Extinction events

In The Sixth Extinction, by Elizabeth Kolbert, the author stresses that if no changes are made to the world in which we live today, that a mass extinction will occur. Kolbert reveals that species are becoming extinct at a rate that is similar to those of preceding mass extinctions. Most importantly, if the destruction and contamination of the natural world continue at the same pace then it will conclude with the end of humanity. Similar to the extinction of dinosaurs 65 million years ago,…

Our planet is in the middle of the sixth mass extinction of mammals, fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and plants. We are currently experiencing the worst case of extinction than the dinosaurs which was 65 million years ago. Extinction may be a natural event but there has been a recent increase of species extinction from 1000 to 10,000 per year. This means in the future we may lose species every day [1]. Before extinction was caused by earthquakes, volcanic eruption and climate change but this…

Aleechia Gill 09/29/16 RFJ 5 Mass extinctions are a number of events in which a large percentage of the species on the planet go extinct and have a great impact on today’s living things. There have been at least five mass extinctions recorded in the history of the Earth thus far. The earth lost more than 75 percent of its species. It is being debated that we are currently in the sixth mass extinction. Graptolites, it began with the filtered-fed animals and colony builders, which disappeared…

that during life on Earth there has been 5 mass extinctions. These mass extinctions are said to be a normal part  of life and might even be an important factor for life on Earth. The main mass extinctions that have been discovered are the Ordovician Mass Extinction, the Devonian, Permian, Triassic, and the Cretaceous Mass Extinction. Scientists now even believe that we are not only part of the problem but the main subjects of the sixth mass extinction caused by Homo sapiens (humans). Andrew…

believed to be wiped out by a meteorite/asteroid or another catastrophic event. How did an asteroid cause a mass extinction causing the majority of a planet’s population to die? Newton’s laws of motion can explain how and why a asteroid caused a mass extinction wiping out an entire planet’s evolution. Scientist have multiple hypotheses leading to the end of the Cretaceous Era or T-K event. One of such, is the astronomical event that hit the earth sending an immense amount of debris and dust…

years ago (mya) (Smith 2011). One major feature of this period is the formation of the supercontinent, Pangaea which affected the environment and the climate as well which gave rise to new species. Another distinct feature is the greatest mass extinction event which killed around 54% of all marine families and most of the land species as well (Erwin 1989). This phenomenon then gave way to the “Age of the Dinosaurs”. Geography and Climate Due to the movement of the tectonic plates, the two…

Around 543 million years ago the Cambrian Explosion occurred, some say it may represent the most important evolutionary event in the history of life on Earth. The “Cambrian Explosion” refers to the rapid appearance of most major living animal body plans in the fossil record within 20 million years or less. This may seem to be a long period of time but is a relatively short in evolutionary history. This swift change in the fossil record appears to be inconsistent with the ideal of the slow…

Why did dinosaurs disappear? There are three main theories that explain dinosaur’s extinction, and they each have crucial evidence to support them. These are the mysteries of the dinosaurs. The extraterrestrial theory, or the asteroid theory, was created by a team of scientists that sought out evidence and came to an astronomical conclusion. They discovered that…

Almost 70 million years ago, the most recent of apocalyptic extinction events occurred, wiping out the dinosaurs and signaling the start of a new era. The Cenozoic Era (age of mammals) has been split into seven sections called epochs with the final epoch being called the Holocene epoch, which brought forth a new ecosystem that harbored humanity. To conclude the eras that occurred previously, there have been five apocalyptic extinction events that occur roughly every 100 million year, and…

The Permian Mass Extinction Introduction There are five major extinctions in history: the Late Devonian, the Ordovician-Silurian, the Permian-Triassic, the Triassic-Jurassic, and the Cretaceous-Tertiary. Known as the Big Five, these extinctions exceeded all others in size and destruction, each killing more than 60% of species from that period. Each one acted as a bottleneck, allowing the survival of only a fraction of the organisms that had been thriving before, from which evolution and life…