• Question: what is the defintion for biodiversity

    Asked by anon-217277 to Savannah on 10 Jun 2019.
    • Photo: Savannah Clawson

      Savannah Clawson answered on 10 Jun 2019:

      Biodiversity literally means biological diversity – it is the variety of life on Earth, in all of its forms and all of its interactions. I am not a biologist so I am not really qualified to talk about this but I like to think of biodiversity as a big web, where different species are connected to each other through many different interactions. If you break one strand of the web, it will have an immediate effect on the parts of the web that were directly connected to this strand. These areas might then go on to break and eventually the whole web could fall apart. This is the same for biodiversity – it is extremely difficult to predict what the effect of one small change in one ecosystem could have on other ecosystems and the species in it. This is why we must be careful to protect our environment and try to reduce the impact that we have around us so as not to upset the natural balance of the planet.

Comments

  • Photo: Harrison

    Harrison commented on :

    I really like Savannah’s answer! To find biodiversity, you need look no further than your own body. It is an immensely intricate web of trillions of interacting organisms. We could not survive without our wonderful bug friends and they couldn’t survive without us. So if we want to be healthy, we need to treat our bodies kindly both inside and out so that our bug friends remain happy and keep us well.

  • Photo: anon-217182

    anon-217182 commented on :

    the variety of plant and animal life in the world or in a particular habitat, a high level of which is usually considered to be important and desirable.

  • Photo: anon-217064

    anon-217064 commented on :

    If we keep on using fossil fuels what do think will happen but if stop now could we stop global warming

  • Photo: Savannah

    Savannah commented on :

    There is a lot of scientific evidence that says our current use of fossil fuels is causing climate change at a rate never seen before in human history. This is because burning fossil fuels releases what we call greenhouse gases into the atmosphere (like carbon dioxide) and these gases are really good at trapping the heat from the Sun. This is what is causing our planet to heat up and this then leads to effects like the ice in the Arctic and Antarctica melting. If we keep burning fossil fuels at current rates, it is likely that all of this ice will melt and this could increase sea levels globally by up to 70 metres in the future. For context, London is only 14 metres above sea level at the moment so this would be enough to drown a lot of big cities and populated areas. This is the worst case scenario but even small rises in sea level will cause flooding in lots of coastal areas. Rising amounts of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are also poisoning our oceans – the ocean water absorbs carbon dioxide and this is killing marine life and bleaching coral. Fossil fuels are also poisoning our air and have been linked to breathing problems like asthma as well as other illnesses. These are just a few examples of what fossil fuels are doing to our planet and these problems will only get worse if we don’t cut down our use.
    .
    If we make radical changes now, I believe it is possible to stop global warming. It is predicted that to prevent a global temperature increase of 1.5 degrees Celsius, we need to leave 80% of fossil fuels in the ground. To put this in context, a global temperature rise of only about 5 degrees Celsius separates us now from the last ice age! Alternatives to fossil fuels include wind power and solar energy and the great thing about these is that they won’t run out! It is important to remember that fossil fuels are non-renewable and it is predicted that our stocks of coal and oil will run out in as little as 50 years at current rates of use. The only problem is that renewable energy technology isn’t always very efficient and we would struggle to instantly replace all of the energy we get from fossil fuels. Therefore, it is important to make changes in our lives to reduce our demand for energy as well as investing in renewable energy sources. This can be little things like turning off electrical equipment when you don’t need it and using less hot water in your home. Another important thing is to put pressure on big companies as they are the ones using the most fossil fuels. You can also put pressure on the government to make changes to the laws about the use of fossil fuels 🙂