Posted on 08/14/2008 3:28:30 PM PDT by Zakeet
Human activities are cumulatively driving the health of the world's oceans down a rapid spiral, and only prompt and wholesale changes will slow or perhaps ultimately reverse the catastrophic problems they are facing.
Such is the prognosis of Jeremy Jackson, a professor of oceanography at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, in a bold new assessment of the oceans and their ecological health. Publishing his study in the online early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), Jackson believes that human impacts are laying the groundwork for mass extinctions in the oceans on par with vast ecological upheavals of the past.
He cites the synergistic effects of habitat destruction, overfishing, ocean warming, increased acidification and massive nutrient runoff as culprits in a grand transformation of once complex ocean ecosystems. Areas that had featured intricate marine food webs with large animals are being converted into simplistic ecosystems dominated by microbes, toxic algal blooms, jellyfish and disease.
Jackson, director of the Scripps Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation, has tagged the ongoing transformation as "the rise of slime." The new paper, "Ecological extinction and evolution in the brave new ocean," is a result of Jackson's presentation last December at a biodiversity and extinction colloquium convened by the National Academy of Sciences.
"The purpose of the talk and the paper is to make clear just how dire the situation is and how rapidly things are getting worse," said Jackson. "It's a lot like the issue of climate change that we had ignored for so long. If anything, the situation in the oceans could be worse because we are so close to the precipice in many ways."
(Excerpt) Read more at scrippsnews.ucsd.edu ...

Professor Jackson: My government funded research shows we need to stop fishing, shut down all factories, quit driving cars, forget about offshore drilling and elect Obama -- IMMEDIATELY -- or the oceans will turn to slime.
“Warns of Mass Extinctions and ‘Rise of Slime’”
Wait a minute...we’ve already got the democrat party!
Don’t tell me. We have 10 years to make changes or it’ll be too late?
Sorry dude, you’re too late. Jacques Cousteau and Ted Danson told us the oceans would be dead in 10 years back in 1991. So the ocean have already been dead for for the last seven years.
Same old, same old from the envirowhackos.
“The rise of slime” We are already seeing this in congress and elsewhere in the liberal community
The Good Professor in that shirt looks like one of those “gone fishin’” TV hosts from the Sixties.
Once again, we are all gonna DIE!
I thought that ended when Clinton left the White House in 2000
Don't they ever go away?
"We are all doomed!!!" shouts the fool. "We know better" respond 31,000 scientists
Revelation 16:3
The second angel poured out his bowl on the sea, and it turned into blood like that of a dead man, and every living thing in the sea died.
He is RIGHT, and we have been seeing it happening for YEARS!!
The slime has oozed more and more into the limelight, loudly pimping Global Warming, and laying down and spreading for more funding and Carbon Credits.
Anyone questioning the agenda is slimed as well.
That's when I hit the proverbial brakes.
Couldn’t we just smart-bomb the slime with out stealth fighters?
Of course there are those of us who caution the doomsayers. The oceans are not warming, but cooling
http://www.greenhousetruth.com/blog/2006_09_22_ocean_cooling.shtml
but this only leads the gloom and doom crowd to move the topic to acid levels. Yes, a higher level of CO2 will lead to a higher level of carbonic acid in the ocean. However cooler water will lead to more disolved gas of all types, hence more oxygen in the water too.
Its too soon to cry wolf. (Speaking as a former member of Zero Population Growth — we are going to overpopulate the world you know.) Why former? well, the public cannot carry a fear that does not materialize for more than ten years. So ocean fears will collapse in the near term as will the global warming crisis.


Could it be?
No, he's actually Keith Richards.....

And no mention of the technologies that could quickly reverse any problems and make the oceans even better.
For example, enormous offshore fish farms, that would not only relieve the pressure of overfishing, but double, triple or quadruple the amount of fish for the world’s tables. Offshore fish farms are fairly low overhead, just descending nets attached to pontoons and Purina fish chow. Hatchery fish are raised inside the nets, and ocean currents handle oxygenation and cleaning.
When the fish are ready for harvesting, just raise the interior net. The exterior heavy net is to keep out the predators. And when the market is saturated with fish, the fish farms can raise and release endangered fish to repopulate the oceans.
Another example is creating artificial reefs with a simple grid of cables. It was discovered that if you run a weak current through cables, they get radical growth of coral on them. Soon you get a reef growing where there was just sand.
And another example is to plant kelp beds, like any other garden. Kelp beds cause explosive growth of animal life, and grow quickly. Half a dozen scuba divers can plant a new kelp bed in an afternoon, for just a few dollars and the cost of their compressed air.
The bottom line is that most problems have fairly easy and inexpensive fixes. Whining that government should do something just proves that the problem matters less to them than government involvement. It’s called an ulterior motive.
Note that James E. Hansen used to propose the exact same “solutions” to global cooling as he does now for global warming. And they’re the same “solutions” proposed by butterfly expert Paul R. Ehrlich, when he told us that the world was doomed, DOOMED, because of overpopulation. We were all going to die before 1980.
I AM THE SLIME by Frank Zappa
I am gross and perverted
Im obsessed n deranged
I have existed for years
But very little had changed
I am the tool of the government
And industry too
For I am destined to rule
And regulate you
I may be vile and pernicious
But you cant look away
I make you think Im delicious
With the stuff that I say
I am the best you can get
Have you guessed me yet?
I am the slime oozin out
From your tv set
You will obey me while I lead you
And eat the garbage that I feed you
Until the day that we dont need you
Dont got for help...no one will heed you
Your mind is totally controlled
It has been stuffed into my mold
And you will do as you are told
Until the rights to you are sold
Thats right, folks..
Dont touch that dial
Well, I am the slime from your video
Oozin along on your livinroom floor
I am the slime from your video
Cant stop the slime, people, lookit me go
But that's just me.
Sounds to me like the problem will take care of itself in a few years. If we are all dead then who will be causing any more “global warming” or “climate change”?
I thought we all came from "slime".
So it must be a good thing.
Right?
...hello?...
INTREP
The ultimate solution would be to just be rid the earth of mankind to restore the earth.
Seems a bit extreme though. Although it has been discussed by environmentalists.
We may be using the ocean for algae based bio-fuels at some point.
There are two approaches to everything. The eco-nuts always insist that we must make do with less, lower our expectations and prosperity, abandon technology and stop having fun.
Sensible ecologists and technologists always look to our having more, leading better and more prosperous lives, devising technological solutions to problems, spending less and having an optimistic future.
Importantly, only this latter group have ever proven themselves right. The eco-nuts are invariably wrong, but importantly, to them it doesn’t matter, because they don’t really care about the ecology. It is just an excuse for them to get what they really want, which is money and power over other people.
And with that power, they want to force us to have less and suffer more. This is because they equate prosperity and success with moral failure in others, but not themselves. They do not enjoy a good meal knowing that others enjoy their meals as well. And they do not enjoy a soft mattress knowing that others also sleep well. It is a sickness of the soul.
But that being said, the future is bright, because innovation and technology have tremendous prospects for making our lives better and giving us more prosperity, while at the same time saving us money and making life better for all.
New technologies are showing signs of making water desalinization much better, using only a quarter of the energy it does right now. This means that people on the coast would no longer need to get their fresh water in competition with those who live inland. So everybody gets more, and cheaper.
All of that algae and slime can be converted to biofuels!
Dems never see a way to make lemonade, they just want us all to suck on lemons!
everyone knows that widespread use of tobacco wiped out life on earth 150 yrs. ago. move over nitwit, let some other nitwit have a chance. Y2K
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.