The Sixth Extinction

Human beings have always altered their environments, especially since the beginning of agriculture about 10,000 years ago. But that process has radically accelerated under capitalism. Southern California used to be one of the most biologically diverse areas in North America. But in the last 100 years, we’ve destroyed 85 percent of Coastal Sage Scrub. In Los Angeles County, only 5 percent of ancestral wetlands are left.

Worldwide, this translates into what paleobiologists call the Sixth Extinction. At least three of the first five were caused by climate change. The last one, about 65 million years ago, was caused by a comet that smashed into the Earth, carving out the Gulf of Mexico. Right now, as a result of habitat destruction and global warming, we are losing about 30,000 species per year, or about three per hour.

This isn’t just bad for willow flycatchers and fairy shrimp. One of the most promising areas of medical research right now is ethnopharmacology, which focuses on isolating complex organic compounds that can be used to treat disease. The plants and animals that contain these compounds have evolved over millions of years, but they are disappearing faster than they can be studied.

The Sixth Extinction: Patterns of Life and the Future of Humankind by Richard E. Leakey