Response to "Gone: Mass Extinctions and the Hazards of Earth's Vanishing Biodiversity"

The author brings attempts to bring the reader into the environment by offering a detailed description of the environment as the opening. Then the death of an unfortunate hiker is described. Apparently, the detailed description of this death is supposed to serve as an argument for the fragility of species that lack genetic and biodiversity. Humans are simply adapted for a different environment than a lizard or a snake. Unfortunately, the hiker's death had little or noting to do with genetic or biodiversity.

As a side note, some of the species that are most capable of survival in harsh environments have the least, relative, genetic diversity. An example of such are cockroaches. It is imprtant to recognize that cockroaches, like most other species, are adapted for a particular environment. Humans are adapted for a mental, athletic, and beautfy alleles. The process of natural selection rarily pressures humans' genetic code to be more adapted for harsh desert environment.

The author mentions many facts to prove that an extinction is, in fact, occurring. It is important that ignorant people are educated about this fact, but for the author it provides a solid base to build her arguement. She followed this by stating that this sixth mass extinction threatens the human population. How? I can think of no such way that is of great importance to humanity's current physiological survival. The true threat is to the potential improvements that could be generated from knowledge of a soon to be extinct unknown species.

The dilemma of losing potential improvements to humanity through the use of biological traits common to unknown species can be partially avoided by cataloging the genetic codes of all species. This would make identification of desirable traits more difficulty as the features could not be seen in the natural environments, but, nevertheless, it still has some benefits.

The author did not provide facts for diverse arguments. There are many regions that offer compelling arguments for Global Warming. But these regions have their counterparts that do not support Global Warming.

The author did not provide enough unbiased information to convince people that are well versed and opposed to some aspects of her arguments. Nevertheless, her argument was compelling and educational to people that may be knowledgeable and those that are ignorant.