Say goodbye to the Yangtze River dolphin (Lipotes vexillifer). It is officially extinct. This is the first official extinction of a large vertebrate in 50 years.

This same week the Aldabra banded snail, which lived on the Seychelles Islands also became officially extinct.

It probably won’t be the last.

We, humans are the only species pushing other species into extinction in our belief that we are not animals and we alone are capable of suffering in any meaningful way. If we thought they were sentient animals with as much value as a human being we wouldn’t have destroyed them and their environment.