Earth comes back quickly (in relative terms) from mass extinction, and the next is just around the c

Earth comes back quickly (in relative terms) from mass extinction, and the next is just around the corner.


So it seems the good news is that the Earth can recover from anything that has been thrown its way, at least up until this point. I honestly believe the Earth can overcome anything that will come its way barring some extreme catastrophic planet exploding impact or even a sun super nova.
www.sciencedaily.com...

Life was nearly wiped out 250 million years ago, with only 10 per cent of plants and animals surviving.

Professor Benton added: "We often see mass extinctions as entirely negative but in this most devastating case, life did recover, after many millions of years, and new groups emerged. The event had re-set evolution. However, the causes of the killing -- global warming, acid rain, ocean acidification -- sound eerily familiar to us today. Perhaps we can learn something from these ancient events."

In the latest and most devastating extinction event on the planet to date all but 10% of life as we know it was destroyed. Life basically had to start over each time, creating new species to flourish the landscape.


It seems though that while it took the Earth 10 million years to recover (More or less stabilize) it likely took closer to 30 million years for it to fully recover from the event.
www.sciencedaily.com...

The full recovery of ecological systems, following the most devastating extinction event of all time, took at least 30 million years

This to me suggests that even if some humans did live the initial devastation and the first years following said event that people as we know them would be extinct in that time. It could be the human race would evolve into something completely different. It could be that the human race would be replaced by another species altogether.


Many ask what might have caused such an event. For many years it was suggested that a single impact caused the deaths of 90% of the species on Earth. Others have suggested that there were a combination of things and that the extinction event took many years (possibly several life times with the number going into the thousands of years).
www.sciencedaily.com...

Through the analysis of various types of dating techniques on well-preserved sedimentary sections from South China to Tibet, researchers determined that the mass extinction peaked about 252.28 million years ago and lasted less than 200,000 years, with most of the extinction lasting about 20,000 years.

It is likely that a major push in the extinction though was something many fear is taking place even as we speak. Global warming is considered to be a factor in the mass extinctions over time not just the latest. I am not talking man made global warming (my personal opinion is that man is having less of an effect than some would have us believe), but the real event of global warming that is occurring.

There is ongoing debate over whether the death of both marine and terrestrial life coincided, as well as over kill mechanisms, which may include rapid global warming, hypercapnia (a condition where there is too much CO2 in the blood stream), continental aridity and massive wildfires. The conclusion of this study says extinctions of most marine and terrestrial life took place at the same time. And the trigger, as suggested by these researchers and others, was the massive release of CO2 from volcanic flows known as the Siberian traps, now found in northern Russia.

Now comes news many will find frightening.

It seems we are headed toward a future mass extinction.
www.sciencedaily.com...

Global temperatures predicted for the coming centuries may trigger a new ‘mass extinction event’, where over 50 per cent of animal and plant species would be wiped out

The research team has, for the first time, discovered a close association between Earth climate and extinctions in a study that has examined the relationship over the past 520 million years — almost the entire fossil record available.

I take from all of this that the Earth cleanses itself of inhabitants from time to time and starts it all over again. I take from this that mans (as in mankind) time is limited on this planet. It seems that some would think we are already in the start of the 6th mass extinction or that it is closer than once thought.

www.sciencedaily.com...

"If currently threatened species -- those officially classed as critically endangered, endangered and vulnerable -- actually went extinct, and that rate of extinction continued, the sixth mass extinction could arrive within as little as 3 to 22 centuries," he said.

One cannot deny that the number of species being killed daily or having their numbers critically lowered is frightening. Of course a great deal of extinction today is greatly influenced by humans. The Earth though will push the rest of the species to their limit and end the rein of more than a few.

The good news in all of this is that one species recovers faster than others possibly. The bad news it does not look good for humans.
www.sciencedaily.com...
www.sciencedaily.com...

Corals seem to have problems surviving in many areas do to mankind. On the other hand they have shown great resilience through time in being some of the first to recover the quickest.

Metazoan-dominated reefs only took 1.5 million years to recover after the largest species extinction 252 million years ago

It seems that corals recover at a rate of at the very least 10% faster than other species, and at the most 30% faster. The numbers at which they recover is amazing compared to other organisms. One could say this is because they are located in the oceans and that this is a bit more stable than other habitats on Earth. I do not think that is the case though.

There was one other species that recovered quite quickly that also lived in the oceans. They however are no longer to be found swimming in our oceans. They do though have close relatives that are still alive that we know as Nautili's. I speak of course of the Ammonites.
www.sciencedaily.com...

It seems they recovered at a rate that is very similar to that of the reefs.

The discovery of this explosive growth over a million years takes a heated debate in a new direction. Indeed, it suggests that earlier estimates for the End-Permian extinction were based on truncated data and imprecise or incorrect dating. Furthermore, the duration for estimated recovery after other lesser extinctions all vary between 5 and 15 million years.

It might be that the oceans hold a bit more stability than the land, it certainly seems likely. I doubt though that this is the only cause why some species make a quicker come back than others.

In the end though it seems the Earth will move on with or without the help of mankind. It actually seems likely to me that mankind can do little to stop what Earth has in store for its inhabitants. What is in store for mankind? I guess part of that depends on ones beliefs. It seems certain though that there will be one more mass extinction, and the Earth will fix itself. That does not mean mankind will continue to exist or that we can even hold back what is coming.

