It’s time for today’s #MakeAPlanet quiz! Which set of phenomena were closest in time?
1) T. Rex — Stegosaurus
2) First unicellular life — First multicellular life
3) The ☄️ that killed the dinosaurs — Neanderthals
4) Trilobites first appeared — Trilobites went extinct
Y’all put your time travel caps on today!
So, what’s the answer? Let’s go one by one: The first evidence of life we have in the fossil record dates back about 3.5 billion years ago, only (!) a billion years after Earth formed.
Multicellular life, with its increased complexity?
600 million years ago!
Next longest, we have trilobites, which survived two (!) mass extinctions and thrived as well-armored ocean champs from about 521 million years ago to the end of the Permian, 252 million years ago. They died in the biggest mass extinction on Earth, which eradicated 90% of life.
And, as most of you clever girls (see what I did there?) guessed, T. rex and stegosaurus not only never saw one another, they missed their chance by a whopping 77 million years, putting them at the third-shortest interval. T. Rex lived closer in time to us than many 🦕 species!
Which means the shortest span of time was between the Chixulub ☄️ that killed off 🦖 66 million years ago, and our close cousins, the Neanderthals, who showed up at least 430,000 years ago. Clocking in at ~65.5 million yeas, it beats out T. Rex and Stegosaurus by at least 10 myr.
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