Full History of Earth – The Whole History of the Earth & Life
Full History of Earth It can be very difficult today for a person to imagine that life on our planet was once different than it is now. Of course, you can imagine yourself as a medieval knight or even a Viking, thanks to historical films, TV shows, and a bit from school textbooks. But what about the time when there were no people on Earth at all? Or were there once distant ancestors of humans who lived so far in the past that they aren’t even remembered by Hollywood?
Well, scientists have not yet invented the time machine. I suggest you take a look at the history of our planet with your own eyes, to begin with. Let’s go back to the past four billion, 600 million years ago, our earth didn’t exist. Yet there was only a newly formed Proteau Sun and a ring of gas and dust and incredibly beautiful sight.
But we’re interested in something a little different. Fast forward time a little bit ahead. Four billion five hundred forty million years ago, our planet was formed. Back then, it was about as far from inhabitable as possible. The conditions on earth were really hellish. Instead of the usual landscapes, there was a sea of fire from molten rock. There were radioactive elements all around and the surface temperature reached four thousand seven hundred degrees Celsius. That’s about eighty-five hundred degrees Fahrenheit.
Instead of air, there was carbon dioxide, nitrogen, sulfur, and water vapor instead of solid land, magmatic oceans. Add to that the constant bombardment from large asteroids and you get a picture that’s more like the end of the earth than its beginning. After several million years as the result of a collision with a young planet called Faya, the moon was gradually formed one day.
Back then lasted about six hours. With such a short day, having time for anything would be simply impossible. It’s good that the workday didn’t exist yet from about four billion 100 million years ago to three billion eight hundred million years ago. The late heavy bombardment hit the earth, a huge number of asteroids. Some scientists suggest that at this time there were already oceans on Earth despite its high temperature. Honestly, I barely believe it. But who am I to argue with scientists?
It was the asteroids that helped the planet gradually become covered with water. According to one theory, the asteroids carried with them a tiny amount of life-giving moisture and delivered it to Earth. That’s how over billions of years, about half of the water of the world ocean came to Earth from space after the bombing ended. That is about three billion. Eight hundred million years ago, the temperature of the earth began to slowly decline. But current lifeforms couldn’t survive on the planet’s surface anyway because there was no oxygen in its atmosphere and there was no ozone layer to block ultraviolet radiation.
However, there are fossils that are about three million, five, 500 million years old, which means that life on earth could have arisen much earlier than we used to think from three billion two hundred million to two billion.
Eight hundred million years ago, almost the entire surface of the planet was occupied by a shallow ocean, the temperature of which ranged from fifty-five to eighty-eight degrees Celsius. That’s one hundred and thirty-one to one hundred ninety Fahrenheit. However, microorganisms were already inhabiting this hot water. The land was only volcanic islands that were slowly growing over time. Just imagine how hot it was. The days began to lengthen and about two billion five hundred million years ago, the first supercontinent Conolan began to form.
So let’s fast forward a little one billion. Five hundred million years ago, Earth days now lasted at least 16 hours, though complex organisms still didn’t exist. But lithosphere plates continued moving and after 400 million years created another supercontinent, Rodinia, and after some time, Pangaea about six hundred fifty million years ago, according to popular theory, our planet was a snowball, literally. This theory is called Snowball Earth. Scientists assume that everything was completely covered with ice and even the equator was as cold as modern Antarctica.
It’s. To even think what the temperature was at the polls at this time, but even under a thick layer of ice, the planet maintained a fairly high temperature. No ice age can kill volcanoes and the carbon dioxide from their eruptions, which accumulated in the atmosphere, gradually melted the glaciers. This melting released a huge amount of oxygen, which forever changed the planet. About five hundred forty-one million years ago, the Cambrian explosion occurred. Temperatures rising to 30 degrees Celsius or eighty-six Fahrenheit, and a record concentration of oxygen caused a huge number of living organisms to emerge.
The biological diversity was so impressive that some creatures even developed exoskeletons to protect themselves from being eaten by others. Researchers believe that almost all of the existing types of animals appeared during this period. The length of the day now reached twenty-two hours 450 million years ago. Plants and arthropods began to actively conquer the land 419 million years ago. The first insects appeared about three hundred million years ago. Most of our planet was occupied by swarms. Many scientists, such as Professor Frederic Rich, hold this view.
But the swamps of antiquity were not like modern ones. Some plants reached 30 meters in height. That’s about a hundred feet and giant insects flew everywhere. This was thanks to the high oxygen concentration. Be glad that our modern dragonflies, huge ancestors, didn’t survive to this day. Seriously, that wouldn’t be the most pleasant replacement for pigeons.
Two hundred fifty-two million years ago, the Permian Triassic extinction event took place, destroying 96 percent of marine species and 73 percent of terrestrial vertebrate species. Most likely, numerous eruptions became the cause of extinction. The air was filled with ash and carbon dioxide.
There was little sunlight, plus lava was flowing everywhere. Anyone could die in this environment. Dinosaurs then arrived to replace the destroyed species. But not only did huge dinosaurs divide the planet among themselves, but the continents also moved about one hundred seventy-five million years ago, but Pangaea also began breaking up the Atlantic and other oceans appeared and the world began taking on its current form that we see today. At this time, you could find the first pine trees, praying mantis, and bees 50 million years ago.
The power over the planet was then passed on to mammals. Without dinosaurs, they began feeling freedom, actively spreading around the planet and evolving with all their might. Meanwhile, the length of the day had reached almost twenty-four hours and the temperature stably remained near the twenty-four degrees Celsius mark. That’s about seventy-five Fahrenheit. About eight to four million years ago, according to scientists, an important split occurred. The ancestors of modern apes began separating from our ancestors, each heading down their own evolutionary path.
About four million years ago. The climate on the planet once again changed. Of course, this didn’t happen right away, but it was the climate that turned part of the dense forest into the savanna. According to one theory, this is what made our distant ancestors climb down from the trees, stand up straight and start looking for food. They were not the only particular species that began fighting for survival. Many tried to adapt to the changes. But in the end, only humans succeeded to the degree that they went on to invent tools.
The Wheel and Netflix. One million four hundred thousand years ago, Homo erectus began to colonize Eurasia. Seven hundred ninety thousand years ago, they already knew how to use fire. What the population of the Earth was exactly during this period is rather difficult to calculate. You know, the population census at that time wasn’t very good. And then about three hundred thousand years ago, Homo sapiens appeared the reasoning human. They appeared and began to populate the entire earth so actively that they still can’t stop.
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