good.

A high-level international workshop convened by IPSO met at the University of Oxford earlier this year. It was the first inter-disciplinary international meeting of marine scientists of its kind and was designed to consider the cumulative impact of multiple stressors on the ocean, including warming, acidification, and overfishing.

The 3 day workshop, co-sponsored by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), looked at the latest science across different disciplines.

The 27 participants from 18 organisations in 6 countries produced a grave assessment of current threats — and a stark conclusion about future risks to marine and human life if the current trajectory of damage continues: that the world's ocean is at high risk of entering a phase of extinction of marine species unprecedented in human history.

To say what is happening is unprecedented in human history is an understatement meant for public consumption. The human species is only 200,000 years old. Only paleontologists, paleoclimatologists and others immersed in Deep Time (millions upon millions of years) can truly appreciate what is happening.

We are watching a sixth mass extinction take place in the oceans. There have been five "mass" extinctions in the Phanerozoic Eon (the time after the very long Pre-Cambrian), which began 542 million years ago. The last one occurred when an asteroid wiped out the non-avian dinosaurs and wreaked havoc on other Earth life 65 million years ago—~70% of species perished. (If some mammals hadn't survived the holocaust, we wouldn't be here.) It is thought that the closest analogue in Deep Time to what is happening now (in terms of rapidity) occurred 55.9 million years ago during the Paleocene/Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM). From the workshop press release—

The scientific panel concluded that:

• The combination of stressors on the ocean is creating the conditions associated with every previous major extinction of species in Earth’s history
• The speed and rate of degeneration in the ocean is far faster than anyone has predicted.
• Many of the negative impacts previously identified are greater than the worst predictions [heretofore]
• Although difficult to assess because of the unprecedented speed of change, the first steps to globally signficant extinction may have begun with a rise in the extinction threat to marine species such as reef-forming corals.

Dr. Alex Rogers, Scientific Director of the International Programme on the State of the Ocean (IPSO) which convened the workshop said: "The findings are shocking."

"As we considered the cumulative effect of what humankind does to the ocean, the implications became far worse than we had individually realized. This is a very serious situation demanding unequivocal action at every level. We are looking at consequences for humankind that will impact in our lifetime, and worse, our children's and generations beyond that..."

As examples, the panel point out:

• the rate at which carbon is being absorbed by the ocean is already far greater now than at the time of the last globally significant extinction of marine species, some 55 million years ago [the PETM], when up to 50% of some groups of deep-sea [benthic] animals were wiped out
• a single mass coral bleaching event in 1998 killed 16% of the all the world's tropical coral reefs
• overfishing has reduced some commerical fish stocks and populations of by-catch species by more than 90%
• new science also suggests that pollutants including flame retardant chemicals and synthetic musks found in detergents are being traced in the Polar Seas, and that these chemicals can be absorbed by the tiny plastic particles in the ocean which are in turn ingested by marine creatures

The experts agreed that adding these and other threats together means that the ocean and the ecosystems within it are unable to recover, being constantly bombarded with multiple attacks.

So, let me ask you this. After reading this press release, do you still think it matters whether Obama or some Republican is elected president in 2012? Why not vote for Bozo the Clown?

In my own latest series of articles on the destruction of life in the oceans, I focused on overfishing because there the human impact on marine species is too obvious to ignore. In reality, there are multiple environmental insults (stressors) deleterious to life in the oceans in play, as the IPSO workshop results make clear. The point of the meeting was to assess the effects of all the human-caused factors taken together. We find them in the longer version of the workshop summary. Here's a sample:

The key points needed to drive a common sense rethink are:

• Human actions have resulted in warming and acidification of the oceans and are now causing increased hypoxia [oxygen depletion].

  Studies of the Earth's past indicate that these are three symptoms that indicate disturbances of the carbon cycle associated with each of the previous five mass extinctions.

  [And see my post on acidification The "Other" Carbon Problem — Ocean Acidification.]

