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The Last Time Oceans Got This Acidic This Fast, 96% of Marine Life Went Extinct

Posted by Soulskill on from the it's-not-easy-being-green dept.

merbs writes: The biggest extinction event in planetary history was driven by the rapid acidification of our oceans, a new study concludes (abstract). So much carbon was released into the atmosphere, and the oceans absorbed so much of it so quickly, that marine life simply died off, from the bottom of the food chain up. That doesn't bode well for the present, given the similarly disturbing rate that our seas are acidifying right now. A team led by University of Edinburgh researchers collected rocks in the United Arab Emirates that were on the seafloor hundreds of millions of years ago, and used the boron isotopes found within to model the changing levels of acidification in our prehistoric oceans. They now believe that a series of gigantic volcanic eruptions in the Siberian Trap spewed a great fountain of carbon into the atmosphere over a period of tens of thousands of years. This was the first phase of the extinction event, in which terrestrial life began to die out.

12 of 417 comments (clear)

  1. Strictly speaking... by Viol8 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ... they're not becoming acidic, they're becoming less alkaline and are slowly heading towards neutral. Not that that distinction matters to the plankton.

    Personally I think this issue and other other pressures on ocean life from man such as pollution and plastic debris is far more pressing in the snort term than global warming but hardly anyone - even the enviromentalists - makes a big deal about it.

    1. Re:Strictly speaking... by MightyMartian · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "... they're not becoming acidic, they're becoming less alkaline..." is like saying "you're tires aren't going flat, they're just becoming less inflated."

      And the explanation for why acidity (or as you so euphemistically put it, "de-alkalinizing") is because of the amount of carbon being absorbed through, and you guessed it, CO2 emissions, the same thing causing AGW. They are aspects of the same problem, with, and wait for it, the same solution; reducing CO2 emissions.

      --
      The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
    2. Re:Strictly speaking... by itzly · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Which probably means no major extinction event in the near future....

      I think the extinctions are more related to the rate of change than to absolute numbers. Absolute numbers for CO2 have been much higher, and there was plenty of life at those times. The problem is that it takes a different form of life, adapted to the different environment. Quick changes could possibly overwhelm the rate in which species can adapt.

    3. Re:Strictly speaking... by MightyMartian · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The "ice age" theory never had much support as I recall, and was more an artifact of the cesspool that is science journalism.

      Do you have an actual objection to the science, or just yet another tired rhetorical objection "Oh you see, a few scientists were wrong, therefore all scientists are wrong..."

      --
      The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
    4. Re:Strictly speaking... by itzly · · Score: 5, Insightful

      "John, when people thought the earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the earth was spherical, they were wrong. But if you think that thinking the earth is spherical is just as wrong as thinking the earth is flat, then your view is wronger than both of them put together."

      http://chem.tufts.edu/answersi...

    5. Re:Strictly speaking... by MightyMartian · · Score: 4, Insightful

      So you in fact have no issue with the scientists, but with other non-experts.

      Except for your last sentence, which indicates you are denier playing yet another tired rhetorical trick and imagining that it somehow just wipes out all the science.

      You just don't like bad news, and are too fucking infantile to get a grip

      --
      The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
    6. Re:Strictly speaking... by Shakrai · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Willfully ignorant? Fuck you. I accept the underlying premise that the climate is changing and mankind's activities are contributing a non-zero amount to that change. Pointing out the fact that the climate has changed before does not make me a denier and it speaks volumes about you that you feel the need to attack someone who largely agrees with you because they don't completely toe the party line.

      Incidentally, the only things I don't accept are the doomsday rhetoric about the consequences of climate change and the proposed "solutions" that will ultimately accomplish nothing. Well, that's not entirely true, they'll massively increase energy bills in the first world while simultaneously halting development in the third world. But hey, who gives a shit, we've got ours, fuck all of those poor brown people.

      Whether you're willing to admit it or not, energy is civilization and massively increasing the cost thereof condemns billions of people to remain in poverty. You'd do better to spend those countless trillions on preparing humanity for the change that we couldn't stop even if we axed all carbon emissions tomorrow.

      --
      I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
      We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
  2. Re:No mention of sulfur by Enry · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Because we've always had volcanoes and the oceans didn't acidify as a result?

  3. Re:Maybe not as scary you might think by Hardhead_7 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    And hey, we shouldn't worry about meteor impacts because all life on Earth now is descending from life that survived the one that killed the dinosaurs! Bring on the meteors! Also, did you know that many people in Japan are descending from people that survived having nuclear bombs dropped on them, thus rendering them immune to radiation?

  4. Re:Which brings us to now by Luckyo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Because this time it will be us making room for the next upcoming species.

  5. Re:Great, Let's Build IFR's by nine-times · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So, where are all the environmentalists demanding we build integral fast reactors as fast as we can?

    There are actually quite a number of environmentalists who have suggested that we should use nuclear power in order to get off of fossil fuels. I suspect a lot of the problem is political. There are still a lot of people with an irrational fear of nuclear power on one side of the issue, and on the other side there are people who support fossil fuels just to say "fuck you" to "the hippies". And that's before you even get into the lobbying and propaganda from fossil fuel producers.

    It's an uphill battle to do anything, even if it completely makes sense and has broad support, because there are always ignorant people and entrenched interests.

  6. Re:It's been nice knowing y'all by Noah+Haders · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Actually, the acidification primarily effects animals with shells or bones. So soon you can go for a swim and there will be nothing but jellyfish. No sharks though.