6th big earth devastation

[kATTEKONGEN]

It actually has, thank you so much.
I realise the x-files are sci-fi but they are inspired, on this particular episode at least by real events. And i was just thinking if a new mass wipe-out was due for real or not, and why did men were the ones to actually flourish on the face of the planet when the other beasts are 10 times stronger and more resistant, maybe it was just chance.

try to search a bit around on youtube on mass wipe outs with birds and fish. There was a state in the US which had a couple of pretty crazy incidents in the beginning of this year,

[Yasri]

Here is some info I found online. Do note there is over 20 other events that have happen during that time period that wiped out tons of life but not over the 50% mark, as far as we know at this time.

In the past 540 million years there have been five major events when over 50% of animal species died.


Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction event (End Cretaceous or K-T extinction) – 65.5 Ma at the Cretaceous.Maastrichtian-Paleogene.Danian transition interval.[4] The K–T event is now called the Cretaceous–Paleogene (or K–Pg) extinction event by many researchers. About 17% of all families, 50% of all genera[5] and 75% of species became extinct.[6] In the seas it reduced the percentage of sessile animals to about 33%. The boundary event was severe with a significant amount of variability in the rate of extinction between and among different clades. Mammals andbirds emerged as dominant land vertebrates in the age of new life.


Triassic–Jurassic extinction event (End Triassic) – 205 Ma at the Triassic-Jurassic transition. About 23% of all families and 48% of all genera (20% of marine families and 55% of marine genera) went extinct.[5] Most non-dinosaurian archosaurs, most therapsids, and most of the large amphibians were eliminated, leaving dinosaurs with little terrestrial competition. Non-dinosaurian archosaurs continued to dominate aquatic environments, while non-archosaurian diapsids continued to dominate marine environments. The Temnospondyl lineage of large amphibians also survived until the Cretaceous in Australia (e.g., Koolasuchus).


Permian–Triassic extinction event (End Permian) – 251 Ma at the Permian-Triassic transition. Earth's largest extinction killed 57% of all families and 83% of all genera[5] (53% of marine families, 84% of marine genera, about 96% of all marine species and an estimated 70% of land species) including insects.[7] The evidence of plants is less clear, but new taxa became dominant after the extinction.[8] The "Great Dying" had enormous evolutionary significance: on land, it ended the primacy of mammal-like reptiles. The recovery of vertebrates took 30 million years,[9] but the vacant niches created the opportunity for archosaurs to become ascendant. In the seas, the percentage of animals that were sessile dropped from 67% to 50%. The whole late Permian was a difficult time for at least marine life, even before the "Great Dying".


Late Devonian extinction – 360–375 Ma near the Devonian-Carboniferous transition. At the end of the Frasnian Age in the later part(s) of the Devonian Period, a prolonged series of extinctions eliminated about 19% of all families, 50% of all genera[5] and 70% of all species.[citation needed] This extinction event lasted perhaps as long as 20 MY, and there is evidence for a series of extinction pulses within this period.


Ordovician–Silurian extinction event (End Ordovician or O-S) – 440–450 Ma at the Ordovician-Silurian transition. Two events occurred that killed off 27% of all families and 57% of all genera.[5] Together they are ranked by many scientists as the second largest of the five major extinctions in Earth's history in terms of percentage of genera that went extinct.

[v2prwsmb45yhuq3wj23vpjk]

The Sun doesn't have the necessary mass to go supernova, thankfully (novae are different, seen primarily in binary systems). Its red giant phases will effectively produce the same result in the end. We've got about a billion years or so before our little garden party ends.

Apologies for nitpicking.

Which is why I said nova and not supernova. How do you nitpick something you just completely agreed with?

[Slummish]

If you're interested in the next most likely event, research the Yellowstone Caldera.

[Gothicshark]

ok to answer this question with actual facts.


Major extinction events include:

1. Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction event (End Cretaceous or K-T extinction) – 65.5 Ma
2. Triassic–Jurassic extinction event(End Triassic) – 205 Ma
3. Permian–Triassic extinction event (End Permian) – 251 Ma
4. Late Devonian extinction – 360–375 Ma
5. Ordovician–Silurian extinction event (End Ordovician or O-S) – 440–450 Ma

Lesser extinction events include:

1. Modern Human Era (almost counts)
2. Quaternary extinction event
3. Middle Miocene disruption
4. Eocene–Oligocene extinction event
5. Aptian extinction
6. End-Jurassic extinction
7. Toarcian turnover
8. Olson's Extinction
9. Carboniferous Rainforest Collapse
10. End Silurian
11. Lau event
12. Mulde event
13. Ireviken event
14. Cambrian–Ordovician extinction event
15. Dresbachian
16. End Botomian
17. End-Ediacaran extinction

see chart for regularity http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi..._intensity.svg

We are not due a major event again, since the cycle is near completion.

As for size of creatures. see Quaternary extinction event that's why there are no large 'Monster' animals.

