Congratulations Humans: We're Literally Causing Unprecedented Marine Extinction

Scientists warn the way we are hunting and killing marine species will have lasting, devastating effects on ocean ecosystems for millions of years.

Prior to the current era, the world has experienced five mass extinctions. Today, we're apparently witnessing and contributing to what has been termed the "sixth extinction", which is shaping up to be the speediest death of marine animal species, ever.

What makes the sixth extinction unique is that large species such as great white sharks, blue whales and southern bluefin tuna are dying in large numbers.

The Guardian reports that this is because humans tend to fish for, well, larger fish. We also tend to fish a lot; to the point where many of these species are now pushed to the brink of extinction.

A group of scientists today released a paper about emerging trends of mass extinction in oceans. They've identified that large species play critical roles in marine ecosystems, which means that their extinction would have seriously damaging impacts on ecosystems of the future.

What kind of effects? It's described as a "knock-on" effect, like a set of falling domino pieces.

In fact, we've already seen this happen with the disappearance of very large predatory sea snails called Triton. When they began dying out, we saw an explosion in crown of thorns starfish, who just so happen to love devouring coral, and then every coral-dependant organism suffered as a consequence too.

The paper's co-author, Noel Heim, a researcher at Stanford, said humans tend to enter new ecosystems and proceed to kill off the largest animals first.

“We see this over and over again," he added.

The only reason marine systems have been spared to this point is because, previously, we didn't have the technology to fish in deeper oceans, or on an industrial scale.

If you're feeling sad after reading this, don't worry, we are too.

Err... we hope?

Photo: iStock.