It's definitely an issue. We have a lot of matter compounding the issue, ranging from political inaction, to public ignorance, to a scientific hesitancy to strike and alarmist tone, to the strange phenomenon of scientific denial, and so on. All this issues foment to form one convoluted mass of a problem, with no clear solution in sight. We make both great progress and regress. Progress in the form of endangered species programs and growing public knowledge of environmental problems, regression because of a massive attempt to control and hide the facts of the seriousness of matter from the public and from officials who can do something. Essentially we face a tragedy of the commons, quite simply, where not even can be done to remedy the situations we face. At best we deal with damage control - how much money and resources do we have to throw at the issues when species x, y, or z disappear? How do we deal of climate change and poor people in third world countries? How do we get people to be concerned about these problems when it's usually difficult to even get people to be concerned about the ingredients in the fast food they consume every day?
So it's not just a mass extinction problem on the horizon. It's a whole host of problems that we will have to embrace whole hog, so to speak, in order to exact any meaningful change in how we humans perceive and interact with the natural world at large - indeed, even with each other.
www.theguardian.com
www.popularmechanics.com
