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Subscribe to RSSEarth during the Cambrian Period was relatively warm and without polar caps. Most of the continents resembled deserts and were clustered in the southern hemisphere. Life was small and simple mostly in the oceans. There were no land plants but fungi, algae, and lichens probably greened many land areas.
Over the past 750 million years, our blue marble has gone through remarkable changes — continents have shifted, ice ages have come and gone, sea levels have risen and fallen, and one-time deserts have turned green, allowing creatures to crawl out of the oceans and live off the land.
These changes are now being made visible by the Planetary Habitability Laboratory at the University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo. The first set of the Visible Paleo Earth visualizations are being released today, on Earth Day, and more will be available in coming weeks.
"I think people looking at the whole period will realize how fragile our planet is, how it changes," Abel Mendez, who is leading the project, told me in advance of the public release.
Visualization contruction
Mendez constructed the visualizations by combing through color images of Earth from NASA's Next Generation Blue Marble project and blending them with the global paleoclimate reconstructions developed by Ronald Blakey from Northern Arizona University and Christopher Scotese from the University of Texas at Arlington.
University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo
The Americas 65 million years ago just before the extinction of dinosaurs after an impact in the Yucatan Peninsula (center). Our planet was warmer, had many more forests and almost no ice caps during the end of the Cretaceous Period.
As he built the visualizations, Mendez said he was struck by the fact that the distribution of land mass among the continents has changed dramatically over the past 750 million years, but the total land area has stayed consistent – between about 10 and 30 percent of total surface area. "I was expecting to see more," he said.
The color of the land area changes dramatically, especially beginning 500 million years ago, during an era known as the Cambrian Period. Life was small-sized back then, and mostly confined to the oceans. As a result, the continents were mostly deserts.
From that point forward, terrestrial life began to flourish. In the years leading up to the extinction of the dinosaurs, he noted, the planet was even greener than it is today. "That is something nice to see in the pictures," he told me. "Today we have too many deserts. The dinosaurs had more food."
Habitable exoplanets
In addition to providing Earthlings with a voyeuristic view of the changes through time on their own planet, Mendez's project is part of a larger goal to understand the habitability of Earthlike planets around other stars.
Today, very few exoplanets can be directly imaged, but that will change in coming years. Mendez hopes to learn how the light reflected by faraway terrestrial planets changes can vary, depending on how much ice or vegetation covers their landscapes.
"If we can see that light, we will be able to have an idea of the continental distribution and how much vegetation" the planets have, Mendez said.
For today, the focus is on our planet. These visualizations provide a view of Earth's ever-changing continents and climate from the past to the present. What's in store for the future? "There are people who have some ideas of how the planet will be in the future with climate and continental change," Mendez said. "Eventually, I will make images for those also."
More about Earth's past, present and future:
- Interactive: Earth's timeline
- Ancient rocks contain climate forecast
- Rock links Antarctica and North America
- Rodents could rule the future animal kingdom
John Roach is a contributing writer for msnbc.com. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by hitting the "like" button on the Cosmic Log Facebook page or following msnbc.com's science editor, Alan Boyle, on Twitter (@b0yle).
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OMG. The ice caps all MELTED and there wasn't anyone around to SAVE THE PLANET!!!!!!!
So then, we must be living on a different planet since the other one couldn't be saved by Al Gore and his Nobel Whatever Prize. Oh, the humanity.
"I think people looking at the whole period will realize how fragile our planet is, how it changes,"
Actually I'm amazed at how resilient the eco system is and how it can take whatever has been dished out and rebound. Even astronomically high CO2 levels, OMG!!!!! It has survived much much worse than feeble mankind can come up with.
The ice caps melting today wouldn't destroy the planet, just the people on it. I think when people say "save the world" they tend to mean save the people. The earth is extremely resilient in and of itself, but life is very fragile.
