[Coral-List] Evidence that ocean warming has caused most Caribbean coral loss
tomascik at novuscom.net
tomascik at novuscom.net
Thu May 4 13:37:15 EDT 2017
Hi everyone,
I have been following this discussion for a while and I hope folks
will take time to and have a look at:
"Ginsburg, R.N. Compiler. 1994. Proceedings of the Colloquium on
Global Aspects of Coral Reefs: Health, Hazards and History, 1993.
RSMAS, University of Miami." ISBN-0-932981-79-8
Cheers,
Tomas
Quoting Ulf Erlingsson <ceo at lindorm.com>:
> Dear John,
>
> Dennis is a geologist, you are an ecologist, and I am either a
> geographer or geologist according to the academic tradition of each
> country. In this particular case I would strongly advice that
> everyone put on their "geography hat" and view this from high up
> above, since we can never solve this in time if we insist on
> understanding which chemical compound is responsible for which effect.
>
> We have global input of pollutants, hundreds of thousands of
> substances, and they mix in the ENTIRE ocean. Stop thinking of
> pollution as "local," it is not. It gets mixed so anything that does
> not decompose or permanently leave the ocean WILL end up in every
> last corder of the world oceans and seas, eventually. If it is toxic
> enough, it WILL have an impact.
>
> It is all good and well that ecologists are studying the
> interactions, it is necessary, but the decisions of what actions to
> take visavi pollution cannot be based on such research alone. There
> has to be an "umbrella research" that looks at the geography of
> pollution, stressors and effects, like a black box, and politics
> must err on the side of caution in the face of the unknown. Like
> they do in the European Union. The U.S. is hopelessly behind when it
> comes to environmental protection.
>
> Ulf Erlingsson
> Lindorm, Inc.
>
>
>> On 2017-05-03, at 17:26 , Bruno, John <jbruno at unc.edu> wrote:
>>
>> Dear Dennis,
>>
>> I respectfully disagree. For ecologists, determining the relative
>> role of different factors in driving patterns is largely the point
>> of our field. It has nothing to do with feeling "our subdiscipline
>> is the most important?. Good ecology means testing multiple
>> hypotheses that explain an observation, retesting those hypothesis
>> over and over, etc. Its not about ego - this is fundamentally what
>> "trying to understand the nature of the system" IS.
>>
>> Identifying the causal drivers of population declines is
>> fundamental to species conservation. This concept goes way back to
>> Graeme Caughley, and forms the basis of the ?declining population
>> paradigm? in conservation science. It isn?t necessarily ?all tied
>> together?. Every plausible factor that could possibly influence a
>> pattern doesn?t necessarily have a measurable role. Most species
>> are weak interactors and lots of processes aren?t all that common
>> or important. In the case of coral decline, there are literally
>> dozens of possible explanations and since conservation dollars are
>> finite and we can?t tackle every problem, its critical to identify
>> the main causes. Doing so is not a ?waste of bandwidth?. Moreover,
>> it?s common (on the coral-list) to assume the interaction of two
>> important stressors is synergistic; that?s often true at the
>> individual-level, but at the community level they are just as
>> likely to be antagonistic, i.e., they dampen each others effects.
>> Figuring stuff like this out is important to effectively managing
>> reefs.
>>
>> (As an aside, my view is that there is certainly evidence of local
>> impacts, like pollution. The challenge is to figure where that?s
>> the case (we do VERY little monitoring of water quality on reefs)
>> and also how to address it (its a tough problem). Just screaming
>> that all the loss is due to pollution and that nutrient pollution
>> is widespread in the ocean is not supported by the science. We
>> should follow the lead of local management in places like the
>> Florida Keys, Bermuda, etc where they?ve (largely) tackled
>> nutrients, anchor damage, fishing, etc.)
>>
>> Sincerely,
>>
>> John
>>
>>
>>
>>> On May 3, 2017, at 2:55 PM, Dennis Hubbard
>>> <Dennis.Hubbard at oberlin.edu <mailto:Dennis.Hubbard at oberlin.edu>>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi Elizabeth:
>>>
>>> None of this helps answer the question going around of what is the
>>> "primary" driver of reef decline. If anyone hasn't read it, I
>>> highly recommend Jeremy Jackson's "Reefs Before Columbus" article
>>> in Coral Reefs awhile back.... it is sobering, as is John
>>> Pandolfi's follow-up discussions of how early anthropogenic
>>> impacts might have kicked in.
>>>
>>> So, for me, as a reef scientist, it really doesn't make a great
>>> deal of sense to argue over what is worse just so we can feel "our
>>> subdiscipline is the most important". It's all tied in together
>>> and, while we take up bandwidth with this, we could be spending
>>> that time trying to understand the nature of the system better.
>>>
>>> As a reef GEO-scientist, when I think back to the "good old days,
>>> I'm thinking early Holocene.
>>>
>>> Best,
>>>
>>> Dennis
>>>
>>
>
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