Living World: The Shape Of Life To Come

Rapid climate change may leave polar bears high and dry
(Image: Ingrid Visser/SplashdownDirect/Rex Features)

From New Scientist:

A 3-metre-tall kangaroo; the car-sized armadillos called glyptodons; giant lemurs and elephant birds from Madagascar. Almost as soon as humans evolved, we began killing off other species, not just by hunting but also by changing the landscape with fire.

Now we are altering the planet more rapidly and profoundly than ever, and much of the diversity produced by half a billion years of evolution could be lost in the next few centuries. We are triggering a mass extinction that could be as severe as the one that ended the reign of the dinosaurs.

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