If no ice ever melted, We would run out of fresh, clean, drinking water- This world was just fine before Al Gore came, and it will be just fine when he's gone. He is not needed. I suppose he needs to feel important somehow- When did Gore become a scientist anyway? Apparently he is only a spokesman taking credit, in his mind, equal to super hero status- He is nobody. His "work" is in vein. He is a loser-
Of course the Earth can survive us. That is a given. Can we, and the species we depend on for food and air, survive what we are doing? That is what it is all about. What is more important: survival of the human species over the next century or jobs in the logging and petroleum industries?
well said Jake
Actually, the ice caps melting won't destroy the people either. Life is very resilent as well. While there are many reports on the probable extinction events over time based on climatic change, none of theories have been verifiably proven; hence the ongoing controversy. As for global warming - Since there is verifiable evidence of numerous global warmings between extinction events, we can safely say that life will persist.
Wow! spectacular pictures of how the earth looked way back then. They were taken by whom? Oh yeah, THAT'S right, it's just more of those computer generated things like in the movie Avatar. I have one little question for Jake, why would humans all die if the ice caps melted? And Dropping Bullets, you are correct, if no ice melted there would be no fresh water, some say 80% others 70% of the earth's fresh water is frozen on the Antarctic continent, ice up north doesn't count it's salt water.
Yeah didn't anyone ever watch Water world. The desert like conditions on @ 10 to 30 % less land sounds real nice. Webbed feet sounds even better.
It is not the idea that it is going to happen its just a matter of when. And the the events leading up to a dramatic climate change. Remember it takes trees to make a forest. And most cant see the forest from the trees. The world is always changing and the earth will have her way. With or without us measly humans.
'70% of the Earth's surface is water. Of this 70%, 98% is salt water, leaving 2% as fresh water. Of the 2% that is fresh, about 90% is frozen.
Jack: "The ice caps all MELTED and there wasn't anyone around to SAVE THE PLANET"
You act as if you think your first comment is relative to the AGW debate. Nobody disputes the fact that the climate has changed before. That is not what the debate is about. And no one disputes the fact that life persisted through past changes. But that doesn't mean they would have been present to live through.
The human species is just a mere blip on the earth's time continuum. We're currently existing here based on the current conditions that make it relatively habitable for us to survive here. As conditions change, our species will become endangered and then extinct, as so many other species have in the past. It's all part of the universal and/or earth's ever-evolving, randomly occurring existence, with no beginning nor end.
Maybe, in 65 million years, it will be the "New Dinosaurs" digging us up and asking what happened. Need to leave a message, somehow, it was the fault of politicians. Oh wait, how long before the sun is to swell and cook the earth?
Sharon, there will be an end. In about 5 billion years the sun will expand and consume the earth. End of story.
The problem with that argument Sharon is that no other species on Earth has the ability to alter there environment and be able to thrive the way humans have. Even through a nuclear holocaust I believe in some small corner of the Earth some people would find a way to survive and begin to rebuild. I think we will be around for awhile.
You have noticed the animals that flourished then aren't around now, right?
'Saving the Planet' means saving this wonderful ecosystem which supports human beings. Only the simpleminded think that the planet itself won't survive our demise.
Freddy, you're dreaming. We're about to become a staggering minority on this planet. Perhaps we'll even go extinct, just as we've driven hundreds of other species since we became a majority.
How can this been? Didn't God create the Earth like 5000 years ago?
George - A day is to a thousand years as a thousand years is to a day. Man invented time not God, he could care less what we use to measure time.
Man did not invent time, he invented god.
Stop it, Jack, you're being a jerk.
he noted, the planet was even greener than it is today. "That is something nice to see in the pictures," he told me. "Today we have too many deserts. The dinosaurs had more food."
The plants had more CO2.
Glad somebody else noticed that silly comment. I recall seeing on the discovery channel once about how India was one big giant chain of volcanoes back millions of years ago. It is evident by the temples in some regions of that part of the globe being carved out entirely from lava deposits. I'm pretty sure there was a giant increase in many greenhouse gases back then compared to now. Life flourished then, and according to this guy, they had more food.
I will say, life probably prefers gradual change vs instant change, but even after great extinctions, life always bounces back. Shy of the moon falling out of orbit and hitting the earth, it is pretty hard to extinguish all life. Even in that situation, I would be willing to bet some microbe would be ejected into space, and then fall back to earth a while later to quickly start repopulating the earth with life.
One way or another, we should reduce our waste. It really shouldn't matter if it does anything to the global environment or not. Nobody likes a garbage dump in their back yard.
