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Humans Use 83 Percent of Earth's Surface
belloc writes "CNN is reporting on a Wildlife Conservation Society report that states that humans take up 83 percent of the Earth's land surface to live on, farm, mine or fish. The article rerers to a WCS human footprint map, but the WCS site seems to have been CNN'd. Funny: I just got back from a little road trip across the southwest, and from all the nothing you see out there, you would think that 83% is a bit high. I guess Arizona farmlands must look a lot like wild, untouched desert."
They use the Earth's surface to fish? Now that is a technological breakthrough worth discussing...
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
We've only got 83% of the globe? God must be disappointed.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
That reminds me of the movie, "The Truman Show" where Truman wants to be an explorer and his teacher pulls down a map and says, "Awww, you're too late, everything's been explored already."
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In case of further CNN'ing (a new version of slashdotting?)
The Human Footprint
Human influence is driving conservation crises on a global scale. There is little debate in scientific circles about the importance of human influence on ecosystems. Scientists have shown that we appropriate over 40% of the net primary productivity (the green stuff) produced on Earth each year either taking it directly or keeping other organisms from using it through our agriculture and land use practices (Vitousek et al. 1986, Rojstaczer et al. 2001). We consume 35% of the productivity of the oceanic shelf, are fishing down food webs, and taking 60% of the available freshwater run-off. Although just estimates, these few statistics are testament to the unprecedented escalations in both human population and consumption during the twentieth century, resulting in entirely new environmental crises in the history of humankind and the world. E.O Wilson, the famous naturalist, claims it would now take four Earths to meet the consumption demands of the current human population, if all humans consumed at the rate of the average North American. The influence of human beings on the planet has become so pervasive that it is hard to find an adult person in any country who has not seen the environment around her reduced in natural values during her life time - woodlots converted to agriculture, agricultural lands converted to suburban development, suburban development converted to urban areas. Think of your life, of your neighborhood, of the neighborhood you grew up in -- what it was and what it is now.
The cumulative effect of these many local changes is the global phenomenon of human influence on nature, poorly understood and needlessly destructive. Human influence is arguably the most important factor affecting life of all kinds in today's world. Yet despite the broad consensus among biologists about the importance of human influence on nature, this phenomenon and its implications are less appreciated by the broader human community, which does not recognize them in its economic systems or most of its political decisions.
Formerly it was difficult to visualize this influence across the entire planet, but recent advances in the quality of geographic data now allow us to systematically measure human influence on the land's surface. We used a series of map overlays representing human land uses, power infrastructure (based on lights visible at night to a satellite), settlements, roads and other access points, and human population density to map the "human footprint" on the land's surface.
Click here for a larger version in PDF format
The Last of the Wild
Analysis of the Human Footprint indicates that 83% of the land's surface is directly influenced by human agency. 98% of the areas where it's possible to grow rice or wheat or corn (maize) are similarly influenced. It is within the remaining 17% of the land's surface that some of the best remaining opportunities for conservation lie. We located 568 "last of the wild" places as targets for conservation action. Although these wild places vary enormously in their biological productivity and diversity, they represent the least influenced or "wildest" areas in each of their respective biomes on each continent. As such they provide a promising opportunity to conserve wildlife and wild places while minimizing conflicts with existing human structures and demands.
Meanwhile individuals, institutions and governments must find solutions across the gradient of human influence in order for conservation to succeed. Human influence presents a problem to the co-existence of people and wildlife, and human ingenuity is the key to transform the human footprint and save the last of the wild.
References:
Rojstaczer S, Sterling SM, Moore, NJ. 2001. Human appropriation of photosynthesis products.
Vitousek PM, Ehrlich PR, Ehrlich AH, Matson PA. 1986. Human appropriation of the products of photosynthesis. BioScience 36: 368-373.
Wilson EO. 2002. The Future of Life. New York: Alfred A. Knopf
"Antarctica and a few Arctic land patches were not included in the study because of the lack of data and near absence of human influences"
isn't that the point..there's a whole continent that's basically uninhabited..but since that would lower their numbers, they threw it out.
------ Work is so much easier when you don't
CNN is reporting on a Wildlife Conservation Society report that states that humans take up 83 percent of the Earth's land surface
This is not a good summary of what the rWCN report states. 83% of the earth's surface is "directly influenced by human agency" (their words). This does not mean humans occupy or farm in 83%; this measure could be anything as simple as "takes water from an aquifer that flows though land x".
