THE POLITICS OF EXTINCTION

Pope Francis has been in the States for the last few days, and although much of his message many of us may agree with, his is still a message of death. Although recognizing, and if at all possible, battling Climate Change is a message that resonates with a hopefully large number of atheists, it does not alleviate the path to extinction that the catholic church would like to take us down. 

Although conservative leaders did not welcome his messages on climate, wealth, refugees, etc.; they really enjoyed his life starts at conception spiel. The catholic church has been at the lead when it comes to the rights of cells. Apparently that is so much more important than the unknown number of children molested by priests; the church has still not made their records accessible to the government or the people. All internal, christian law. 

The Ordovician-Silurian extinction occurred about 439 million years ago due to a drop in sea levels as glaciers formed followed by rising sea levels as glaciers melted. During this extinction 25 percent of marine families and 60 percent of marine genera (the classification above species) were lost.

The pope's reluctance to bring up the many horrors that have been recently committed by the church, and his stance on women negates and overwhelms any good his message may contain. The anti-choice movement has its champion, and the world screams in anguish. Over 7 billion humans now hold sway over all life. Catholics have been in the forefront of the anti-choice terrorist movement, and the pope supports the terrorists.

The Late Devonian extinction took place somewhere around 364 million years ago. To this day its cause is unknown. However, evidence supporting the Devonian mass extinction suggesting that warm water marine species were the most severely affected in this extinction event, has lead many paleontologists to believe that an episode of global cooling, similar to the event which that may have resulted in the Ordovician-Silurian mass extinction, may have lead to the Devonian extinction. Thus this theory suggests that the extinction of the Devonian was triggered by another glaciation event on Gondwana, which is evidenced by glacial deposits of this age in northern Brazil.

According to Earth Overshoot Day we used up what the earth produced on August 13, 2015. This means we are drawing down on the earth's principle instead of living on its interest, if economic models work for you. Basically we use more resources than the earth can produce. 

The Pope's desire to see humans needlessly propagate is an abomination; propagation is what animals do to keep their species alive, but it is not something they should be forced to do. To straddle teens who have an entire life ahead of them with the burden of raising offspring, to destroy a woman's life for the sake of the unborn, to deliver children into the misery of a life that cannot be sustained, is simply torture.

The Permian-Triassic extinction happened about 251 million years ago and was Earths worst mass extinction. 95 percent of all species, 53 percent of marine families, 84 percent of marine genera, and an estimated 70 percent of land species such as plants, insects and vertebrate animals were killed during this catastrophe. 

The anti-choice comments were applauded by our conservative congress. The anti-science crowd who cannot accept basic life sciences like evolution, who cannot understand climate science, who purposefully close their eyes and minds to reach an unsustainable goal of profit for the few and misery for the rest. These people really are not just a freethinker's enemy, they are the enemy of all life that exists on this planet.

The Chairman of the House Science Committee, Lamar Smith, cut NASA's earth science budget this year. Though he chairs a committee on science, he doesn't understand what science is. Ben Carson, one of our fine anti-science conservatives running to be president of the Unites States, thinks evolution is a fairy tale. A neurosurgeon who does not accept the basic life science that we have al benefitted from. Instead of science, we now used ideology as theory. This list goes on and on, the vast majority of conservative elected officials do not have our best interests at heart. 

The End Triassic extinction, taking place roughly 199 million to 214 million years ago, was most likely caused by massive floods of lava erupting from the central Atlantic magmatic province triggering the breakup of Pangaea and the opening of the Atlantic Ocean. This possibly contributed to global warming.

If you glance at the possible reasons for past extinctions, you'll notice that climate change has been a possible helping hand, or the main event, that drove countless species into extinction. Yet here we are, ignoring all the signs of another catastrophe. We are drowned out by a media that cannot explain what is happening in a soundbite so doesn't bother trying. The public seems to care less and less about anything science, unless it's a new way to kill, and that fault lies squarely on the confusing data being fed to them by the media. 

The Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction occurred about 65 million years ago and is thought to have been aggravated, if not caused, by impacts of several-mile-wide asteroid that created the Chicxulub crater now hidden on the Yucatan Peninsula and beneath the Gulf of Mexico. Yet, some scientists believe that this mass extinction was caused by gradual climate change or flood-like volcanic eruptions of basalt lava from the Deccan Traps in west-central India. During this extinction, 16 percent of marine families, 47 percent of marine genera, and 18 percent of land vertebrate families including the dinosaurs.

Religious leaders, and politicians, are only looking out for their own welfare; senseless puppets in our new Oligarchy. These are the newest of the false prophets. They are living for today and not for eternal life. 

The Holocene extinction, sometimes called the Sixth Extinction, is a name proposed to describe the currently ongoing extinction event of species during the present Holocene epoch (since around 10,000 BCE) mainly due to human activity.

Humans may be on their way out. We have spread to the ends of the earth using resources as fast as we can. For the most part, we have no sense of the future. Our ideology and politics are driving us to extinction. Any that have even a minimal understanding of the ecological requirements for diversity, basic biology and life sciences, should be able to imagine a future that doesn't include life as we know it.

It was fun people.