fish-rides-bike t1_iug25xj wrote on October 31, 2022 at 1:20 AM

Reply to comment by dead_46th_president in Antarctica's emperor penguins at risk of extinction due to the climate crisis by mossadnik

Yeah. I mean to be fair, all forms of life are at risk of extinction, strictly speaking and given a large enough timeframe. I’ve just been hunting lately for statements that don’t use “could” or “should.” I mean fair enough, if co2 keeps going up, if the ice melts, if the penguins don’t adapt, they may well decline.

cornerblockakl t1_iuirbt0 wrote on October 31, 2022 at 5:16 PM

I’m still waiting to see the (any) decline plotted on a graph. That way we can check yearly progress of extinction of a species.

fish-rides-bike t1_iuivbt0 wrote on October 31, 2022 at 5:43 PM

There are so many other confounding things going on: hunting, not hunting, hunting or not of animals that prey on a species, hunting or not of animals that compete for food with a species, reintroductions of animals that prey on or compete, increased food due to climate change, new ranges opening up due to climate change, other species invading new territories, being either predators or new food sources. There are threats misattributed to cc, like the bees — probably killed by sprays that are now stopped, and bees are back, climate change notwithstanding.

Penguins and ice seem to go together, but Antarctica is huge, the ice shelves are massive, and penguins seem to do just fine on land of which there is plenty under the ice — they just don’t photograph so well on land.

cornerblockakl t1_iuizj3x wrote on October 31, 2022 at 6:10 PM

It’s complicated. Very complicated. So complicated only a fool would put money on predictions in the future. Lol. So complicated that there will never be a precise graph plotting the demise of any species. Or sea level rise. Or temp changes. (The climate changes. Humans may influence it. So might the sun. Or axis tilt. Or a million other things)