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The Extinct Creatures Science Still Can_t Explain _ Boring Science for Sleep · Boring Science

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  Speaker 1: Hello and welcome, my fellow science enthusiasts and curious minds.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Before we embark on our journey through the captivating world
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  Speaker 1: of ancient extinct animals, I want to take a moment
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  Speaker 1: to greet you warmly and thank you for joining me
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  Speaker 1: this evening. Whether you're winding down after a long day,
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  Speaker 1: seeking a bit of relaxation, or simply looking to expand
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  Speaker 1: your knowledge while drifting off to sleep, I'm delighted to
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  Speaker 1: have you here. As we prepare to delve into the
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  Speaker 1: fascinating realms of paleontology and the creatures that once roamed
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  Speaker 1: our Earth, I'd love to get a sense of where
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  Speaker 1: you're tuning in from. If you're feeling inclined, please do
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: leave a comment sharing your corner of the world and
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  Speaker 1: what time it is for you right now. It's always
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  Speaker 1: a joy to see the diverse global community that comes
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  Speaker 1: together over a shared love of learning. If this is
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  Speaker 1: your first time joining me, and you find yourself enjoying
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: this style of calm historical storytelling, I warmly invite you
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  Speaker 1: to subscribe. There's always room for more inquisitive minds in
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  Speaker 1: our little community. and I'd be honoured to have you
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  Speaker 1: along for future adventures through the annals of history. Now,
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  Speaker 1: let's take a deep breath, get comfortable, and allow ourselves
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  Speaker 1: to be transported back in time, to a world so
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  Speaker 1: different from our own. Picture in your mind's eye a vast,
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  Speaker 1: untamed landscape, where the only sounds are the calls of
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  Speaker 1: strange and magnificent creatures, the rustle of ancient foliage, and
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  Speaker 1: the whisper of primeval winds. It's a place of wonder
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  Speaker 1: and mystery, a land before time where the very rules
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  Speaker 1: of nature were still being written. In this long ago era,
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  Speaker 1: before the rise of humankind, the Earth was home to
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  Speaker 1: an astonishing array of animals, many of which would seem
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  Speaker 1: almost alien to us today. From towering dinosaurs that shook
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  Speaker 1: the ground with their footsteps to tiny scurrying mammals that
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  Speaker 1: would one day inherit the Earth, the diversity of life
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  Speaker 1: was truly breathtaking. Yet for all their differences, these creatures
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  Speaker 1: shared one thing in common. Their stories, their very existence,
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  Speaker 1: have been lost to the ages. Only through the tireless
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  Speaker 1: efforts of dedicated scientists, the paleontologists who piece together the
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  Speaker 1: puzzles of the past, can we begin to unravel the
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  Speaker 1: mysteries of these ancient animals and the worlds they inhabited. Tonight,
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  Speaker 1: we'll be following in the footsteps of these intrepid researchers,
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  Speaker 1: venturing into the field and the laboratory to discover what
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  Speaker 1: we really know about the incredible creatures that once called
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  Speaker 1: our planet home. Along the way, we'll meet some of
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  Speaker 1: the pioneering figures who helped shape our understanding of prehistoric life,
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  Speaker 1: and we'll explore the cutting-edge techniques that are allowing us
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  Speaker 1: to peer ever deeper into the distant past. So as
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  Speaker 1: you settle in and make yourself comfortable, let your imagination
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  Speaker 1: wander to a time long before our own, a time
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  Speaker 1: when the world was a vastly different place, filled with
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  Speaker 1: creatures beyond our wildest dreams. And as we journey together
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  Speaker 1: through the aeons, I invite you to embrace the sense
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  Speaker 1: of wonder and awe that comes from contemplating the grand
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  Speaker 1: tapestry of life on Earth. Our story begins in the
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  Speaker 1: early 19th century, in a world where the very notion
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  Speaker 1: of extinction was still a controversial idea. At the time,
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  Speaker 1: the prevailing belief was that the Earth and all its
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  Speaker 1: inhabitants had been created in their present form by a
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  Speaker 1: divine hand, and that no species could ever truly disappear
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  Speaker 1: from the face of the planet. But all that was
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  Speaker 1: about to change, thanks to the efforts of a few
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  Speaker 1: unconventional thinkers who dared to challenge the status quo. One
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  Speaker 1: such individual was an English doctor by the name of
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  Speaker 1: Gideon Mantell, a man whose passion for fossil hunting would
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  Speaker 1: lead him to make one of the most groundbreaking discoveries
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  Speaker 1: in the history of paleontology. Mantell's story begins in the
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  Speaker 1: rolling hills of Sussex, England, where he and his wife,
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  Speaker 1: Mary Ann, would often spend their leisure time scouring the
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  Speaker 1: countryside for interesting rocks and fossils. It was on one
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  Speaker 1: such outing in 1824 that the couple stumbled upon a
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  Speaker 1: find that would change the course of their lives and
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  Speaker 1: the very way we understand the history of life on Earth.
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  Speaker 1: As they explored a quarry near their home, Marianne's keen
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  Speaker 1: eye spotted something unusual. A set of large, fossilised teeth,
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  Speaker 1: unlike anything they had ever seen before. Intrigued, the Mantels
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  Speaker 1: brought the specimens back to Gideon's study, where he could
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  Speaker 1: examine them in greater detail. As he turned the teeth
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  Speaker 1: over in his hands, Mantel was struck by their size
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  Speaker 1: and shape. They were far too large to have belonged
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  Speaker 1: to any known living reptile, and their serrated edges seemed
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  Speaker 1: to suggest a creature with a powerful bite. The more
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  Speaker 1: he studied them, the more convinced he became that these
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  Speaker 1: were the remains of an ancient extinct animal, one that
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  Speaker 1: had roamed the earth long before the dawn of humankind.
