Earth has entered sixth mass extinction, warn scientists

The Earth has reached a sixth mass extinction event, according to new research. 

The report, led by the universities of Stanford, Princeton and Berkeley, said vertebrates were disappearing at a rate 114 times faster than normal. The normal rate at which animals vanish is two mammal extinctions per 10,000 species per 100 years. But even by highly conservative estimates, species are disappearing 100 times faster than that, according to the study.


Using research from the International Union of Conservation of Nature, the study found that 338 species have gone extinct since 1500, with about 60 per cent of them disappearing since 1900.

"(The study) shows without any significant doubt that we are now entering the sixth great mass extinction event," said Paul Ehrlich, a biologist at Stanford University who helped co-author the study.

The scientists believe the destructive activity of humans -- such as land clearing and carbon emissions -- could be to blame for this rapid extinction.

Now that the data is available, the authors hope to use the information to save as many species as possible before it’s too late, said co-author Gerardo Ceballos of Universidad Autónoma de México.

"If it is allowed to continue, life would take many millions of years to recover," Ceballos said, "and our species itself would likely disappear early on."

Source (www.ctvnews.ca)