The Rocky Road for Triassic Mammals
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- Опубліковано 3 жов 2024
- It always amazes me how close mammals came to being completely extinct during the Triassic Period. This video I explore the fossil record of mammals during this chaotic period in Earth's history, and how are lineage nearly expired 252 to 200 million years ago. The chance of our own success was anything but guaranteed.
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Another compelling and important video - thx! Personally I don’t think that intelligent life could only have evolved from mammals. Dinosaurs (eg Struthiomimids) with binocular vision, expanding brains and hands with opposing “thumbs” had all the ingredients needed for the runaway evolution of intelligence that - for poorly understood reasons - happens in humans.
To think the Dycynodonts almost were the dominant groups in the Mesozoic, I wonder what would have happened if they had been
If not for the Great Dying I bet Dicynodonts would continue to do just as well if not better over time,perhaps surviving into the modern day.
I think the crossing of our trachea and oesophagus was a damned risky move! That could've done for us many times over! I blame the Mudkips!
Thanks. I really liked your video. I haven't had a chance to learn about life in the Triassic since I was a child. Then I went off into the physical sciences. Now I have the time to learn all the news that I missed in the last 60 years. The books look interesting too. I have a book about how life returned after the ice age. I have read it many times - it is that interesting to me.
So glad you're uploading frequently again Dr. Burger! We really missed your in depth paleo content here on the Tube. I love to think about the ancient Mesozoic conifer forests, to imagine these little guys going about living alongside little pterosaurs and proto birds.
my problem with the Drake equation is the jump from "probability of life" to "probability of intelligence". There are a LOT of big steps in between there, whose probabilities are not known, and likely very small. (Apart from some astronomical ones overlooked, like: fraction of planetary systems with large planets in stable orbits to allow billions of years of stable planetary orbits of smaller terrestrial planets in habitable zone (apparently the presence of a Saturn-like planet in ours was crucial to prevent Jupiter from drifting nearer to the sun and disrupting the orbits of the 5 terrestrial planets), presence of a large moon to stabilize climate through stabilizing axial tilt, fraction of rocky planets that are not pure ocean worlds - very hard to have a radio-technology-capable civilization develop on a water world, etc)
I agree completely with how speculative the Drake equation is. I am sure that Drake took a lot of negative feedback for this equation. But the equation exists now. "... three stages in scientific discovery: first, people deny that it is true; then, they deny that it is important; finally they credit the wrong person." Alexander von Humboldt
The abundance of phosphorus.
@@mathewritchie It could be. I think that multicellular life could not exist without collagen which was rare before there was oxygen in the atmosphere.
It's interesting how one thing can trigger another thing which then results in something essential needed for a new form of life.
Right. I have nothing against the concept of the drake equation, just that it did not include a lot of both astronomical/geological steps with their own probability, and the jump from “origin of life” to “intelligence capable of being detected with radio signals” has so many steps with small probabilities included that I agree with Benjamin - if one glosses over those steps without evaluating each one, one has to assume that the number is ridiculously small as a starting point
Here is a fun one towards the end of the sequence: “ready massive energy supply that can be accessed via low tech means to facilitate origin of electrical devices: i.e.: most likely fossil fuels, requiring a long period with high rates of organic deposition.. . There is a converse to this: Say we do wipe ourselves out in the end but after we depleted fossil fuels on this planet - would that prevent a future intelligent species on this planet from radio-technology-capable (astronomically detectable) advancements beyond what was doable in antiquity through 17th century for as long as it would take to build up massive coal and oil deposits?
Great, fantastic video! Love it!
Thank you. I really enjoy your uploads
I really appreciate the time and effort you take to share this wonderful and interesting knowledge with us. Thanks again.
Hi teacher! You are very kind and nice teacher to listen! I love your way of teaching us something about dinosaurs and please continue to make videos ! We love you!
Great video!
Thank you for yet another excellent and thoughtful video.
