Joe Rogan on overfishing: what the evidence says · JRE #2341
SUBJECT: OVERFISHING
Not a true/false call. Every claim is logged with its sources; read the exhibits below.
94% of all the big fish that are in the ocean are sucking them out in giant numbers, 94% of all the big fish that are in the ocean are gone over the last, you know, whatever it is.
What the evidence says 01 / RECORD
The widely cited source for this claim is Myers and Worm's 2003 study in Nature, which estimated that industrialized fishing had reduced large predatory fish (tuna, swordfish, marlin, sharks and similar species) to roughly 10 percent of pre-industrial biomass, implying about a 90 percent decline, with community biomass typically falling around 80 percent within the first 15 years of exploitation. That figure was itself contested by later stock assessments as an overestimate for some species, and no authoritative source puts the loss at 94 percent. Rogan's directional point (a very large decline in big ocean fish) reflects the science, but the specific 94 percent figure overstates the roughly 90 percent estimate. Exaggerated.