A definitive summary of the history of Life on Earth, according to the scientific record, from our series, The Value of Biosphere Earth. (Scroll down for citations.) What is the value of Earth's biodiversity to modern Civilization, technology, and human beings in general? This series seeks to connect people of all backgrounds to a better understanding of what our life-support system is and how its integrity is our #1 economic and shared priority. This episode synopsizes the history of Life’s deveopment.
Each segment synopsizes the latest science in two to five paragraphs. Researcher/author, Chris Searles (director, BioIntegrity), is host. Sections 1-4 talk about “the biosphere.“ Sections 5-8 present a “biospheric climate solution“ and outline how restoring Earth's biospheric integrity is, according to the Science cited in each segment, far more valuable to human beings and our future than a tech-centric civilization and/or climate solution.
Read The Value of Biosphere Earth, Earth’s Life Timeline:
Citations
Earth graphics
- “The Pale Orange Dot” (Microbial Earth circa three billion years ago) -- Zubritsky (2017). NASA Team Looks to Ancient Earth First to Study Hazy Exoplanets. NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Retrieved online, 2021. https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2017/nasa-team-looks-to-ancient-earth-first-to-study-hazy-exoplanets
- “The Blue Marble” (Biosphere Earth, circa the year 2000) -- Stockli, Nelson (2000). Earth The Blue Marble. NASA Visible Earth. Retrieved online, 2021. https://visibleearth.nasa.gov/images/54388/earth-the-blue-marble
Timeline graphic
- Microbes – citation [1] below
- Protista – Early Eukaryotes. (2020, August 14). Retrieved September 24, 2021, from https://bio.libretexts.org/@go/page/13577 (also https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-biology/chapter/eukaryotic-origins-2/)
- Fungi – Lutzoni, F., et al. Contemporaneous radiations of fungi and plants linked to symbiosis. Nat Commun 9, 5451 (2018).
- https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-07849-9; Berbee, M.L., et al. Genomic and fossil windows into the secret lives of the most ancient fungi. Nat Rev Microbiol 18, 717–730 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41579-020-0426-8
- Plants & Animals – citation [2]
- Modern humans – citation [6]
1. First Microbes
- “3.5 Billion years ago.” Sim, M.S., et al. Role of APS reductase in biogeochemical sulfur isotope fractionation. Nat Commun 10, 44. (2019) https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-07878-4 Science: Biology, Chemistry, Earth. doi:10.1126/science.aar7944. (2017) https://sciencemag.org/news/2017/12/life-may-have-originated-earth-4-billion-years-ago-study-controversial-fossils-suggests
- “4.47 Billion years ago.” Service, R. How an ancient cataclysm may have jump-started life on Earth. Science: Chemistry, doi:10.1126/science.aaw606. (2019) https://sciencemag.org/news/2019/01/how-ancient-cataclysm-may-have-jump-started-life-earth
2. First plants & animals
• “Around 600 million years ago.” Bobrovskiy, I., et al. Ancient steroids establish the Ediacaran fossil Dickinsonia as one of the earliest animals. Science 361 (6408), 1246-1249. (2018) DOI: 10.1126/science.aat7228. From “Confirming the identity of early animals” inset. https://science.sciencemag.org/content/361/6408/1246
3. Earth’s biosphere has taken form several times, last 600 million years
• Dutfield, S. The 5 mass extinction events that shaped the history of Earth — and the 6th that's happening now. Live Science. Retrieved online. (2021) https://www.livescience.com/mass-extinction-events-that-shaped-Earth.html
4. Greater diversity & attributes with each iteration
• Eisenberg, L.The Tree of Life. Evogeneo. (2017) https://www.evogeneao.com/en
5. Forming roughly 65 million years before the first homo sapiens
• Penninsi, E. How Life Blossomed After the Dinosaurs Died. Science: Evolution, Palentology, Plants & Animals. Retrieved online. doi:10.1126/science.aaz9741. (2019) https://sciencemag.org/news/2019/10/how-life-blossomed-after-dinosaurs-died
6. First Homo sapiens
- Hublin, J., et al. New fossils from Jebel Irhoud, Morocco and the pan-African origin of Homo sapiens. Nature 546, 289–292 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature22336 (Overview here: https://sciencemag.org/news/2017/06/world-s-oldest-homo-sapiens-fossils-found-morocco#)
- Stringer, C. The origin and evolution of Homo sapiens. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 1698 Jul 5; 371(2016): 20150237. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2015.0237. ttps://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4920294/
7. Migrated out of Africa 180,000 years ago
• Callaway. Israeli fossils are the oldest modern humans ever found outside of Africa. Nature 554, 15-16. (2018) doi:
https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-01261-5
Last ice age ended
• Clark, et al. The Last Glacial Maximum, Science 325, Issue 5941, pp. 710-714 (2009). doi: 10.1126/science.1172873
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/325/5941/710.full
8. The economic society
• Daly, Farley. (2011) Ecological Economics, Second Edition: Principles and Applications. Island Press. ISBN: 9781597269919. https://islandpress.org/books/ecological-economics-second-edition
9. Material Wealth monarchies and oligarchies began approx. 6,000 BCE.
- Speiser, E. A. “Ancient Mesopotamia and the Beginnings of Science.” The Scientific Monthly, 55(2), 159–165. (1942) https://www.jstor.org/stable/17767
- Reference article. Monarchy History. The International Commission and Association on Nobility. https://www.nobility-association.com/monarchyhistory.htm [Retrieved 2021]
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