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Statistics on the rates of extinction have mostly been inferred from
a species-area relationship and projections of habitat destruction.
If we're only interested in the proportion of species
remaining after some portion of the habitat has been destroyed
is generally between 0.15 and 0.35. If current rates of tropical
deforestation continue for another 30 years half of the remaining rain
forest will be gone. If we then prevent all further
deforestation, between
and
of the species presently there will remain, i.e., 10%-20% will go
extinct. More sophisticated approaches use an exponential decay
model, recognizing that the predictions of the above approach apply
only after the remaining forest fragments have reach an
immigration-extinction equilibrium. Notice, however, that these
calculations only reflect the effects of lost habitat, not
increased exposure to disease, competition with invasive exotics,
overxploitation, or habitat degradation.
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Kent Holsinger