That Earth had more "food" and atmospheric CO2 in the past has nothing to do with the present situation. The increased food and CO2 back then was the result of hundreds of thousands of years of planetary evolution. Today's dilemma arises not so much from the quantity of CO2 and lack or abundance of "food", but from the rapidity of change. For example: If the oceans rise quickly, the coastal marshes and tropical reefs likely die or suffer enormous damage. If the marshes and reefs die, the oceanic food chain dies, and so do we.
CO2 is food for plants. As a by-product, they produce oxygen, which is food for all but plants. All created by God, Jesus and The Holy Spirit.
Do you really think that God is going to save us now that we've screwed up this planet with our greed and waste and evil? The way in which we have abused this beautiful treasure makes me think the Lord isn't going to do anything for us in the end. All the misguided people who think the end won't come in water again are mistaken. God isn't doing it this time. WE'RE DOING IT TO OURSELVES!!
The forests are cut down every day. Without its lungs this planet can't breathe. WE'RE SCREWED!
I think man's existence on earth amounts to minutes in earth's history time line. Those who believe we are going to be around for the long haul is dreaming. Anyone remember Easter Island?
I remember a cool movie about that island. In the end, a dude floated away on an iceberg. There was also a cool race to collect an egg.
I remember Easter Island - slave traders captured all the natives. The island was easy pickings after they deforested the whole area.
Willingparticipant- Yes the humans were only around for about 1 thousandth of the time that the dinosaurs survived; im just thinking if we do survive that long that we will at least have a colony on the moon and maybe further planets but there is one problem. If another more advanced alien race wants our planets they can just take them with their almighty technology.
I do. On Easter Island the people lived in a beautiful paradise. They destroyed their environment by cutting down all their trees and that was the end of their paradise, their ecology and their ability to cultivate food plants because all their soil eroded into the sea due to the lack of trees.
We just need to put a reflective shroud around Venus, then terraform it; right size, right elements, just to damn hot. Then we leave this planet as a park, let it heal itself in the fullness of time.
Problem solved.
OMG, I listed to this, and didn't hear science, but climate change denying, pole shift is gonna kill us fruitcakes!
As long as it only kills the fruitcakes, then we'll still have a viable culture to live on.
Fruitcakes? Seriously? From the one that appears to be worried pole shift? True, the position of Earth's poles shift a tiny bit every year, but that has been going on since the formation of the planet. Its not going to kill us, but even if it could, why worry about something you, the real fruitcake, are powerless to stop?
You seriously think you're in a position to call anyone a fruitcake? The one that is worried about pole shift killing us? The poles have been shifting a tiny bit each year since the formation of Earth. Pole shift is not going to kill us, but even if it could, why worry about something you are powerless to change? Oh... I get it. YOU ARE THE FRUITCAKE!!!
.
No wonder I got lost in the woods, that pole shift had my compass off. I knew it wasn't my fault! LOL
It would appear that most of the science-minded, intelligent bloggers took Good Friday off for the annual fertility celebrations. Lucky pagans.
What a beautiful piece of animation and just fascinating to imagine what Earth must of looked like then.
Yes we humans have held sway over this planet for mere minutes if not seconds of this planets overall history and look at the damage we have done in such a short time.
But you are right, the Earth will survive. We won't of course. Gaia has already begun scrapping us off the surface of her beautiful world and in less than a thousand years we will have been replaced by a sentient insect culture who will hopefully have a greater respect for the precious gift they have been given.
Happy Earth Day and Happy Fertility Festival everyone.
As this article borders on science fiction, your comment is just as appropriate. I'd rather see a probable picture based on real data. Geology provides a good view of the past and better predicts what portions of land mass would have been above water. This is just an illustration used to support the article and was probably drawn after the fact, without any regard to any real scientific data.
Since the article is about the visualization, it would be hard for the article to have been written first.
I stand by the first sentence of my statement.
It's Good Friday and Resurrection Sunday is coming.
Yes, the annual fertility rights are in full swing. 59 minutes to Miller time.
Happy Earth day everyone!!
Happy Earth Day Kathy! :)
Pure fantasy in the warped minds of those educated beyond their intellect......