To pick up on the other end with regard to 'high intelligence' and it's likely extreme rarity a few drastically oversimplified thoughts:
I would suggest us humans are barely capable of 'high intelligence' at all and everything we have achieved so far is the result of barely sufficient ability and numbers until the last 2-300 years or so.
If one considers any 'ability' within a population usually follows a normal distribution one might argue the vast majority of us are really only capable of being functional within our environment and society - novelty and innovation being restricted to a tiny proportion at the 'high' end of said distribution.
Now consider the Neanderthals, seemingly our closest peers. There is seemingly nothing to choose between them and us but in spite of having a good 100k year head start their technology for want of a better word 'stagnated', why? Given what we know I would expect the normal distributions of 'abilities' for Neanderthals had something like a 95% overlap with ours, so close in fact that I would expect any random Neanderthal brought up in modern society would do just fine. The tiny difference that made all the difference was maybe our slightly 'higher' distribution along with greater overall numbers affording us just enough extra 'innovators' that we not only came up with newer technologies but they were able to stick over time... even so if you look at the last 300k of H. Sapiens 'progress' it's obvious it was very touch-and-go for most of our existence - innovation and 'progress' have really only exploded as our numbers have.
In short 'we' may be the only known 'high intelligence' in the universe, and yet I would argue we barely made it to our 'lofty' position and even today only a tiny proportion of us just about qualify. Yes, I err on the 'Rare Earth' side of the Fermi Paradox debate while also recognising 'we' hardly qualify.
I hope that was interesting to some. Please recognise I took some dreadful leaps of oversimplification for brevity, no need to pick all too obvious holes.
PS
Dr Burger,
Thank you so very much for you thought-provoking and highly interesting videos. Speaking as an interested amateur I find your point about the possible alternate phylogeny of Monotremes and Multituberculates most intriguing - I've tried to look in to the subject of 'protomammals' on numerous occasions and always found it confusing, not being able to line up in my head what the texts say with what photos seemed to present.
More than likely just my stupidity but at first glance this 'alternate' narrative seems to make more sense to me.
Thank you again.
Very fine program, Dr. Burger! This is one of my favorite eras in our planet's ancient past. Many thanks again!
So much excellent information here and, four months later, I am watching once more. Thanks again, Dr. Burger
I never made it past the 8th grade. I appreciate this. I have been able to teach my self to write well enough, that I can be understood. I have improved my vocabulary and. I would just never be able to understand what you were saying 38 years ago.
I love this so much! Huge fan, new to your work and binging your content. I like that you feature Ray Trolls art. I thought I was going into Paleontology back in 1992 but did not. I love and appreciate your expertise and thank you for great videos!
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We're the only highly technical civilization, not the only intelligence.
Wow ur so smart
Great video! I'm enjoying your Planet Earth class. Learning a lot of really cool things. You are an awesome teacher!!
Love the videos dude plz keep em coming
Very informative!
I'm thinking about that One creature back in the Cambrian that survived, and it's descendants succeeded in surviving, eventually leading to us. Talk about a Hard Road to travel.
27:51 Those teeth are uncanily similar at first glance to the teeth of some Murinae rodents.
BTW, there is still a chance mammalian types earbones evolved more than once, apparently early Monotremata still had a Postdentary channel and therefore may had evolved independently from Therians, there's a chance this happened in again in the Haramiyidans if Multituberculates descended from them.
Can you tell about indian dinosaurs like the Rajasaurus
Dr. B B kicks a**.
Does every geologist wear an Indiana Jones hat?
Baseball caps are too.... pedestrian?
rip dinos, if only the knew the pleasures of alcohol they wouldnt have summoned that meteor.
nice expose', "The Meek Shall Inherit the Earth" couldn't be more true. The Triassic was just Weird, evolution gone rampant, I guess eventual Humans, the Weirdest of the Bunch, from this conflagration should have been expected.
No, we're not the only intelligent species in the known universe, we're the only known intelligent species in universe.
that herrerasaurus meme was kinda annoying
Not reptiles at all .
Ridiculous useless equation