Gray Whale, Southern-Hemisphere Algae Seen In N. Atlantic

oxide7 writes "The gray whale hasn't strayed to the Northern Atlantic since the 18th century. The Neodenticula seminae, a species of algae, hasn't been there in 800,000 years. Now, members of both species have been spotted in the Northern Atlantic."

Comments

This is bad because?

[ghostdoc]

So if a species dies out and disappears from an ecosystem, that's bad for biodiversity and can potentially cause the collapse of the ecosystem.

Now we find out that if a species that used to be part of an ecosystem re-enters it that's also bad and can potentially cause the collapse of the ecosystem.

Is there *anything* good that can happen to an ecosystem? Surely *some* changes are good?

Re:This is bad because?

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Is there *anything* good that can happen to an ecosystem?

Gradual change.

Re:This is bad because?

[Arlet]

Who said it was bad ? It's just a sign that things are changing, but the return of the whales or algae in itself aren't bad.

Re:This is bad because?

[im_thatoneguy]

It's almost as if the natural world is nothing more than bunch of delicately balanced equilibriums! Who would have thought!?

Re:This is bad because?

[jovius]

The gist of the article is the opening of North West passage by which the whale and the algae have passed from Northern Pacific to Northern Atlantic.

The ecosystems always adapt. Some species die out and others find a microscopic ecological niche - it's a natural process. At the moment species are becoming exinct en masse. Are the changes introduced by steady oscillating processes or abruptly as a planet wide catastrophe? The humanity is the unbalancing factor in the process - we are a sort of super predator that consumes available resources at an alarming pace.

Your question evades the real question about the anthropogenic changes on Earth. We are at the top of the food chain, so it's us who will eventually suffer from the disruptions below. The more gradual and easy the changes the more time we have for adaptation. So there's still a lot to learn.

Re:This is bad because?

[Nursie]

You know it's funny that you think they want humans extinct, yet they are usually the ones shouting loudest to do something to stop humans going extinct.

It's the non-environmentalists that seem to have the deathwish.

Re:This is bad because?

[Arlet]

A whale is either there or it's not. It isn't half there.

But two whales can be half there.

Current "global warming" is well within the bounds of natural variation

Irrelevant. What's relevant is the current global warming is caused by human activity, how it will impact our lives, and what options we have to change it. The fact that millions of years ago it was even hotter due to some natural phenomenon doesn't change anything. It's like saying: "it's not a problem that your house is flooded, because 165 million years ago, there used to be a sea in that place"

Re:This is bad because?

[Pino Grigio]

This graph is instructive (note, Michael Mann had no part in its construction). What do you notice about temperature (left hand side is most recent)? Yes. It's not only highly variable (sampling error?) but that variability is not unprecedented. In fact current changes in temperature as measured over the last few hundred years are well within the bounds of natural variability.

Re:This is bad because?

[Arlet]

It's only hotly debated by some politicians, laypeople on blogs and in the popular press. The debate in the scientific literature is almost non-existent.

Re:Only the beginning

[PixetaledPikachu]

Why won't people listen to this guy? It's like everyone fell asleep or left after the first half of the movie or something.

because it's an Inconvenient truth

Re:Only the beginning

[Anonymous Coward]

Why won't people listen to this guy? It's like everyone fell asleep or left after the first half of the movie or something.

For the same reason people doesn't listen to greenpeace.
While he says a lot of things that are true the hit/miss ratio is too bad for anyone to be able to take anything he says at face value.
It's not enough to say a lot of things that are true. If you wan't people to start listening to you you will also have to stop telling things that aren't.

Re:What happened in the 18th century?

[captainpanic]

Careful readers do not focus on the whales only. The previous posts did focus on the whales only, but never mentioned the climate. If you now wish to change the topic here, and discuss the climate, it would be fair to include the 2nd topic of the article too: algae.

The real story are the algae. Algae weren't hunted to extinction 800,000 years ago. But their reappearance in the Northern Atlantic is likely a climate-related issue.

Missleading headline

[Anonymous Coward]

The Neodenticula seminae is not a southern-hemisphere algae as the headline says. It belongs in the Bering Sea and at middle to high latitudes of the North Pacific. The news here was that the two species were able to travel through the Northwest Passage to the Atlantic since the ice has melted away.

Re:What happened in the 18th century?

[fyngyrz]

But their reappearance in the Northern Atlantic is likely a climate-related issue.

Yes... or an ocean pollution-related (nutrient,toxin) issue. Or a river pollution-related (nutrient,toxin) issue. Or a passenger-on-a-hull issue. Or a natural (nutrient) issue. Or a current-alteration issue. Or a secondary species has brought them along, perhaps as a parasite or a host, or simply a passenger. Or a geological (heating, cooling, pressure, nutrient, toxin) issue. And I'm pretty sure a marine biologist could extend that list without a lot of effort.

Yessir, the re-appearance in the Northern Atlantic of this algae definitely allows us to immediately draw the following conclusion: The algae has re-appeared in the northern Atlantic.

Re:Only the beginning

[Disfnord]

Al Gore is, or at least was, a politician. In the U.S., we have what is known as a two party system. Even though those two parties are often in agreement on many issues, the people who vote for those parties can be extremely emotional about their party. Consequently, to maybe 50% of the U.S. population, Al Gore is first and foremost a "Democrat" and therefore the enemy. This makes it incredibly easy to ignore everything he says as lies and liberal propaganda. And that will never change. The issue has now become politicized, there's no going back.

Re:What happened in the 18th century?

[capnkr]

Reappearance, or rediscovery? The ocean is a big place, and algae, small. We find new things in our oceans every day. And 'careful readers' will note:
1: that the algae in question is not from the Southern Hemisphere, as this /. summary suggests - it is a Northern Pacific algae.
2: The Arctic ice pack did not extend from the surface to the sea bottom, like some kind of ice barrier which excluded whole oceans from contact. You do recall that nuclear subs have made the trip under the N Pole. Who's to say an algae can't do the same, that it *has* to have come through the NW passage?

This article - and it's suppositions - are sadly lacking in any detail of merit. It is climate-scare puffery with little to back it up, IMO. Let's get back to 'News for Nerds'....