• The speeds of many negative changes to the ocean are near to or tracking worst-case scenarios from the IPCC and other predictions...

  ... The 'worst case' effects [of climate change] are compounding other changes more consistent with predictions including: changes in the distribution and abundance of marine species; changes in primary production; changes in the distribution of harmful algal blooms; increases in health hazards in the oceans; and loss of both large, long-lived and small fish species causing widespread impacts on marine ecosystems, including direct impacts on predator and prey species, the simplification and destabilization of food webs, reduction of resilience to the effects of climate change.

  [And see my posts How We Wrecked The Oceans — Part II, Reactions To The Phytoplankton Crisis, and The Phytoplankton Crisis — An Update.]

• Ecosystem collapse is occurring as a result of both current and emerging stressors.

  Stressors include chemical pollutants, agricultural run-off, sediment loads, and over-extraction of many components of food webs which singly and together severely impair the functioning of ecosystems. Consequences include the potential increase of harmful algal blooms in recent decades; the spread of oxygen depleted or dead zones; the disturbance of the structure and functioning of marine food webs, to the benefit of planktonic organisms of low nutritional value, such as jellyfish or other gelatinous-like organisms; dramatic changes in the microbial communities with negative impacts at the ecosystem-scale...

• The extinction threat to marine species is rapidly increasing.

  The main causes of extinctions of marine species to date are over-exploitation and habitat loss. However, climate change is increasingly adding to this, as evidenced by the recent IUNC Red List Assessment of reef-forming corals. Some other species ranges have already extended or shifted pole-wards and into deeper cooler waters...

These conclusions are framed in the language of science, which is simply so much gibberish—an incomprehensible foreign language—to the vast majority of Americans, who often take inordinate pride in knowing nothing. As if that weren't bad enough, the most astonishing thing is that most Americans believe they are entitled to an opinion on scientific matters they no nothing about as if they were political issues like taxing the wealthy or the paring down the public debt. Jesus wept.

So let me restate these conclusions for all those living in The State of Denial—the hopelessly obtuse, the cheerfully oblivious, and the blissfully ignorant.

Marine ecosystems and the inhabitants thereof don't give a fuck about your obtuseness, your oblivion and your ignorance. Your narrow-minded, petty, self-serving, mean-spirited squabbles mean nothing to them. Those creatures dwelling in the ocean are too busy swimming for their lives. They're too busy dying off from causes they could not possibly begin to comprehend.

Someday this war's gonna end...

Those of you who read my Learning From The Aquacalypse know how I view the possibility of a mass extinction in the Earth's oceans—it is all but inevitable. There's no reason for me to rehash that view here. I saw from some of the comments on that post that my views on Human Nature were quite upsetting to some of you. Sorry about that. I just thought you might like to know what you're dealing with.

Here's the workshop summary video. You can find other videos at the State Of The Oceans channel on youtube.

 

Comments

[rumor]

Somehow I hadn't considered this precise thought before: what happens when the scientific consensus concludes that we're past the point where we could have prevented our own auto-demise? So far science is telling us that we maybe, just barely, have a chance to avoid a terminal fate if we exercise a realistically unachievable level of collective restraint, but that provides us, politically and intellectually, with an escape clause. Hope. Emotional salvation.

What happens when that escape clause is gone? I don't like the implications.

[Gil Smart]

Fantastic stuff, Dave. Your blog needs WAY more readers and fans...

It's frustrating because we know humans/governments will never do anything to reverse these trends. This is happening and it will continue to happen simply because we're incapable of facing it, of tailoring our collective behavior to the precautionary principle. It's always balls to the wall, full speed ahead - right over the cliff.

I often like to imagine the arguments that raged as Easter Islanders cut down their very last tree. OF COURSE we need to cut this down, why are you trying to infringe upon my freedom to do so, don't you realize the economic harm conserving this tree would inflict upon the islanders. We're simply hardwired for shortsightedness, I guess.

[debu]

Will the final indignity to the oceans be the release of Fukushima Daiichi's hideously radioactive waters?