To me, the more shocking claim is that humans appropriate directly or indirectly 40% of the NPP of world as a whole. That's a hell of a lot of caloric consumption by any standard.
And people wonder why environmentalists come under attack. It's bullshit reports like this that make absolutely no sense and assume a static technology level.
First of all, drive through Nevada some time. Mile after mile of empty space, but according to this report, humans have "appropriated" it. Technically, I'm sure they're right in the sense that someone owns it, but it's not as if the land is being used for anything.
Another thing that's stupid is that they claim that 98% of the land that can grow crops have been farmed. That is just ludicrous, and reminds me of the other wackos that claim that it would take 8 Earths or whatever to support everyone at the level of the US. There are numerous technological solutions to creating more farmland. Sheesh, how about irrigating the desert? How about huge multi-level greenhouses built in the middle of nowhere?
Sure, that would be more expensive than what we're doing now, but so what? The point is that very few resources are actually limited. Technology almost always fills whatever needs arise.
We'll stabilize population way before then, but this planet could support hundreds of billions of people.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
... bacteria use 99% of the Earth's surface for, er, bacterial purposes ...
I appreciate that this is slashdot and the idea of a moment's thought before a smartass comment is utterly alien.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
Being a private pilot i get to see lots of ground from high above.
To tell you the truth, i don't see *ANY* land that ISN'T marked by humans.
Even the most dense forrests and pristine areas are loaded with new houses, barns, trucks, trailers, roads, pipes, power lines or something that we have planted there.
In a way, i'm jealous of the people who got to see the wild west and walk across america and stake out a piece of the world. Now i can't even go to a public park after dark! Sure wish there was some "free" land somewhere!!
I think this would fall under the "statistics" portion of "lies, damned lies, and statistics". I'd feel a lot less skeptical if:
A. The report was put out by a more impartial group than the Wildlife Conservation Society (that's like an endangerment study put out by a big-game hunting club),
B. they included their method and analysis, and
C. they did not preface their findings by "Scientists say..." which usually is shorthand for, "You're stupid, they're smart, we're quoting them, so believe whatever we tell you."
Is there any further information? How did they arrive at a figure of 83% and four Earths?
There's no sig like this sig anywhere near this sig, so this must be the sig.
I hate to bring this up, but we are all still subject to laws of conservation of mass and matter, which roughly translate into an equilibrium.
I really have a tough time stomaching environmentalist arguments about "overuse" and "overpopulation", because those arguments invariably ignore any idea of equilibrium. There will be an equilibrium to everything humans do. If we eat too much food, one of two things will happen: we figure out how to make more food, or we die. Period.
So I have a serious problem with this being an issue. Also, if you look at the map, a good percentage of the land surface was left out of the equation because of "no data". So what, no data. Just because it's inhospitable doesn't mean you leave it out of your equation. Add Antarctica (artica? arctica? I can never remember...) and I'll bet that number drops a good bit. No one can really live easily in Death Valley or the Sahara, but people still do it.
Hell, looking at the green area of the map really tells me that only about 50% of the land on Earth is really being used or exploited.
This article is just more of the same sensationalist crap that we have come to know and love from our environmentalist whacko friends.
Using similar methods, the Club of Rome predicted in the early 1970s that the world would run out of oil by 1992. They and others also predicted that the West would be hopelessly overpopulated by... right around now. Both predictions have proven to be wildly inaccurate, but they got a lot of press at the time, and they were taken seriously by what passes for "intellectuals" (whose only measure of "truth" is how well a given story dovetails with their ideology).
In other words, this kind of nonsense is a great method for people like the WWF to solicit donations and get their names in the paper, but you shouldn't mistake it for meaningful information.
This was covered in The Economist already, by the way. Old news. They've got some amusing observations about how slipshod the "study"'s methods are, and how many hidden assumptions it relies on.
"Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive" -- hey, that's me!
So close and yet so far from the world's perfect ID number
Reading from the Sanderson et al article on their website ("The Human Footprint and the Last of the Wild."):
Their figure of 85% may well be correct, but their methodology is suspect to say the least.
1) As you say, they ignored Antarctica and other islands.
2) They used nine datasets to plot human influence, of which two were RIVERS and COASTLINES. Given that they used independant plots for population density etc, I have to wonder exactly why they feel humans are responsible for the distribution of rivers and coastlines. They assume that the possibility of access by humans implies human interference.
3) They assumed that roads would affect the environment for 2 km to each side, when the highest estimate for ecological impact was 600 m!
4) They assumed that all settlements would also affect environments upto an arbitrary distance of 2 km, based on the error in *position*, not *extent* of map data.
