Jumping To Conclusions

While Gregg Easterbrook does a good job of refuting this junk science, he fails to understand that species extinction is a fact of nature. If you believe in evolution then some species are going to be more successful that others and some of the less successful ones will disappear. If we use the numbers given in the article (24% = 1.25 million species), there are currently 6 million species of plants and animals. Thus, the 12000 species that Gregg Easterbrook is worried about make up all of 0.2% of the species. Not exactly a large percentage.

By the way, about 65 million years ago, not only the dinosaurs, but also around 70% of all of the species on earth disappeared. Somehow, life on earth managed not only to survive this natural occurrence but also to thrive. Since there were no humans around to destroy the planet then, I guess it would be hard for the Washington Post to blame that disaster on human caused global warming .

Fact is though that Easterbrook is probably the only reporter who has taken the trouble to understand the issues at all (I for one don't) and yet has the liberal credentials to be credible when he calls the greens on their nonsense.

In fact, Richard, your point reminds me of a passage from that golden oldie, Tyrells' *The Liberal Crack-up*. He says by the enviros' logic, we should become "angels" by virtue of blowing our noses -- we're interfering with our own "delicate ecosystems"!