This is in response to the letter titled "Rapid extinctions must be halted" by Carla Llewellyn, which appeared in the Nov. 22 Deseret News.
In her letter she states that "One-quarter of the world's species could be lost within the next 50 years." With new animal and plant species being discovered on a regular basis, it is safe to say that nobody knows how many species exist. It therefore is absurd to say that one-quarter of the world's species could be lost within the next 50 years.Llewellyn goes on in the same paragraph to say, "An alarming 100 species will be lost per day by the year 2000." Just where does this astounding fact come from? Simple math tells us that 36,500 entire species would vanish each year using this "alarming" formula.
I would like to know, if in the air book that Llewellyn pulls her facts from, she could find the names of three or four days' worth of the species that are in danger.
The only species that is in real danger is humans. With the Endangered Species Act, and an alarming 100 species per day dying out, any development for human use will be halted so the nesting ground of the bent beak tweetie dick bird can be preserved.
Jim Jackson
Evanston, Wyo.