Shoppers in Tokyo have been received expert advice to avoid fish caught off the coast of Honshu from Aomori down to the Kii Peninsula (Nagoya way), for now. That affected area is bound to widen with further spills and the inevitable bioaccumulation issues.

Apart from that concern, however, the level of awareness of the perils facing the oceans in Japan is as low as it is in North America. The cult of maguro (tuna) is distressing to observe. The last tuna will no doubt be in eaten in an upscale sushi restaurant in Ginza. From then it will be all jellyfish all the time.

Your views on human nature, DC, are exactly right and apply to humans everywhere, sadly.

[John D]

rumor- I believe a large number of scientists think we are already toast. I see blogs where they argue among themselves as to whether mankind will go totally extinct, or whether a small amount of humans will survive to repopulate.

[RobM]

Life has existed for 3.5 to 4 billion years. Humanoids 1 million years. Civilization 10,000 years. Industrial society 200 years.

Therefore our little experiment with a big brain and fossil fuel lasted about one 20 millionth of evolutionary time. A vanishingly small slice of time.

I find it amazing to know I lived to experience the peak of 4 billion years of replicator natural selection to capture the biggest share of energy.

I imagine the fish will return after we are gone, but it may take a few tens of million years.

[Gail]

"We are watching a sixth mass extinction take place in the oceans."

Actually, we are watching a sixth mass extinction take place ON LAND too. But unlike the fishing industry, the lumber, oil and agricultural industries are much better at concealing the evidence. It's only a matter of a (very) short time before the same "We are shocked at the speed of decline" rhetoric emerges publicly from foresters and farmers.

http://witsendnj.blogspot.com/2011/06/oceans-away.html

[rumor]

John D: Yes, I agree, it's merely uncertain at this point whether things are reversible or even salvageable, but there's still some *possibility* of repreive, at least in technical terms (if not so much in realistic terms of human psychology and history). I'm not so much talking about what reality is but what the effect of perception is on the collective human pscyhe. When science tells us clearly that we're past the tipping point, how are people, collectively, going to behave? Now at least we are constrained by our beliefs or hopes or wishes that perhaps there is a technotopian solution or a sudden shift in collective will to act in restraint. When that no longer becomes possible or relevant - when, in other words, we can no longer delude ourselves so easily - how will people act, en masse?

There's an outside chance that it won't change a damn thing, I suppose. That people will go on ignoring uncomfortable scientific predictions insofar as they urge a change in behaviour, much as we do now. But I think there's a much larger chance that things will turn very ugly, very fast.

[Loveandlight]

@John D and rumor: I'm starting to drift back to my way of thinking that if humans are to survive on this planet, it will be as hunter-gatherers. When I thought that a few years ago, it turned into something of a Hofferian True Believerism, so I certainly hope I don't start lapsing back into that silly habit. (Not in the least because *way* too many self-styled neo-primitivists are, like college-campus radical-leftists, socially-maladjusted idiot-losers who do *not* even remotely have what it takes to put their utopian vision into practice.)

[Denialisbliss75]

I feel like you turned the thoughts in my head into much better words than I could. I, like you are very interested in science. Mine is just a hobby but I have kept up with all the data from various fields that talk about the past and our current situation. I actually predicted about a decade ago that our climate would change much faster than the predictions back then and even now. To me it was pretty easy to see but I guess I tend to put things together better than most. When I think about our future, economically and environmentally it scares the crap out of me.

[Edward Boyle]

I recall the film Deep Impact, where he poeple have date for destruction and slowly all hell breaks out and social order disintegrates. That can't happen here. Shit happens (Katrina, Fukushima, Russian drought) and then people get shocked then go back to a sort of normal after a while. Boiling frog syndrome. It doesn't happen fat enough to jump out. The Japanese are not closing all their nukes, nor the Russians stopping oil pumping nor USA doing anything seriously to stop mass housing directly on coasts, for example.

