Indeed, the problem appears to be fewer mammals.

All of your cute n cuddly favorites, from the super intelligent dolphins, to bulky, lovable whales, to apes and cats and hyraxes are dying off in a horrible evolutionary cataclysm, termed an “extinction crisis” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

“Within our lifetime, hundreds of species could be lost as a result of our own actions,” said Julia Marton-Lefèvre, the director general of the I.U.C.N., a network of campaign groups, governments, scientists and other experts.

The group’s annual Red List just came out, and it includes at least of quarter of all of earth’s mammals. That. Blows. So. Much. In only slightly less depressing news, a third of the planet’s amphibians are also in the crapper. While I’d like to believe otherwise, I have the feeling that the Chevy Volt is not going to solve this problem all by itself. And as Dose readers know, my enduring raison d’etre is the hope that, somewhere in the Yangtze, the Baiji lives.

Meanwhile, some “leading geneticist” says that human evolution is breaking down because men aren’t waiting until they’re old to have kids, because old men’s sperm is more unstable and therefore more likely to contain the mutations that power the evolutionary process. Oh, that and now you can be a total moron and yet manage not be killed off by nature before procreating.

As if we didn’t have enough to worry about what with our mammal problems.

Actually, this “scientist” seems to be just a tad on the europhilic/ideological/racist side; he cites younger fatherhood in the West as the source of the potential evolutionary pitfalls.

Professor Jones added: “In the old days, you would find one powerful man having hundreds of children.” He cites the fecund Moulay Ismail of Morocco, who died in the 18th century, and is reputed to have fathered 888 children. To achieve this feat, Ismail is thought to have copulated with an average of about 1.2 women a day over 60 years.

Umm, yeah. That’s weird. So are you suggesting that John McCain should make his life’s mission to sire children until he croaks?

And, if that didn’t seem racist, try this one on for size.

“Small populations which are isolated can evolve at random as genes are accidentally lost. World-wide, all populations are becoming connected and the opportunity for random change is dwindling. History is made in bed, but nowadays the beds are getting closer together. We are mixing into a global mass, and the future is brown.”

Oh no! “The future is brown!” What? Sounds like some Pat Buchanan shit to me. On second thought, let’s worry about the massive extinction of life on earth, rather than some quasi-supremacist Clash of the Gene Pools theory.

Save the Baiji!

Tags: Life, Preservation, Sadness, Scariness

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