Species Extinction Overestimated
A group of researchers has recently stated that the extinction rates are not as harsh as many people in the world believe.
They agree that many types of animals are plants are disappearing but not at the rates portrayed in the media. The researchers stated that they know why these rates are overblown, and they have also stated that they have a new method of accurately predicting these rates. Fangliang He, of Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, China, said that the researchers need to revisit the way in which the numbers are calculated. Currently, the researchers do not even know how many types of species are in the world. In the past, the researchers predicted that half of the species of the world will be gone by 2000, and as you can see, they were wrong. According to the experts, the way in which we derive these estimates, is the reason for the overestimation.
The researchers have a very difficult time when it comes to determining the exact number of the species which are going extinct. In order to determine that, they need to know when the species has remained to its final individual. Currently the researchers base their estimations on the number of habitats they find. The fewer habitats the find, the fewer species they expect to discover. In order to prove that specie is on the verge of extinction, the researchers need to find the last individual of that specie, which can be very difficult. Stephen Hubbell of the University of California at Los Angeles said that the news is pretty interesting, but in the same time it complicates things a lot. If the new theory is true, then the researchers will have to make new calculations in order to determine the correct number of the species in the world.11
