Comments on: Life on Earth gets wiped out every 27 million years, say boffins

By: Elephant's Child

Elephant's Child — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 12:22:25 +0000

Oh dear we’ve only got 16 million years & I thought we had 200 million years until the sun burnt out !
On the bright side, the extinctions are gradually getting less servere.
I’m sure by then humans will have found a way to make sure they survive.
After all cream always rises.
Mind you so does scum !

By: Rob

Rob — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 07:58:19 +0000

I think it would help if people googled Mass Extinction Events. There are many postulated possibilities that would cause such a regular periodicity. I think that the dark star Nemesis has not been completely discounted by experts. Another possibility is that the solar system moves up and down in the galactic plane, and every 27 million years we encounter a very busy region of space that is full of comets and asteroids. Some of the mass extinction events are marked in the fossil layer by the presence of extra-terrestrial minerals, such as would occur if an asteroid hit us and spread its contents all over the Earth.
Another remote possibility is a release of massive amounts of methane from below the sea. Firestorms racing across the earth, tsunamis, etc…
fun fun fun.

By: Jess xxx

Jess xxx — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 07:31:43 +0000

‘The next globo-extinction event is due in about 16 million years’ time.’

No it’s not, it’s due in two years time….FEAR THE MAYAN PROPHECY!

By: Nick

Nick — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 22:11:38 +0000

My bad, they are saying that life is being wiped out exactly every 27 million years with a maximum probabillity of this being a fluke of 2%. I still maintain the graph is confusing with reguards to multiples of 27 and discrimination of significant results, and the statistics they use are well beyond anything I have ever studied, (because I don’t study statistics). But I respect the scientific community, so if this is without rebuke amongst astrophysicists thats actually quite staggering. Once every (exactly every) 27 million years aliens terraform the planet, or … post your theory here.

By: Nick

Nick — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 21:35:57 +0000

What I think they are saying is that there are periods of mass extinction every 27 million years give or take 20 million skip a few. That is not exactly every 27 million years, otherwise they would produce a nice graph showing clear 27 million year intervals rather than an earthquake readout with some pingpong balls plopped on there to mark the “significant” events that are not discernable to the untrained person. But if exactly every 27 million years even give or take 3 million years all life gets wiped out thats actually staggering. But so staggering that they would make a better job of putting across this awesome fact. If this is the case please kindly email my ignorant self.

By: Sue

Sue — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 20:54:13 +0000

The key is the difference between the title “Life on Earth gets wiped out every 27 million years, say boffins” and the fist line of the article “MUCH OF life on Earth gets wiped out every 27 million years, say boffins”

By: Taylor

Taylor — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 17:47:43 +0000

Isn’t this called mass extinctions and they happen all the time. We had to learn them in order for biology. There is a climate change and a new (normally recently evolved) phylum/class (ex mammals right now) becomes the “dominate” ones.

By: hm

hm — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 17:17:22 +0000

agreed mark!

By: Mark

Mark — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 16:07:19 +0000

If only it would wipe away all evil starting now.

By: iHeartDerren

iHeartDerren — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 15:41:20 +0000

Lol that just makes me laugh! a) there is nothing that I can think of that could make us extinct so frequently
b) why every 27 million years? Does the extinct – making – thing have an alarm clock then?!
and… c) how do they know that this is what has happened? They can’t exactly prod some soil to get those figures, so how did they get them?