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Gaia scientist Lovelock predicts planetary wipeout

LONDON (Reuters) - The earth has a fever that could boost temperatures by 8 degrees Celsius making large parts of the surface uninhabitable and threatening billions of peoples' lives, a controversial climate scientist said on Tuesday.

James Lovelock, who angered climate scientists with his Gaia theory of a living planet and then alienated environmentalists by backing nuclear power, said a traumatized earth might only be able to support less than a tenth of it's 6 billion people.

"We are not all doomed. An awful lot of people will die, but I don't see the species dying out," he told a news conference. "A hot earth couldn't support much over 500 million."

"Almost all of the systems that have been looked at are in positive feedback ... and soon those effects will be larger than any of the effects of carbon dioxide emissions from industry and so on around the world," he added.

Marsupialized wrote:I'm cool with it

BadComrade wrote:The sun's eventually gonna supernova and swallow the earth anyway, so who gives a fuck. Human beings and the earth itself are nothing in the grand scheme of things. I think it's about time we get over ourselves.

clocker bob wrote:No word on what this will mean for Tom Waits.