Where are we?

“I have recently watched a fascinating series, “Earth” presented by Chris Packham. It enforces the tragedy of how humans have changed our one chance planet in the last few hundred years.  Earth has gone through some devastating transformations since its birth; however, these have occurred judiciously over millions of years.  What we can now appreciate is that our activities have accelerated natural deviations on a colossal scale, and it seems to be unstoppable”.

“I’ve written notes from some of the documentary, I can accept that these aren’t fully detailed, but it draws the general picture of the history of the Earth, which was born around 4.6 billion years ago”. 

The origin of life. Scientists are unsure about its arrival of earth – but the first cellular organism, called Cyanobacteria filled the oceans. Again, over millions of years.  CUE: Photosynthesis, a key process in the life of the planet. Oxygen exhausted from the simple celled organisms; algae – lots of it. Chemistry affirms that Oxygen had to react (oxidise) the rock surfaces in the deep ocean before reaching air in an almighty mission to rid the methane toxic atmosphere and create the thin blue line, our sky of today. It took millions of years. 

500 million years ago, a symbiotic relationship was formed between celled organisms (photosynthesizing algae) and fungi (it still happens today!). They adapted hyphae which reached from the shallows onto land. Natural succession and the foundation for life in the form of organic matter. The first land dwelling organisms evolved. A fungus (tree like structure) called Prototaxites grew up to 6M high and dominated the landscape for, guess, millions of years!  The first plants, Archaeopteris evolved during this time. 

253 million years ago, Permian. The earth land mass, the super continent of Pangea, had the right ingredients for rich assortment of life. But this was the start of a mass extinction. A volcanic event, where super-heated rock, larva, pushed through the mantle causing fires, releasing toxic gases and volcanic ash. The ozone layer shrank, the entire planet warmed up, plants became sterile, ecosystems were out of balance and the oceans became toxic. More than a third of all life (prolonged death from starvation and being poisoned) became extinct over 2 million years.  

A time when our fossil fuel coal, oil and gas reserves were laid. 

The Cretaceous age 66 million years ago witnessed another mass extinction event. An asteroid impact. The Yucatan peninsula, Mexico. Immediate impact, molten rock rained on earth, fires, earthquakes, toxic gases, and tsunamis occurred years after impact. The planet’s atmosphere was blanketed, the sun’s rays failed to reach photosynthesising plants and the food chain was broken. It took hundreds of years for the ash and dust to fade from the skies.   New species were given the chance to evolve from the few surviving, but the large dinosaurs never did.

The Cradle of Humanity

Our ancestors walked across the rift valley 300, 000 years ago, this was the pivotal point of human evolution. The first cave drawings were discovered, these were predicted to be 13, 000 years old. Coincidental, lucky, opportunistic human beings succeeded, communicated, built shelters, hunted, gathered, and farmed. The fossil fuels that were laid hundreds of millions of years ago were extracted 200 years ago, burned and are still being burned. As a result of our industrial activities (and deforestation), CO² levels in the atmosphere has been rising at an alarming rate (graph below).

“We are entering a new geological epoch.
‘The Anthropocene’ The newly proposed geological time unit:

The age of humans.”

We are living in a time many people refer to as the Anthropocene. 

Humans have become the single most influential species on the planet, causing significant (and lasting / irreversible damage) :-

Global warming, changes to land, environment, water, organisms and the atmosphere…

Click here to read the 2nd part – The Way to a Better World