5) Random assertions like: "Hunting no longer supplies a major source of in the Western world, but it does in most of the rest of the world." This is patently false. Very few communities use hunting as a major food source. The vast majority of people around the world are fed by agriculture. But the authors use this statement to justify scoring human influence as "moderate" (4) up to 15 km from settlements on this basis. (They estimated 15 km to be a day's travel.)
I'm sure there are more errors, this was a very cursory reading.
I'm disappointed that this was published in a peer-reviewed journal. This article is in no sense good science, although it makes a fine political manifesto.
My other sig is also a
That statistic usually comes from anti-abortion activists in response to the claim that the world needs no more people on it. It is of course true (barely) but extremely misleading.
Texas comprises 262,000 square miles. Putting (circa) 6 billion people in that space gives 1184 square feet per person. Not entirely comfortable considering your house would butt up against someone else's on all sides but certainly livable.
Unfortunately, this is just LIVING space. Where are you going to get food? Growing enough crops for one person to sustainably survive requires at between one and six acres of land -- one acre is over 43,000 square feet! Cattle ranching and other "meat farming" requires far more space, because you have to feed the cattle. Then you need a water source. Power generation. Transportation systems. Buildings in which to work/create things. Modern conveniences.
Pretty soon you're up to 20-30 acres per person required in the US to keep things moving. America comprises 2.3 billion acres... do the math and you'll see we don't even have room in the US for the measly 250,000,000 residents we already have, much less the entire world!
Just a thought... it bugs me when people (and I don't blame you) overgeneralize how much space one person REALLY takes up.
Besides, I like to stretch out.
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Find your ecological footprint
and then...
compare it to the rest of the world's
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
Every time there's a slashdot article regarding the World Wildlife Fund, I have to make a post like this.
;p
Looks like it's that time again.
They're an alarmist group that really doesn't know what they're talking about. Let's take your first paragraph:
The statistics regarding the World Wildlife Fund's footprint are accurate for TODAY the 'ecological footprint' is defined as the 'area of productive land and water that people need to support their consumption and to dispose of waste'. London's footprint is 120 times as big as the land it covers, and as extrapolated by the WWF, Earth's ecological footprint is in danger of growing larger than the entire planet.
Great, that's very informative. The problem is, it's entirely misleading. So, okay. London has a footprint 120 times as big as the land it covers, but so what? The problem lies here: they're assuming that if an acre of land is used to support human (farming/fishing/living/whatever) that it's completely used. As in, that land marked used is somehow fully used.
If it's used for farming, odds are it's not being used to it's full potential. If it's used for trash, you can just keep putting more trash on top of it... or use it to create *more* land. (Tip: It's called landfill.) What the WWF is neglecting is that there's no reason, aside from a preserve, to *not* use land. Just like a house seems to take up the same 'footprint' as an apartment building doesn't mean that if we want to double the number of people, we need two houses.
It's just flawed, lousy logic. But that's okay. They're cruising for donations.
Ah yes, but these are no ordinary statistics! Taken from their site,
Although just estimates, these few statistics are testament to the unprecedented escalations in both human population and consumption during the twentieth century
These are estimated statistics! What we have here is an alarmist group making up statistics and drawing radical conclusions based on them. And what am I supposed to do about it? Oh, I'd guess that they're looking for donations so they can publish more insightful reports just like this, to keep me informed of all of these possible catastrophic consequences that are just around the corner.
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Let me tell you about arizona farms.
They are mostly used to raise dirt and rocks. Sometimes scrubs, as they are worth a lot in the black market. But, we arizona farmers are after the ripe harvest of dirt. Good, clean dirt, too. None of this wet 'mud' stuff everyone else seems to prize. Sure, it doesn't grow much, but that's exactly what we want. We can then harvest it, and then lay it down in front of our houses for a wonderously rocky/sandy type of look. Oh, and don't forget, it brightens things up a bit, too.
They stuck me in an institution, said it was the only solution, to...protect me from the enemy, myself
One post stating that environmentalists are "wackos" gets a 5:Insightful, one saying Earth can support "hundreds of billions of people" gets a 4:Interesting, while a carefully written post pointing out grazing patterns and water supply issues is labeled a "Troll". Go figure.
This is a fine forum to talk about tech, but a tough audience to talk about the non-artificial world. I suppose that too many are born, live, and die in cities where a lawn qualifies as "nature". Use /. for its strengths, and don't sweat the rest.
There are two kinds of societies: sustainable and doomed.