[jellicle]

Based on other mass extinctions, we can expect ten+ million years of very low life diversity during this extinction that we're causing. So, for a period much longer than humans have been around (which you describe as "the interim"), we will experience only the dying. No human will experience any eventual recovery of biosphere diversity which may occur, long after we are gone.

[big-green-man]

Are we seeing mass extinction caused by warming though? I see extinctions caused by pyrethroids, chemical runoff, excessive hunting, deforestation, overfishing, cats, other direct human caused disruption to biomes, but directly from carbon dioxide emission? Maybe I missed it, but so far it's just warnings that fail to materialize where carbon emission is concerned, unless I'm misinformed.

[Clamchop]

One very direct consequence of CO2 pollution is increased ocean acidification, which interferes with the chemistry for building shells and other calciferous structures that many marine animals depend on. A warm ocean can dissolve more CO2, which makes it acidic, like a carbonated drink.

The Great Barrier Reef is now thought to be doomed to coral bleaching in the next few decades. Half has been lost already.

Another example is that biomes are moving at rates ten times faster than we'd expect from natural climate change. That is it say, plants and animals and fungi need to move ten times faster uphill or toward the poles to keep up. This is being documented in mountainous rainforests, but the sheer number of species in those areas is so high, and their natural ranges so small, that some are no doubt being lost before they can be discovered.

Even if all those species could keep up with the pace of change (and they can't), the unlucky ones will find themselves with nowhere to go. Some climates won't move, they'll disappear. Even if a suitable climate opens up somewhere else on earth, species are not known for teleporting.

It's not recommendable to wait for the warnings "to materialize" because the game will already be lost.