Dinosaurs Were Thriving Until Asteroid Struck, Research Suggests (theguardian.com) 39
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Dinosaurs would not have become extinct had it not been for a catastrophic asteroid strike, researchers have said, challenging the idea the animals were already in decline. About 66 million years ago, during the late Cretaceous period, a huge space rock crashed into Earth, triggering a mass extinction that wiped out all dinosaurs except birds. However, some experts have argued the dinosaurs were already in decline. Now researchers say the dating of a rock formation in New Mexico throws doubt on that idea, suggesting dinosaurs were thriving until the fateful impact.
Dr Andrew Flynn, the first author of the research at New Mexico State University, said: "I think based on our new study that shows that, at least in North America, they weren't going towards extinction." Writing in the journal Science, Flynn and colleagues report how they dated a unit of rock called the Naashoibito Member in the San Juan basin using two methods. Flynn said the perception that overall dinosaur diversity was falling before the asteroid hit could be a result of there being fewer exposed rocks, and hence fossils, dating to the end of the Cretaceous period than earlier in the epoch. "It looks like, as far as we can tell, there's no reason they should have gone extinct except for [the] asteroid impact," he said.
Dr Andrew Flynn, the first author of the research at New Mexico State University, said: "I think based on our new study that shows that, at least in North America, they weren't going towards extinction." Writing in the journal Science, Flynn and colleagues report how they dated a unit of rock called the Naashoibito Member in the San Juan basin using two methods. Flynn said the perception that overall dinosaur diversity was falling before the asteroid hit could be a result of there being fewer exposed rocks, and hence fossils, dating to the end of the Cretaceous period than earlier in the epoch. "It looks like, as far as we can tell, there's no reason they should have gone extinct except for [the] asteroid impact," he said.
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Humans vs. Dinosaurs (Score:5, Insightful)
Dinosaurs lived for 165 millionsish years. It took an asteroid to wipe them out. (non-avian of course)
Humans have been around for 100k, maybe a million or two depending on where you want to throw the dart.
Feels like humans will wipe out humans before an asteroid hits.
--
“If something robotic can have responsibilities, then it should also have rights.” – Emily Berrington
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Not "humans", trumptards.
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The Great Filter (Score:5, Interesting)
Apes with machine guns are frightening. Apes with refineries are terrifying.
Re:The Great Filter (Score:5, Informative)
Not necessarily. The industrial revolution suddenly created exponential growth because of the discovery of large seams of coal. Wood doesn't burn hot enough - and there arn't enough trees - to run powerful steam engines so without coal , and then oil, we may have carried on developing slowly and eventually created a technical society - though not using fossil fuels - but it would have taken a LOT longer. However in the scheme of the lifetime of a species an extra thousand years here or there is nothing.
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*borat voice* It's like when you give a woman power */borat voice*
Re:Humans vs. Dinosaurs (Score:5, Informative)
(non-avian of course)
While this caveat is correct, it is incomplete, as most avian lineages died out too. Only some toothless lineages survived, and that's the important adaptation. Toothed birds had a diet similar to their theropod ancestors. Birds with toothless beaks diverged from that diet to a seeds and insects based one, and in the aftermath of the meteor impact, that was an important treat.
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Oh, really? I'm sure that the eagles, hawks, owls and other birds of prey [wikipedia.org] would have something to say about that.
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Don't blame me (Score:2, Funny)
I voted for Giant Meteor in 2024.
Re:Don't blame me (Score:5, Insightful)
I voted for Giant Meteor in 2024.
Judging by the current state [apnews.com] of the White House East Wing, I'd say you got it.
Breaking news (Score:3)
Widely taught in 1st grade but finally confirmed now that it is on the internet.
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Widely taught in 1st grade but finally confirmed now that it is on the internet.
You might be surprised to know, but the things you were taught in 1st grade were extremely simplified. If your understanding of paleontology hasn't advance beyond 1st grade, I'm sorry. It is a fascinating topic.
