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So the thing about the dinosaurs is they were probably always doomed. It just happened to be the meteor that (mostly) finished them off. Why? Well, in times of
by cletus 5y ago
So the thing about the dinosaurs is they were probably always doomed. It just happened to be the meteor that (mostly) finished them off.
Why? Well, in times of consistency, the natural trend is for life to get bigger. For herbivores, bigger means access to more vegetation (eg giraffes can eat higher in trees) and is a defense against predators. For predators, size increases the size of prey you can, well, prey on.
But as soon as there's a sudden change, size is a disadvantage. You have high food needs (predator or prey). This makes you vulnerable.
It's probably more amazing that the dinosaur era lasted >150M years than that this era was ended by a meteor impact.
- booleandilemma 5y agoIt’s crazy that they lasted > 150M years and never developed intelligence. Meanwhile we’ve been here just 10 million years or so and we’re starting to make it to other planets.
- nojokes 5y agoPerhaps they did but they did not have means to express themselves and modify the environment?
- booleandilemma 5y agoI started thinking about that after I posted. What a shame that would be!
- nullc 5y agohttps://pbfcomics.com/comics/dinosaur-meteors/ https://pbfcomics.com/comics/dinosaur-meteors/
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- asdff 5y agoIntelligence is usually a huge waste of resources so it's not typically selected for past a certain level. I would still consider my cat highly intelligent with her strategy making during play, and her understanding of human emotions. In the case of our ancestors, there was a time when traditional resource gathering techniques were not as successful as those that took strategy, coordination with others, understanding migrations of other animals and seasonal progressions of edible plants, and potentially even tool use. Those that were intelligent enough to adopt these techniques managed to feed themselves and reproduce, while those lineages that weren't struggled, and eventually died out entirely. The end of the Neanderthal was sort of like this. They failed to improve their hunting strategies, their population shrank especially in competition with early humans, and eventually they died out.
- cpeterso 5y agoOr dinosaurs developed technology, detected the killer meteor, and relocated to Venus.
- edgyquant 5y agoMammals have been around for more than a hundred million years, maybe as old as the first dinosaurs themselves. 10 million years is about the time humans and gorillas diverged from a common ancestor. We’ve been evolving just as long as every other animal and it was environmental pressures (and luck) that lead to us being what we are.
- majkinetor 5y agoWhales seem to have better feeding strategy as they can depend on microbiota.
- sgt101 5y agoThere were small dinosaurs as well...
- acjohnson55 5y agoSome of them still exist! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_birds https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_birds
- cletus 5y agoThat's kind of the point: the _small_ ones still exist.
- Jorengarenar 5y agoAnd some are crazy intelligent
- catlifeonmars 5y agoThere were plenty of small dinosaurs.