We Have Entered the Sixth Mass Extinction Phase: Scientists

The combination of global warming, loss of habitat and rising pollution is responsible for this possible catastrophe.

We lost the dodo because of our reckless way of living. Are humans next? (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)

Everybody has heard about how the combination of global warming, increasing environmental pollution and loss of habitat is hurting the planet. But if a study by Stanford University in the United States of America is to be believed, it might be killing us.

#HoloceneExtinction is trending on Twitter as a reference to the sixth mass extinction of the earth. Because of this mass extinction phase, we have already lost close to 80 species of mammals, over 100 bird species and more than 30 amphibian species since 1500.

The Telegraph reports that the scientists studying this trend claim that after the Cretaceous-Tertiary mass extinction, which wiped out the dinosaurs 66 million years ago, this extinction will be the biggest loss to Earth.

Without any significant doubt that we are now entering the sixth great mass extinction event. Species are disappearing up to about 100 times faster than the normal rate between mass extinctions, known as the background rate. Our calculations very likely underestimate the severity of the extinction crisis. There are examples of species all over the world that are essentially the walking dead.
—Professor Paul Ehrlich, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment to The Telegraph

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