Those are good points, Wat, we cant make a valid comparison because we weren't around then to witness those mass extinctions. And like you said, this is serious and can easily get worse. The current mass extinction isn't all climate related though, it's also linked to human expansion and cutting down of forests and living in areas they have no business living in. I like the human global superpredator comparison, but a better comparison is that humanity, as a whole, functions like a virus. You're right that this mass extinction isn't like the others, much like manmade climate change, it's happening a lot faster than the natural ones.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction
The Holocene extinction, otherwise referred to as the Sixth extinction or Anthropocene extinction, is the ongoing extinction event of species during the present Holocene epoch, mainly as a result of human activity.[1][2] The large number of extinctions spans numerous families of plants and animals, including mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles and arthropods. With widespread degradation of highly biodiverse habitats such as coral reefs and rainforests, as well as other areas, the vast majority of these extinctions are thought to be undocumented, as no one is even aware of the existence of the species before they go extinct, or no one has yet discovered their extinction. The current rate of extinction of species is estimated at 100 to 1,000 times higher than natural background rates.[3][4][5][2]
The Holocene extinction includes the disappearance of large land animals known as megafauna, starting at the end of the last Ice Age. Megafauna outside of the African continent, which did not evolve alongside humans, proved highly sensitive to the introduction of new predation, and many died out shortly after early humans began spreading and hunting across the Earth (additionally, many African species have also gone extinct in the Holocene). These extinctions, occurring near the Pleistocene–Holocene boundary, are sometimes referred to as the Quaternary extinction event.
The arrival of humans on different continents coincides with megafaunal extinction. The most popular theory is that human overhunting of species added to existing stress conditions. Although there is debate regarding how much human predation affected their decline, certain population declines have been directly correlated with human activity, such as the extinction events of New Zealand and Hawaii. Aside from humans, climate change may have been a driving factor in the megafaunal extinctions, especially at the end of the Pleistocene.
Ecologically, humanity has been noted as an unprecedented "global superpredator" that consistently preys on the adults of other apex predators, and has worldwide effects on food webs. There have been extinctions of species on every land mass and in every ocean: there are many famous examples within Africa, Asia, Europe, Australia, North and South America, and on smaller islands. Overall, the Holocene extinction can be linked to the human impact on the environment. The Holocene extinction continues into the 21st century, with meat consumption, overfishing, ocean acidification and the decline in amphibian populations being a few broader examples of an almost universal, cosmopolitan decline in biodiversity. Human overpopulation (and continued population growth) along with profligate consumption are considered to be the primary drivers of this rapid decline.[6][7][8]
I found some papers so I'll link them here:
http://scientistswarning.forestry.orego ... -13-17.pdf
Moreover, we have unleashed a mass extinction event, the sixth in roughly 540 million years, wherein many current life forms could be annihilated or at least committed to extinction by the end of this century.
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/360/6393/1080.2
https://doi.org/10.1126%2Fscience.269.5222.347
https://doi.org/10.1046%2Fj.1420-9101.1 ... -9010124.x
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs ... cobi.12380
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2017/ ... 49114.full
Much less frequently mentioned are, however, the ultimate drivers of those immediate causes of biotic destruction, namely, human overpopulation and continued population growth, and overconsumption, especially by the rich. These drivers, all of which trace to the fiction that perpetual growth can occur on a finite planet, are themselves increasing rapidly.
http://static.squarespace.com/static/51 ... .+2014.pdf
The overarching driver of species extinction is human population growth and increasing per capita consumption.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/spe ... ists-warn/