The anti-hydrocarbon group Extinction Rebellion has been organizing protests in Toronto.

This is the same group that glued themselves to doors and tables at the Quebec Energy Association conference.  They have been causing disruptions across the U.K. with outlandish stunts such as chaining themselves by the neck to the British Parliament building.

Like others activists they use plenty of carbon themselves, not just to get to their protests, but to hold them.

Like other radical campaigners, they don’t let the facts interfere with their slogans.  They rage on about millions of extinctions.  They’re trying to frighten people with apocalyptic warnings of ecological demise.

More than 99 percent of all species, amounting to over five billion species, that ever lived on Earth are estimated to have died out. Estimates on the number of Earth’s current species range from 10 million to 14 million, of which about 1.2 million have been documented and over 86 percent have not yet been described.

Here are the hard facts on extinctions from 1500 until today:

  • 869 species have gone extinct;
  • 190 species of birds;
  • less than 500 species of invertebrates;
  • less than 100 species of reptiles; and
  • around 100 species of amphibians.

Excerpted and enhanced from the Canadian Energy Network.