sixth mass extinction

…to call modern times the sixth mass extinction. This high extinction rate is largely due to the exponential growth in human numbers: growing from about 1 billion in 1850, the world’s population reached 2 billion in 1930 and more than 7.8 billion in 2020 and is expected to reach about…

…in the midst of a sixth mass extinction, driven by human activities—namely, the conversion of natural areas to agriculture and urban uses, hunting and overfishing, pollution, and climate change. Researchers estimate that the current rate of species loss varies between 100 and 10,000 times the background extinction rate (see also…