Raist

reply to post by Raist

Lots of information here, S&F.. I read somewhere that 99.9% of all species have lapsed into extinction at some point. The exception is humans. Although, we have come very close to joining that crowd. Thousands and thousands of years ago, when all humans where mostly centralized in Africa, the climate was extremely unstable and this caused many of the humans to die off. Luckily a few thousand survived, making it far enough up north to settle and survive..

I honestly believe the Earth can overcome anything that will come its way barring some extreme catastrophic planet exploding impact or even a sun super nova.

Global warming is still an issue that i don't see the Earth overcoming. Eventually, at least to my understanding, the climate will become to unstable for human existence to be possible. All life will probably burn up if global warming continues. As far as the planet itself, and not the life on the planet, it will eventually be destroyed, either by the sun, or by the inevitable heat death of the universe, or maybe even when the Andromeda Galaxy collides with our own.. The planets destruction is as inevitable as the destruction of the universe. It is certain.

This is good. As a traveler of the world I will tell you that there is much beauty in the world and in humans but the truth is they are outnumbered by a force of ignorant sick thought. Man has become a cancer to itself and the earth and by no fault of its own. There is a power structure that has been in play for over 1000 thousand years that know the cycles of the earth and how it cleanses itself. This round, man has over exploited and directed human destiny for their selfish need with such things forced reproduction, over population, diseases promoting alcohol, sex, materialism, capitalism to pervert the human race, milk it for all its worth knowing that it will all be gone one day.

We always bounce back and the powers that be always keep the knowledge of how we have been abused in the past, where we came from and how we got there from mankind leaving it in ignorance and believing that there was nothing before 3000 b.c.

This has happened before. If you only knew how many times, you would never believe it.

reply to post by TheCelestialHuman


Yes, global warming is a major factor. Actually it is now thought to be the major factor in all of the mass extinctions. The most recent of course caused by a multitude of reasons with global warming certainly being a factor.

There have been numerous warming and chilling stages throughout time. It seems the global warming that occurs is followed by ice ages (some bigger than others). I believe our last ice age was the largest.

What seems to occur though is that the global warming melts the polar caps or whatever ice is on the Earth at that time causing the oceans to rise and changing throwing the climate into some sort of mess. After that the polls freeze again dropping ocean levels and changing the climate again.

The first post briefly touches on this through this link.
www.sciencedaily.com...

There is ongoing debate over whether the death of both marine and terrestrial life coincided, as well as over kill mechanisms, which may include rapid global warming, hypercapnia (a condition where there is too much CO2 in the blood stream), continental aridity and massive wildfires. The conclusion of this study says extinctions of most marine and terrestrial life took place at the same time. And the trigger, as suggested by these researchers and others, was the massive release of CO2 from volcanic flows known as the Siberian traps, now found in northern Russia.

This really makes sense. Add to the global warming disease and other natural disaster and you have mass extinction. I of course do not believe global warming was the only cause but it had its place in the extinctions that occurred in the past and that will occur in the future.

As noted in the above posts the extinction did not take place over night. It was something that took thousands of years (hundreds of thousands most likely) to come about. It took place through a great number of disasters, combined with global warming. The fossil record shows that it took much longer than thought at one time for the mass extinction to take place.

This is also touched on a bit in the same link as above.

While I do not believe in manmade global warming, I do think we have the start of global warming taking pace now. My point to all of this is that the Earth will recover from it; Earth has always recovered from it. Mankind on the other hand may or may not recover from it; we certainly will not stop it. The Earth heals itself and works its own ways. It gets rid of things that it sees fit to get rid of.

This is the one thing that makes the Earth so great. Even after we pollute it daily the Earth will cleans itself, it might take us out of the equation all together but it will fix itself.

Raist

reply to post by Shadow Herder


I love exploring the world in which we live. I love to study the rocks containing evidence of life in the past and I love to study the living creatures running the Earth today. I wish I could afford to explore more than just the areas near me that I can drive to but that is how life works I guess

With life reaching a low of 10% of what it was at one time and rebounding I can say that I feel life will continue on the planet as long as the planet is whole. I am not so sure about humans though. I think the next mass extinction will cause mankind to exist no longer.

Raist

reply to post by Raist


Great thread thanks OP.

Certainly a lot to ponder. I was reading last year (or may have been start of this one) that extinction events can be traced to gamma ray bursts from outside our Solar System. The article i was reading at the time said that signs had been found in various isotopes that seemed to confirm this for several of our Mass Extinction Events - and even that they could have triggered the Siberian Traps and Deccan Traps into action.

However, looking for this article to link for the purpose of your thread, it seems to have disappeared. Not sure if that translates as removed as it was hokum or, (my favoured option) suppressed as it was bang on! I did however find this, that shows this is still being examined.

Gamma Ray Bursts

reply to post by Flavian


Thanks.

That sounds pretty interesting, thanks for the link.

I admit I am not completely informed about the ozone layer, so for all I know it could "grow" back. According to the article though the burst were destroying the ozone layer that protects the Earth.

I am not familiar with this idea. Most of what I have read (not just the articles I linked above) suggest multiple events bringing about the extinction. Though I think many agree that the impact was certainly a final blow for life at that time.

I wonder if the destruction of the ozone could have been a factor in the cooling of the Earth after the global warming stages. Certainly its destruction would have devastating affects on ocean life also.

I will have to look into this further; it is certainly an interesting idea. I wonder if the ozone was not just a bit thinner in the past?

Raist