Sure mang. I've been killin' bitches with my guns for the whole damn holocene.

Interesting read, but I'm surprised that there was no mention of the Holocene extinction. Given the current rate of extinction, especially of plants, we could be looking at a complete ecological collapse in the not too distant future. It seems like a more serious existential threat than asteroids or rampant AI in that it's actually happening as opposed to something that might happen or could happen.

>> ^blutruth:

>> ^brycewi19:
Does anyone recognize the musical artist playing in the background?

The song is Holocene by Bon Iver and is off their self-titled album that was released last year.


Thanks!

>> ^brycewi19:

Does anyone recognize the musical artist playing in the background?


The song is Holocene by Bon Iver and is off their self-titled album that was released last year.

>> ^rychan:
>> ^cybrbeast:But the statement about humans killing off the megafauna is far from certain. They could have easily died out due to climate change or evolutionary pressures besides humans.
I find that scenario highly unlikely. These species had gone through scores of ice ages and warming periods, only to die exactly when the humans arrived at each continent by coincidence? At least, that's Jared Diamond's argument and I find it persuasive.


That's just correlation, a causal mechanism needs to be found. And it is unlikely that human populations were big enough to severely impact the population of these giant mammals stretched over a huge expanse. Elephant were never killed off and they mustn't be much harder to kill than mammoths.
The point is that we just don't really know exactly what was the cause. But it's not that unlikely that they were out competed by the smaller mammals that were gaining ground. That and extinction events are usually the reason why most of the branches of the evolutionary tree die out. Being really large is a good advantage in keeping isolated from the cold, but with the warming climate of the Holocene this advantage was lost. Also the trade off of being large is requiring a much larger intake of food.

"Gentlemen, while we do not yet fully know the cause of the Great Holocene Extinction Event, we do find this curious band of colored plastic all around the world in the sediments marking this time period."

I doubt farming is the only reason that made this land arid and infertile. If this site is really that old, it was there even before the end of the last ice age and the beginning of the Holocene. The Younger Dryas before the Holocene was the last cold snap. According to wiki it transformed a lot in the area:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Younger_Dryas
"The Younger Dryas is often linked to the adoption of agriculture in the Levant. It is argued that the cold and dry Younger Dryas lowered the carrying capacity of the area and forced the sedentary Early Natufian population into a more mobile subsistence pattern. Further climatic deterioration is thought to have brought about cereal cultivation. While there exists relative consensus regarding the role of the Younger Dryas in the changing subsistence patterns during the Natufian, its connection to the beginning of agriculture at the end of the period is still being debated. See the Neolithic Revolution, when hunter gatherers turned to farming."

Also after the Younger Dryas, the end of the last ice age would have coincided with a ~100m rise in sea level, maybe prompting stories of a great flood, later morphing into Noah's story.