Thursday, May 31, 2007

More scientific debate on the future of seafood

Will we see the end of seafood in 2048? This projection generated a lot of debate, and now it's time to see the next installment.

Emmett Duffy over at Natural Patriot announces the next installment in the debate over "the end of seafood" in 2048. The debate includes Ray Hilborn who likens this debate to the evolution/intelligent design circus. Guess which side he wants to be on?

Worm and colleagues (including Emmett BTW) answer their critics in the issue of Science released today, and they find their work continues to stand. I haven't fully digested the whole exchange, but my initial opinion is that the original paper remains valid. More on this after I digest further.

Thanks to Emmett for his work, for this tip, and for his great work at Natural Patriot, check it out sometime if you haven't already.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mark, Thanks for the support and all the great stuff on Blogfish. Although the Science exchange highlights some of the disagreements, I really do sense that the various sectors of the marine scientific community are beginning to come to consensus that diverse, functioning marine ecosystems are critically important to sustainable fisheries, and that effective management will be enhanced by better linkages to the ecosystem context in which fish populations live.

Mark Powell said...

Emmett, It's nice to hear that you're headed to resolution with some of the critics of your work. Did Ray Hilborn retract his "mind-boggling stupid" comment?
Mark

Anonymous said...

I don't know Ray personally, but I get the sense from his writing that he's not the retracting kind. On the other hand, he and Boris Worm are co-organizing a working group at the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis to find common ground between fisheries management and marine conservationists. I consider this is a very hopeful sign.