He estimated that in 2003, almost 30% of the world’s fish stocks were defined as ‘collapsed’. What he then did was simply extend that trend line out until it reached 100%. He assumed that fish stocks would just continue to collapse, one after another, until they all had in 2048. It’s a somewhat innocent extrapolation. For a scientist it’s an interesting thought experiment: ‘If things carry on as they have in the past, when would this reach 100%?’ I often do these calculations myself. They’re fun. But this approach highlights a fundamental problem that we’ve seen over and over in this book.
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