I am not a marine biologist, but I would imagine that having top predators present is a necessary criterion for classifying a reef habitat as "healthy." The relevant question therefore is "why are large predators not present?" To me, Global warming, fishing, changing pH of the seawater, and other factors all would seem to be plausible answers. Simply saying "a coral reef without top predators is not healthy therefore removing top predators made the reef unhealthy" is not a useful statement. Can you provide a link to the study?
Maybe they'll just have a few dozen in the air at all times spaced evenly around the world. In the meantime they could be performing scientific or even commercial functions.
Those rural/poor areas don't need the same amount of electricity as your house to make a world of difference. A roof covered with 1% effecient solar cells plus a deep cycle battery would power lights, run a radio, and charge cell phones.
Make it cheap enough and it would be nothing short of revolutionary.
My guess is that evolving to tolerate higher temperatures results in some kind of significant disadvantage to the resulting sperm. Maybe the molecular change required for tolerating high temperatures causes a drop in speed or endurance. Maybe there's an essential chemical reaction necessary for the production of sperm that simply doesn't happen above 95 degrees F.
I agree that it's counterintuitive, and as far as I know the actual mechanism hasn't been uncovered yet, but you can bet there's some kind of trade-off keeping the status quo in place.
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Simple Mobile: http://www.mysimplemobile.com/plans-wireless-broadband-plans.aspx
people consume, consume and consume all the time
And then we wonder why we have an obesity epidemic. Hint: it's all the consuming.
I am not a marine biologist, but I would imagine that having top predators present is a necessary criterion for classifying a reef habitat as "healthy." The relevant question therefore is "why are large predators not present?" To me, Global warming, fishing, changing pH of the seawater, and other factors all would seem to be plausible answers. Simply saying "a coral reef without top predators is not healthy therefore removing top predators made the reef unhealthy" is not a useful statement. Can you provide a link to the study?
Maybe they'll just have a few dozen in the air at all times spaced evenly around the world. In the meantime they could be performing scientific or even commercial functions.
Those rural/poor areas don't need the same amount of electricity as your house to make a world of difference. A roof covered with 1% effecient solar cells plus a deep cycle battery would power lights, run a radio, and charge cell phones.
Make it cheap enough and it would be nothing short of revolutionary.
Failure to make a decision is indistingishable from deciding to do nothing.
My guess is that evolving to tolerate higher temperatures results in some kind of significant disadvantage to the resulting sperm. Maybe the molecular change required for tolerating high temperatures causes a drop in speed or endurance. Maybe there's an essential chemical reaction necessary for the production of sperm that simply doesn't happen above 95 degrees F.
I agree that it's counterintuitive, and as far as I know the actual mechanism hasn't been uncovered yet, but you can bet there's some kind of trade-off keeping the status quo in place.