What happens when the insect kingdom collapses?

[LogicalFallacy]

Well apparently it's not good. Insects are more than just pests - they are essential to keep an ecosystem thriving. If they go, then pretty much everything else goes.

 

New research shows rapidly declining numbers largely due to intensification of agriculture over the last six decades. This is of course increasing and use of pesticides is common place.

 

It probably sounds like the sky is falling, except these are not prophesises of fire from the sky... this is hard data. Insect populations declining, bee populations declining, increasing pollution, climate change, and increasing human population. Is earth on course for one of its famous mass extinction resets?

 

Article below:

 

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006320718313636

 

PDF version : https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/S0006320718313636?token=579F772CFCD4FF6A8AA194197DDC865E9A42A740BC979A7C4154AAE401B0F4A87F05967FB7491BAD3302D8B11AF90CAE

 

Quote

 

The repercussions this will have for the planet's ecosystems are catastrophic to say the least, as insects are at the structural and functional base of many of the world's ecosystems since their rise at the end of the Devonian period, almost 400 million years ago.

 

 

 

[disillusioned]

We're in the middle of a mass extinction event right now.

 

https://www.pnas.org/content/114/30/E6089

[LogicalFallacy]

3 minutes ago, disillusioned said:

We're in the middle of a mass extinction event right now.

 

https://www.pnas.org/content/114/30/E6089

 

Yes. Somewhere there is a study that shows the rapid loss of bio diversity as a mass percentage since humans have started intensification. I'll have to find it, but now most mass is made up of human influenced life - so humans, sheep, cattle, poultry etc .

 

 

[pantheory]

This is what happens in a man dominated world. Man comes first. But we do need to keep tract of the loss of insect species and the big picture in general. Many insects such as cockroaches have a much better chance of surviving millions of years longer than we will, but many other insect species will die out while new insect species will be created by adaption to a man-altered world.

[RealityCheck]

Insects have survived events in Earths history far worse than whatever we can muster.  I think they'll be fine regardless although humanity is another story.