Well the mind is the only real Time machine, and it is powered by our imaginations. The greater the imagination, the greater the visualizations. Fun stuff!
Does that mean you are an idiot since you can recognize the fantasy that the educated can't?
Ryan-3361264;
It simply means that I don't believe the enlightened educators...God said He created it and I am satisfied with that no further explanation or examination needed....
No offense meant. I'll be the first to admit I'm an ass from time to time, and I saw a wide open door with that initial comment. I don't know you so I'm not qualified to actually make that assumption, but I would be neglecting my duties as an ass if I didn't pounce on an opportunity like that. lol
The more I look at the night sky, the more I am fascinated with the miracle that is planet Earth. From the hellish ball of the Hadean molten rock to the blue-white marble, what an incredible journey Mother Earth has had over the last 4.5 billion years! It's been the cradle of so many species and has given humankind a chance to gaze at the wonder that is the universe. Microbial life is probably abundant in the universe but I think intelligent life is very rare. Which is why Earth is so precious. It's our home. And there is nothing more loving, affectionate and beautiful as home (with all it's varied people).
Happy Earth Day to everyone!
Rakesh, that was an excellent logical explanation.Basic ,but yet genius
The basic changes in the animation are well supported by evidence. Of course, whenever you try to visualize a system based on general knowledge, you will have to speculate on the details. But that does not change the general picture, and intelligent people should be able to enjoy the animation with that caveat in mind.
when speculating involves more faith than reasonable pattern recognition it is not considered under 'supported evidence'.
thanks for the 'warning'.
What will be will be. There are 7 billion people on this planet and counting. Are there any bleeding hearts out there with a level mind. Does anybody really think they can change the living habits of people who don't give a damn about anything except how to survive from day to day? Do you "tree huggers" really think you are going to save the planet? As long as there is oil and gas and coal available on this earth, it will be utilized until it is exhausted. Humans will eventually dissapear from this earth long before we humans in our infinite ego can change anything that can make a difference. What will be will be.
Since we have already changed many things that have made big differences, your logic seems suspect.
In the past we resources were at a minimum what always happened to get all back in balance. A WAR!!! That is what we have to look forward to. World War 3. China has way too many people to survive at the rate they are going. If all the different nations keep growing in population ( and they are ) then in another 25 years that will be all that is let for man-kind is to have another war. That will get rid of the population growth and get everything back into balance. But if they use Nukes then I have to say that will be then end for all. Maybe even planet earth. Enough nukes will split the planet in half. Think about it.
For all there destructive power, we don't have enough nukes to split the world in half with surface detonations. We do have enough to wipe out most life, especially larger animals. Life will persist, but most species that inhabit the earth now would become extinct.
My all discussion this from a wonderful little article. Most of the comments had nothing to do with the article which is par for the course. I think it was neat-o!
I expected to see a rainbow with that backgroung music.
Wow glad I only have 20 years left here.
hang in there Red..the new 60 is 47...or 72...or something like that...
This is so typical of the ignorance and stupidity of the shallow minded people, you all think you know it all don't you ,a Scientist gives a beautiful rendition of what our planet looked liked and you morons make stupid ass remarks on it, and not believe that we live in a Fragile Eco system, aren't the present day disasters proof enough or are you all blind and ignorant to those as well,l but yet if some natural disaster should disturb your shallow minded, closed view you are the first to say why me ,you naysayers disgust me.
Please don't give us your ignorant rhetoric I for One and many others are sick and tired of it, you all deserve what you get
LD35 ...I don't know if we deserve you...there's enough bigots already out there...
LD 45, bold words. A little on the inflammatory if you ask me...
Sure a lot of us are indeed sick and tired of ..well, the stuff you mentioned... we don't all go around making comments which only purpose is to be inflammatory.
Yes melting ice cpas is a normal thing that happens every how many years but we certainly are not helping the matter any by no means whatsoever.Our carbo footprints have cause a normal planetar function to acelerate and a break neck speed in the scheme of things.What I' more concerned with are the ever increasing numbers of earthquakes that are rocking the planet everywhere including right here in the U.S.You gotta admit that there's been a ghuge increase in earthquake activity all over the world,now thats something that really does has me thinking
First of all, slow your typing down, read what you type, fix the errors, turn off the bold and italics, and then once you've done all that, just realize for a moment that earthquakes are NOT happening more often. We just have more monitoring devices and better communication techniques. Simply put we hear about the earthquakes more than we used to.
