

New mass extinction event identified by geologists - schrofer
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-32397220

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acconrad
To think that in only 250mm years, virtually all creatures disappeared and
then came back to create intelligent life.

Now consider that the solar system is 4.6 billion years old, and shortly
thereafter were the terrestrial planets. That means there were 18 chances for
a mass extinction like this. Now granted many of these planet embryos have
fused into the current planets or turned into asteroids and meteors, but what
we're left with is the possibility of the rise and fall of intelligent life in
our own solar system on different planets (or our own) without a trace.

Fascinating and frightening.

~~~
killface
To think that human history is maybe 50,000 years old, tops. Recorded history
maybe 10,000 years. Then take these events that happened MILLIONS of years
ago... There could have been conscious, intelligent life back then, but it
just died out and all traces have disappeared in that time.

~~~
Madmallard
Given that we have really, really old fossils from tiny creatures that barely
leave a trace at all I'd say the likelihood of another species of similar
intellect as humans on this planet in its history is very low.

