Balance of nature: ecosystems are losing diversity (Introduction)

by David Turell , Wednesday, October 28, 2020, 00:32 (1487 days ago) @ David Turell

And it is said that this hurts humans:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/10/201027105409.htm

Biodiversity on Earth, including the diversity of species, genetic diversity within species, and the diversity of ecosystems, is the basis of life of all organisms, including humans. Fundamental processes depend on biodiversity, such as plant growth and the stability of material cycles. However, biological diversity is decreasing continuously. According to researchers, this loss has meanwhile reached an alarming extent. For this reason, numerous scientific studies and experiments cover the importance of biodiversity to the functioning of ecosystems and their use for humans.

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"The findings of the Jena Experiment confirm that current species loss has directly consequences for humankind," Wilcke says. "As a result, functions of nature that may apparently be taken for granted break off." According to the geoecologist, examples are the production of biomass for food, fabrics, construction materials, and fuels as well as water and nutrient cycles. Their changes have severe impacts, such as floods, drought, or groundwater pollution. "To stop this development and to protect species diversity, further research and practical measures on all levels are needed, from the individual consumer to national governments to international bodies," Wilcke continues.

In a series of three publications in Nature Ecology & Evolution, the Jena consortium published major results between 2018 and 2020: The more ecosystem functions, such as a closed nutrient cycle, and resulting ecosystem services (e.g. biomass production) are to be achieved, the more plant species are needed, the scientists say.

Together with the BioDIV Experiment in the USA, the Jena consortium found that the results of artificial experiments, in which mixes of plant species were usually composed randomly, are stable and may be transferred to the natural world.

In its most recent publication, the Jena Experiment concludes that ecosystem functions and services cannot only be predicted from the properties of plants. It is rather necessary to consider the entire complexity of biotic and abiotic interactions of an ecosystem, i.e. all interactions in the living and non-living nature.

Comment: delivers the same constant message. The huge bush must maintain its ecosystems and the inherent diversity or humans will suffer. God knew what He was doing setting up the current system, knowing how large a population of humans would eventually appear. It seems dhw doesn't view t his in the same way I do. If God started with bacteria, and He did, He had to know where He was going and what He needed to create while on the way to achieving a completeness of his creation of self-sustaining living organisms. All dhw sees is a God experimenting, creating spectacles, looking for interesting organisms, and then if He wanted humans as an endpoint, He seems to have done it all wrong, inventing things not needed and taking too long, like stopping to make dinosaurs along the way, all the while using the same DNA code control for everyone. God uses a better code than any we ever devised. A very smart purposeful God.