There is nothing Al Gore or anyone can do if this planet decides to crap on us! And since when is Al the scientific voice of the world? He acts as if mankind deliberately screwed up the workings of planet earth!
So sick of hearing about our "carbon footprint" and "going green" Live your life, do your part, die anyway!
Ignorance and arrogance abound.
when matter come out to presence, man was watching at that moment what was happening. the great desert is inside our minds, behined the black dot which determines us by x,y& z axis
best regards to those who are looking for truth.....
You have a desert in your mind?
It was a neat animation but I think it would have been much better if the Earth were filleted out like standard wall maps so we could see the whole Earth all at once, and I also found the clouds to be a little distracting. I mean, seriously, all the action is happening in the southern hemisphere and for most of the animation we are focused on the northern hemisphere. Drop the perspective shot and go with a splayed-out earth map style. I think that would help.
The way humans are overpopulating the planet its going to require more than climate change to modify human behavior. Between killing off all the animal life for food and gobbling up all the mineral wealth there probably won't be much left in a hundred years for whoever remains. Humans are fast becoming the most destructive life form on the planet in pursuit of their survival.
Best regards to those who are looking for the truth, as i feel in my deep mined that : man was watching how matter come out to presence, after that x,y and z axis become our cage and as a huge dark desert hides the pure and first spark of humanity that we are looking for today in laboratories.
I am looking for truth. Will I find it in your deep "mined"? Best regards.
It's Good Friday and Resurrection Sunday is coming.
You mean easter?
Ishtar is the fertility goddess for the Canaanites.
Easter is the English spelling of the word.
I prefer Resurrection Sunday. It shows the original meaning for the day.
In about 5 billion years our sun will expand and consume our earth .End of story.
End of story? END OF STORY?... Charlie, that is a longer amount of time away than our entire solar system has existed thus far. The Earth has existed even less time. Life on this planet has existed even less time.
5 billion years is a long time. A lot could happen between now and then that could change the story. For example human beings could colonize other Moons and Planets, perhaps they could build colony ships and move out of our solar system. Who knows, maybe in 5 billion years humanity will have evolved into beings of pure energy after existing away from planet Earth for so long. Perhaps 100 years from now human beings will make a transition to a bio-robotic technological species. There are any number of ways to continue the "story" past 5 billion years.
4.5 billion years of planetary chaos, millions of species including dinosaurs that lived for millions of years without a purpose, millions of prehistoric humans lived and died good and bad lives all the while without Jesus, the Holy Spirit, God and Satan and the need to be saved before entering the kingdom of heaven! I love articles like these because they reinforce the evidence that there is no great white man in the sky watching and judging everything you do. Life, the universe, ebbs and flows like the tides.
Some interesting images. And regarding all the hystrionics about climate-change: this problem is big, collosally big. In fact, it's so big there is really only one person who can solve the problem: Jesus Christ. That's why I'm really not concerned about going 'green'. And if you don't believe in Jesus or God or at the very least some vague intelligent force behind the creation of Planet Earth, then what does it matter to you anyway? It's all one big cosmic-crapshoot if there is no God, and we're gonna be wiped out like the dinosaurs no matter what we do--- so why not at the very least enjoy ourselves? Whatever you believe in, just doesn't seem logical to me for a person to worry too much. If you believe in God, then have faith. If you don't, then why are you worrying anyway about something that is random and inherently meaningless on a cosmic scale i.e. humans & the earth itself?
God isn't going to solve this problem for us, Kindoalhun. Why should He? He gave us this beautiful world and we've mined it and polluted it and cut down the beautiful forests and eaten the fish out of the oceans. We've exterminated some of the animals and destroyed their habitats. Why? Just because.
We've made this mess ourselves and He is going to let us stew in our own heat and waste because we have free will. This problem we can either solve or it will destroy us all, and God will allow some other animal He loves to evolve as the paramount species on the planet.