A new report just released by the International Program on the State of the Oceans finds the condition of the oceans is declining far more rapidly than even pessimists had expected. It’s bad enough that many marine species — including those that make coral reefs — could be extinct within a generation. Humans may have set Earth on track for a sixth mass extinction event.

The key findings of the International Earth system expert workshop on ocean stresses and impacts Summary Report should be enough to shake any cognizant being out of their lethargy:

• Human actions have resulted in warming and acidification of the oceans and are now causing increased hypoxia – symptoms that indicate disturbances of the carbon cycle associated with each of the previous five mass extinctions on Earth.
• The speeds of many negative changes to the ocean are near to or are tracking the worst-case scenarios from IPCC and other predictions. Consequences matching those predicted under the “worst case scenario” include decrease in Arctic Sea Ice, melting of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, sea level rise, and release of trapped methane from the seabed.
• The magnitude of the cumulative impacts on the ocean is greater than previously understood, as interactions between different impacts can be negatively synergistic.
• Timelines for action are shrinking. Delays will mean increased environmental damage with greater socioeconomic impacts.
• Resilience of the ocean to climate change impacts is severely compromised by the other stressors from human activities, including fisheries, pollution and habitat destruction.
• Ecosystem collapse is occurring as a result of both current and emerging stressors including chemical pollutants, agriculture run-­off, sediment loads and over-­extraction of many components of food webs.
• The extinction threat to marine species is rapidly increasing due to overexploitation, habitat loss, and, increasingly, climate change.

But don’t count on any response from our political or economic elites, other than wanton disregard. They have proved to not be cognizant beings.

A press release quotes Dr. Alex Rogers, Scientific Director of the International Programme on the State of the Ocean (IPSO), which convened the workshop:

The findings are shocking. As we considered the cumulative effect of what humankind does to the ocean the implications became far worse than we had individually realized. This is a very serious situation demanding unequivocal action at every level. We are looking at consequences for humankind that will impact in our lifetime, and worse, our children’s, and generations beyond that.

Co-author Dan Laffoley issued a call for action:

The world’s leading experts on oceans are surprised by the rate and magnitude of changes we are seeing. The challenges for the future of the ocean are vast, but unlike previous generations we know what now needs to happen. The time to protect the blue heart of our planet is now, today and urgent.

The chances of any significant action being taken are precisely zero. The sad reality is the ocean and its ecosystems are doomed to succumb to a constantly bombardment of multiple attacks.

Dan Allen at Energy Bulletin scathingly observes that humans have proved to be less than rational:

[A]ny sane society . . . when faced with such an overwhelming abundance of scientific evidence, would be gnashing its collective teeth and running for the powerdown-exits en masse at this point. No sane society would ignore the screaming warnings of every single Earth system. No sane society would knowingly doom their children and grandchildren to misery and starvation. No sane society would stand by and do NOTHING — NOT ONE DAMN THING!! — while their very life-support systems eroded away before their eyes.

But we are surely not sane.

Political solutions have failed us, are failing us, and will certainly continue to fail us. The only option we have – to slam on the brakes and to stop burning coal, tout de suite – won’t be undertaken voluntarily; to think otherwise is delusional. Climate catastrophe is where we are. As Allen says, that’s the bed we’ve made:

So, sadly, at this late hour, we just flat-out NEED the dark angel of economic collapse to swoop down onto the stage, ‘Deus ex Machina’ style, and save the day.

God help us.

Pray for the collapse of the global industrial economy. And do what you can to begin fashioning a replacement.