This extinct dragonfly was able to fly because there was enough oxygen in the air. Today, it would die just trying to breathe utilizing the amount of oxygen we presently have in our cities.
"We are losing three oxygen molecules in our atmosphere for each carbon dioxide molecule that is produced when we burn fossil fuels. Studies of ice cores and recent data from direct atmospheric sampling have shown that there has been a 30% increase in carbon dioxide since the beginning of the industrial age....Since the beginning of the industrial revolution we have removed .095% of the oxygen in our atmosphere. True, that is only a tenth of one percent of the total supply, but oxygen makes up only 20% of the atmosphere. I looked up safety rules regarding oxygen concentrations and according to OSHA rules on atmospheres in closed environments, "if the oxygen level in such an environment falls below 19.5% it is oxygen deficient, putting occupants of the confined space at risk of losing consciousness and death." What happens if the world's atmospheric levels of oxygen fall to 19.5% or lower? Are we all going to have to carry little blue oxygen tanks with us to survive? Not a pleasant possibility."
Read more: http://blogcritics.org/scitech/article/atmospheric-oxygen-levels-fall-as-carbon/page-2/#ixzz1ATbQua1Y"
REF: http://blogcritics.org/scitech/article/atmospheric-oxygen-levels-fall-as-carbon/
CHART SHOWS HOW CARBON DIOXIDE LEVELS HAVE INCREASED OVER TIME -- ESSENTIALLY, WE ARE NOW BREATHING TWICE AS MUCH CARBON DIOXIDE INTO OUR LUNGS AS BEFORE 1880 -- AND IN CITIES, THE EXPOSURE IS HIGHER.
(REF: http://www.oxygentimerelease.com/A/ScienceOxygen/p9.htm)
IF TRENDS CONTINUE, WITH THE DESTRUCTION OF TREES, POLLUTION OF THE SEA AND ITS DESTRUCTION OF OXYGEN-GENERATING ALGAE, AND THE UNMITIGATED BURNING OF FOSSIL FUELS, THAT OUR ATMOSPHERIC OXYGEN LEVELS WILL DECLINE TO UNDER 8% IN CITIES, FORCING PEOPLE TO BREAHE OXYGEN-RICH AIR VIA PORTABLE UNITS AND MASKS.
SOUNDS OUTRAGEOUS?
IT MAY BE NECESSARY FOR CITY-DWELLERS TO CARRY OXYGEN MASKS WITHIN THE NEXT FEW DECADES IN ORDER TO BE ABLE TO SUSTAIN LIFE. THIS WILL BE THE FIRST 'CYBORG' FITTING THAT ALL CHILDREN, IN PARTICULAR, WILL HAVE TO WEAR IF THEY LEAVE STRUCTURES WHERE OXYGEN IS SUPPLIED IN RICH ENOUGH PERCENTAGES, SINCE CHILDREN HAVE HIGHER METABOLIC RATES THAN ADULTS.
HERE'S AN INTERESTING ARTICLE ABOUT OUR OXYGEN-DEPLETION PROBLEM:
Peter Tatchell
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 13 August 2008 20.00 BST
Article history
Around 10,000 years ago, the planet's forest cover was at least twice what it is today, which means that forests are now emitting only half the amount of oxygen.
Desertification and deforestation are rapidly accelerating this long-term loss of oxygen sources.
The story at sea is much the same. Nasa reports that in the north Pacific ocean oxygen-producing phytoplankton concentrations are 30% lower today, compared to the 1980s. This is a huge drop in just three decades.
Moreover, the UN environment programme confirmed in 2004 that there were nearly 150 "dead zones" in the world's oceans where discharged sewage and industrial waste, farm fertiliser run-off and other pollutants have reduced oxygen levels to such an extent that most or all sea creatures can no longer live there. This oxygen starvation is reducing regional fish stocks and diminishing the food supplies of populations that are dependent on fishing. It also causes genetic mutations and hormonal changes that can affect the reproductive capacity of sea life, which could further diminish global fish supplies.
Professor Robert Berner of Yale University has researched oxygen levels in prehistoric times by chemically analysing air bubbles trapped in fossilised tree amber. He suggests that humans breathed a much more oxygen-rich air 10,000 years ago.
Further back, the oxygen levels were even greater. Robert Sloan has listed the percentage of oxygen in samples of dinosaur-era amber as: 28% (130m years ago), 29% (115m years ago), 35% (95m years ago), 33% (88m years ago), 35% (75m years ago), 35% (70m years ago), 35% (68m years ago), 31% (65.2m years ago), and 29% (65m years ago).
Professor Ian Plimer of Adelaide University and Professor Jon Harrison of the University of Arizona concur. Like most other scientists they accept that oxygen levels in the atmosphere in prehistoric times averaged around 30% to 35%, compared to only 21% today – and that the levels are even less in densely populated, polluted city centres and industrial complexes, perhaps only 15 % or lower.