Next super sized almost everything from the early history of the earth.

see: http://www.slate.com/id/2210631/ its a good simple article.
also: http://washparkprophet.blogspot.com/...ce-so-big.html

In a word, more O2 The Larger the animals can get, less O2 the smaller.

[Powerogue]

that'd be neat, I hope we get giant, sentient raptors as the next big race.

[Sayl]

Which is why I said nova and not supernova. How do you nitpick something you just completely agreed with?

I guess my post wasn't clear if you interpreted tacit agreement. The Sun won't go nova either -- it would need to be a white dwarf leeching mass from a companion star in order to do so (that's the definition of nova). Our star's destiny in the future (i.e. becoming a red giant) is not the same thing.

[Stir]

Evolution works a bit like this:
A mommy and daddy life-form (not necessarily two separate ones) have a baby life form. This baby lifeform is different from mommy and daddy because genetics are not stable, and there's more to a species' individuality than merely DNA (there's also RNA and ribosomes and heat-morphing proteins and more).
This happens a lot of times, and each time, the baby life-form is different than the previous ones. Eventually, you get all sorts of differences. Most are unnoticeable, some are bad, and few are good.
From this stage, there are two (linked) types of 'selection.' There is 'natural selection,' which means that 'bad' differences get killed/eaten/stillborn/diseased/other bad stuff that removes them from the breeding 'program,' more so than unnoticeable difference, and far more so than 'good' difference, and then there's sexual selection, which means that individuals with a certain difference are deemed more attractive by the opposite sex.

In effect, individuals with a 'good' difference get to live longer, making them more likely to breed, or simply have a better chance of getting laid, making them more likely to breed. So 'good' individuals will pass more of themselves on to the next generations than 'bad' individuals, and this is what eventually leads to evolution.

There's more to it than that, of course, but this is the base nut-shell explanation.

As such, 'why' did humans evolve instead of, say, dragons? No real reason. It was a process, and that process doesn't have a goal. There's no winning lottery ticket, and there's no end of evolution. Humans as we know them now will continue to evolve (and we have drastically evolved even over the last sixty-thousand years), and there's no end to it. What will the future bring? We're clueless. Will a mass-extinction period cause humanity to go extinct? Probably not. But it will cause space to happen, in which there is little competition. When there is little competition, there is little selection, granting a boost to evolution processes; an environment in which much more mutations are able to survive and reproduce. So will humanity look the same? Probably not.

[Jistu]

I wouldn't rely on Sci-Fi television for scientific info.
But I assume the next big thing will involve the eruption of the Yellowstone supervolcano.

[v2prwsmb45yhuq3wj23vpjk]

I guess my post wasn't clear if you interpreted tacit agreement. The Sun won't go nova either -- it would need to be a white dwarf leeching mass from a companion star in order to do so (that's the definition of nova). Our star's destiny in the future (i.e. becoming a red giant) is not the same thing.

I looked it up and you're right, though when I learned of the fate of our sun (expansion into red giant and eventually fading out with the remains being a white dwarf) it was described as a nova. History Channel fail, I guess. Maybe it meant the other definition of nova, but that includes returning to its original brightness, which our sun won't.

All this is aside to my original point that expecting a disaster to be imminent because we're over the average gap between the previous five is horribly flawed thinking.

[Evilution]

I wouldn't rely on Sci-Fi television for scientific info.
But I assume the next big thing will involve the eruption of the Yellowstone supervolcano.

No, since the Yellowstone Caldera has been the subject for one or more sci-fi shows we cant take it seriously. (ya right)
Quick, sci-fi writers, make more shows about anything bad that can happen to our Earth so we can dismiss it as fake!

Im looking forward to the show where titan-like being roam the Universe, playing pool with planets... not that it
would be a bad way to go having Mars slam in to Earth. Talk about front row seats.

[Sylenas]

This is in response to a comment a few pages back regarding why we are the dominant species on this planet.

http://leasticoulddo.com/comic/20110326

[Cataclysmic Skyris]

Not even scientists can tell you 100% why and how we came to be.

I do like to keep an open mind on the ancient astronaut theories though. For all we know the cells/microbes/bacteria that mixed with liquid water on Earth and eventually turned into humans could have rode in on Meteorites after the Dinosaurs died out.

Or maybe we were brought here early on in our evolution by a more advanced species, taken from our home planet in another galaxy and placed on Earth as an experiment. Maybe that same race destroyed the Dinosaurs so that they could "use" the planet!

AHHHH!!!!

actuaaaaaally... they have done experiments to see if microbes could survive the impact and what they found out was they not only survived but combined upon the impact creating even more complex microbes...so that is now a confirmer possibility

[Zao]

Also: Being "due" (ie we're past the statistical average intervall) could still give us a leeway of a million, or two, years. Which isn't much in astronomical terms but a helluva lot for humanity. Heck, even 500 to 1000 years would probably allow us to have technologies that prevent some sort of external extincion event.
It is however very possible that we wipe ourselves from the face of the planet in the next few centuries or decades. But that's another topic entirely.