[LeRoy Murray]

I've been saying for years much to the consternation of my friends, that the best thing that could happen to the earth is the extinction of the human race, all of us, not some. If as is alleged to have happened in the past, a few survive, in a few thousand years we'll be right back where we are. I know it means me too, assuming I'm still here, but I sincerely hope the Mayans and the others are right about 2012, and hope its the end of the world and not the end of the age, humans don't deserve another chance.

[Loveandlight]

@LeRoy: I doubt we would be back here again in another few thousand years. The resources simply won't exist to build another industrial civilization. See "Olduvai Gorge theory".

[Remi]

Here's what my kids (and we) have to look forward to:
- Ocean's devoid of most things but thriving jelly fish, which will have cascading effects in the whole web of life
- Melted arctic sea ice with corporations clamoring for the newly exposed resources, which will have cascading effects in the whole web of life
- A destabilized, chaotic climate with floods, droughts, fires...
- A rapid rise in superbugs, and other health emergencies
- Rising oceans, millions of environmental refugees
- Too little food production for our rising population
- Peak oil and its consequences

Yet people don't seem to care enough to change, except possibly replace a few light bulbs... Most of the reporting always ends with: but it's not too late to change things (i.e. tune out, scientists and politicians will make things right). Headlines should be "hundreds of millions of people will die, and billions will die without immediate, large scale actions".

[Mike]

I just wanted to say your blog along with Naked Capitalism are my two favorite sources of information. I'm 26 and but it feels like when I read these comments on these sites, only older folks are interested in these issues. It seems like people in my age group just want to ignore it all and indulge in escapism whether it be video games or TV.

Now, I'm not a scientist but I can see a general ecological decline in my local community. Keep in mind this is just your average American suburb. There are no big factories or toxic waste sites yet everything seems to be in decline. When I was a kid, I used to collect and document various types of local plants and insects as well as fish recreationally. I guess you could say I was an amateur naturalist. Although, I no longer collect specimens, I do keep track of what I observe and it is very disheartening.

In 10 years I have noticed that the rich diversity of dragonfly species has gone from 30-35 (depending on the season) down to only 8. The ponds and lakes now only hold tiny, sickly looking catfish. Common pollinating insects like bees and butterfly are no longer common. Even the famed Monarch butterfly is beginning to be a rare sight in these parts. And this is only in an average American suburb. I can't imagine what is happening in industrial centers or areas of the planet blighted by intense human activity, like Eastern China.

Of course, I'm sure most people using these parks and preserves for their weekly jogs or bike rides even notices or cares about these things. The only other person I knew who was even remotely interested in the ecological health of these areas was an old World War II veteran who passed away years ago. It seems like the majority of Humans aren't going to do anything unless it directly affects them.

I suspect that human race won't go extinct but our ancestors will live on a planet that has been diminished greatly. Once industrial civilization has spent its lifeblood, humans will likely return to a pre-industrialized state and the dreams of a civilization stretching into space will be but a forgotten memory and our fate will tied to the planet's to the very end.

It's depressing to think that our final legacy would be a layer of broken plastic between the Burgess shale and a eons worth of mud and the few man-made objects existing in the vacuum of space. Makes you wonder what the point of it all is.

[Lucas Wheeler]

Dave great as always. But, may I make a suggestion? Why not follow the lead of Dave Foreman in his wonderful new work on human population "Man Swarm and the Killing of Wildlife" -- stop using the term "The Sixth Mass Extinction". Let us all from now on call it what it is: "The First Mass Murder of Life on the Planet". The other "mass extinctions" were the result of inanimate forces of nature -- asteroids, volcanism what have you. This time it is different. This time one form of life is deliberately killing off mass numbers of other lifeforms for it's own shortsighted self-interest. I honestly do not know if humans or "we" meaning "Industrial Society" will survive the slaughter. What I do know is that Prof. Eileen Crist was right when she stated "... it is not our survival and well-being that are primarily on the line, but everybody else's".