Much of this recent, accelerated change is down to human activity, notably the industrial revolution and the burning of fossil fuels. The Professor of Geological Sciences at Notre Dame University in Indiana, J Keith Rigby, was quoted in 1993-1994 as saying:
In the 20th century, humanity has pumped increasing amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere by burning the carbon stored in coal, petroleum and natural gas. In the process, we've also been consuming oxygen and destroying plant life – cutting down forests at an alarming rate and thereby short-circuiting the cycle's natural rebound. We're artificially slowing down one process and speeding up another, forcing a change in the atmosphere.
Very interesting. But does this decline in oxygen matter? Are there any practical consequences that we ought to be concerned about? What is the effect of lower oxygen levels on the human body? Does it disrupt and impair our immune systems and therefore make us more prone to cancer and degenerative diseases?
Surprisingly, no significant research has been done, perhaps on the following presumption: the decline in oxygen levels has taken place over millions of years of our planet's existence. The changes during the shorter period of human life have also been slow and incremental – until the last two centuries of rapid urbanisation and industrialisation. Surely, this mostly gradual decline has allowed the human body to evolve and adapt to lower concentrations of oxygen? Maybe, maybe not.
The pace of oxygen loss is likely to have speeded up massively in the last three decades, with the industrialisation of China, India, South Korea and other countries, and as a consequence of the massive worldwide increase in the burning of fossil fuels.
In the view of Professor Ervin Laszlo, the drop in atmospheric oxygen has potentially serious consequences. A UN advisor who has been a professor of philosophy and systems sciences, Laszlo writes:
Evidence from prehistoric times indicates that the oxygen content of pristine nature was above the 21% of total volume that it is today. It has decreased in recent times due mainly to the burning of coal in the middle of the last century. Currently the oxygen content of the Earth's atmosphere dips to 19% over impacted areas, and it is down to 12 to 17% over the major cities. At these levels it is difficult for people to get sufficient oxygen to maintain bodily health: it takes a proper intake of oxygen to keep body cells and organs, and the entire immune system, functioning at full efficiency. At the levels we have reached today cancers and other degenerative diseases are likely to develop. And at 6 to 7% life can no longer be sustained.
Scaremongering? I don't think so. A reason for doomsaying? Not yet. What is needed is an authoritative evidence-based investigation to ascertain current oxygen levels and what consequences, if any, there are for the long-term wellbeing of our species – and, indeed, of all species.
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IF THE OXYGEN LEVEL GOES BELOW 19.5%,A RESPIRATOR TO ADD MORE OXYGEN TO THE AIR IS RECOMMENDED.
REF:
Air monitoring for toxic exposures By Henry J. McDermott, Shirley A. Ness
WE SHOULD EXAMINE WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON:
"THE SKY IS NOT FALLING,BUT IT IS SHRINKING"
by MATT FORD, for ars technica, Geophysical Letters, 2010
Ref: http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2010/07/the-sky-is-not-falling-but-it-is-shrinking.ars
"Scientists have discovered yet another enigma about our planet: the thermosphere has undergone serious shrinkage. The thermosphere is the largest portion of the Earth's atmosphere and is the next-to-last region before you reach the vacuum of outer space. The fact that it has contracted is not surprising; the thermosphere absorbs extreme ultraviolet (EUV) photons from the sun and warms and cools—expanding and contracting—in a pattern that follows the 11-year solar cycle. While we are coming out of one of the longer periods of low solar activity in a century, scientists have found that the thermosphere has shrunk some 8 percent. That's the largest drop in recorded history, and they cannot explain why...[One] possibility they consider is that changes in the chemical makeup and dynamical processes in mesosphere and lower thermosphere affect the concentration of atomic oxygen at the lower boundary. The authors point out that such internal processes, coupled with known anthropogenic changes, could produce the missing 50 percent of the change that's unaccounted for. "
"Global warming" has been blamed for the death of essential phytoplankton which provide our planet with the majority of its oxygen. Acidification of the oceans is the most obvious reason for phytoplankton death. EVER HEAR OF "ACID RAIN"?
So, what could be done to get our oxygen levels up again?
You already know the answer to that question, and anyone who doesn't get out there and plant trees -- and lobby against coal and oil burning -- will know the answer to the question POSED HERE: WILL MY CHILD OR GRANDCHILD HAVE TO BREATHE OXYGEN SUPPLIED BY A MASK IN ORDER TO SURVIVE?
IF THEY SURVIVE ALL THE OTHER PROBLEMS FACING HUMANKIND, AND BIRTH CONTROL IS NOT IN PLACE, BY 2075 THE FIRST TRUE CYBORGS WILL BE OUR OWN GRANDCHILDREN.
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