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I don't know if that's accurate. The Land Before Time--the quintessential dinosaur reference guide for first graders--depicts dinosaurs struggling to survive in a world in decline, so it seems to be a common belief that they were dying out before the asteroid hit. This news should be of interest even for first graders.
Birds and Crocodiles (Score:2)
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Don't forget about sharks. Sharks are oooooooold.
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Already 100 million years old when those johnny-come-lately dinosaurs came along.
*Some* dinosaurs were thriving.. (Score:2)
A reminder to prioritise asteroid defence/space (Score:3)
We have to do both. Defence of the Earth (dramatic phrase, but see subject above...) has to be studied, funded and run. Along side that a long, probably multigenerationally long, programme of "how do we survive when the Earth is uninhabitable" including the ability to leave Earth and live elsewhere. These programmes are fundamental to long term survival of the human race.
I think one of the problems is that it all sounds very dramatic, big and sci-fi. But it isn't - we have direct evidence that the risk already materialised once and wiped out most life. We also have evidence of the expansion of the sun. All these things are certain, so we have to look at them as reality and not fiction.
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The expansion of the sun won't happen before 2.5 billion years, an asteroid could happen tomorrow.
Want a start on fixing the asteroid problem? All NASA has to do is tell el Bunko that a solid gold asteroid of monumental proportions is heading for Mar-A-Loco and that were we find a way to divert into an orbit, then el Bunko could own it. NASA would shortly get tired of winning.
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On the 2.5Bn years bit - yes, but don't start don't finish. We have no idea how long it will take to develop the techniques required for this, and there will always be a good reason to put it off until tomorrow. Needs to start and just become so embedded over time that future generations don't even question why we're doing it
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The expansion of the sun won't happen before 2.5 billion years, an asteroid could happen tomorrow.
Life does not have that long left on this planet, maybe as little as 600 million years due to other changes in the Sun and its output. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]:
The luminosity of the Sun will steadily increase, causing a rise in the solar radiation reaching Earth and resulting in a higher rate of weathering of silicate minerals. This will affect the carbonate–silicate cycle, which will reduce the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. About 600 million years from now, the level of ca
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But maybe we should stop ruining the planet first, otherwise it won't matter much whether we have asteroid defense or not.
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The first step to surviving somewhere else is locating a somewhere else that is better than trying to live on Earth after it has been hit by an asteroid. Unfortunately Mars fails this test. In fact we could get hit by an asteroid, have a nuclear war, have the worst possible global warming, and living would still be better on Earth than Mars.
What happeneed to the Deccan traps? (Score:2)
https://geosciences.princeton.... [princeton.edu]
Abstract: We test whether Hg in marine sediments over the last 550 m.y. of the Cretaceous is a reliable proxy linking Deccan Traps volcanic eruptions to late Maastrichtian global climate warming and the mass extinction at the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary (KPB).
From what I have seen and read about this, it is quite possible that the traps were emitting unimaginable amounts of gasses for tens of thousands, possibly hundreds of thousands of years. In this video essay from Kurz
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Kurzgesagt goes on mentioning that all the big extinction events were caused by volcanic activity.
If humans survive long enough, they're going to have a pretty bad day when the Yellowstone caldera explodes next. Even in modern history there's The Year Without a Summer [wikipedia.org]
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... it is quite possible that the traps were emitting unimaginable amounts of gasses for tens of thousands, possibly hundreds of thousands of years.
The Deccan traps are estimated to have been active for a period of something like 750,000 years. This was a very slow event. The end-Cretaceous extinction, on the other hand, was very abrupt: ignore the dinosaurs; the record of foraminifera (and other oceanic microfossils) shows that the extinction was essentially instantaneous in the fossil record.
So it just doesn't seem that the Deccan traps fit the data as the cause for extinction.
Would you do any better? (Score:1)
Doesn't it look like where the asteroid hit, that it had been hit before? Aliens aim is a little off ;)
I wish they had all died out (Score:2)