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  Speaker 1: Excited by the potential implications of their discovery, the Mantels
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  Speaker 1: began to share their findings with other naturalists and paleontologists
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  Speaker 1: of the day. However, they were met with scepticism and
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  Speaker 1: even ridicule from many of their colleagues, who found the
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  Speaker 1: idea of extinct creatures to be preposterous and even heretical. Undeterred,
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  Speaker 1: Mantell pressed on with his research, determined to prove that
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  Speaker 1: his hunch was correct. He scoured the quarries and cliffs
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  Speaker 1: of southern England for more fossil evidence, and slowly but
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  Speaker 1: surely he began to piece together a picture of the
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  Speaker 1: creature he believed the teeth belonged to, a massive herbivorous
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  Speaker 1: reptile that he named Iguanodon, after the iguana lizard whose
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  Speaker 1: teeth bore a passing resemblance to the fossil's. As Mantell's
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  Speaker 1: work continued, he found himself at the centre of a
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  Speaker 1: growing debate about the nature of extinction and the history
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  Speaker 1: of life on Earth. His ideas challenged the very foundations
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  Speaker 1: of the scientific establishment, and he faced fierce opposition from
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  Speaker 1: those who clung to the old ways of thinking. But
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  Speaker 1: Mantell was not alone in his pursuit of the truth.
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  Speaker 1: Across the English Channel, in the windswept coastal cliffs of
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  Speaker 1: Lyme Regis, another fossil hunter was making discoveries that would
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  Speaker 1: further shake the foundations of the scientific world, Her name
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  Speaker 1: was Mary Anning, and like Mantell, she had a keen
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  Speaker 1: eye for spotting the telltale signs of ancient life hidden
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  Speaker 1: within the rocks. Born into a poor family, Anning had
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  Speaker 1: been collecting and selling fossils since childhood to help make
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  Speaker 1: ends meet. But what had begun as a means of
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  Speaker 1: survival would soon become her life's passion, and her enduring legacy.
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  Speaker 1: In the 1820s and 1830s, Anning made a series of
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  Speaker 1: remarkable discoveries that would capture the imagination of the scientific
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  Speaker 1: community and the public alike. Among her many finds were
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  Speaker 1: the first complete skeleton of a plesiosaurus, a long-necked marine
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  Speaker 1: reptile that had swum the ancient seas, and the remains
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  Speaker 1: of a strange flying creature that would later be recognised
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  Speaker 1: as a pterosaur, a winged reptile that had soared through
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  Speaker 1: the skies of the prehistoric world. Anning's discoveries, like Mantel's,
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  Speaker 1: challenged the prevailing wisdom of the day and helped to
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  Speaker 1: establish the reality of extinction as a fact of life
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  Speaker 1: on Earth. Her work also highlighted the incredible diversity of
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  Speaker 1: prehistoric life, revealing a world populated by creatures that were
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  Speaker 1: utterly unlike anything alive today. As word of Anning's and
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  Speaker 1: Mantell's finds spread, a new generation of paleontologists began to emerge,
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  Speaker 1: eager to uncover the secrets of the ancient past. In
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  Speaker 1: the latter half of the 19th century, two of these
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  Speaker 1: scientists would come to dominate the field, sparking a heated
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  Speaker 1: rivalry that would push the boundaries of paleontological knowledge and
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  Speaker 1: capture the public imagination like never before. Their names were
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  Speaker 1: Othniel Charles Marsh and Edward Drinker Cope, and their feud
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  Speaker 1: would come to be known as the Bone Wars, a
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  Speaker 1: frenzied competition to discover and name as many new dinosaur
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  Speaker 1: species as possible. Marsh and Cope were both brilliant scientists,
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  Speaker 1: but they were also fierce competitors, driven by a desire
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  Speaker 1: for fame and academic glory. They would stop at nothing
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  Speaker 1: to outdo each other, even if it meant resorting to
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  Speaker 1: underhanded tactics like bribery, sabotage and outright theft. Their rivalry
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  Speaker 1: played out across the American West, a vast and untamed
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  Speaker 1: landscape that was just beginning to yield its prehistoric secrets.
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  Speaker 1: Marsh and Cope would lead rival expeditions into the badlands
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  Speaker 1: of Colorado, Wyoming and Montana, scouring the rocks for any
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  Speaker 1: sign of ancient life. And what they found was truly astonishing.
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  Speaker 1: Between them, Marsh and Cope discovered and named more than
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  Speaker 1: 130 new species of dinosaur, including some of the most
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  Speaker 1: iconic and well-known creatures in the fossil record. There was Triceratops,
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  Speaker 1: the great horned herbivore, Stegosaurus, with its distinctive plates and spikes,
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  Speaker 1: and of course Tyrannosaurus rex, the king of the tyrant
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  Speaker 1: lizards and one of the most fearsome predators ever to
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  Speaker 1: walk the Earth. The Bone Wars helped to put American
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  Speaker 1: paleontology on the map and they fuelled a growing public
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  Speaker 1: fascination with dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures. Suddenly, it seemed,
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  Speaker 1: everyone was talking about these strange and wonderful animals that
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  Speaker 1: had once roamed the Earth, and wondering what other secrets
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  Speaker 1: the fossil record might hold. But even as Marsh and
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  Speaker 1: Cope were making their groundbreaking discoveries, the science of paleontology
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  Speaker 1: was still in its infancy. There was so much that
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  Speaker 1: remained unknown about the lives and behaviours of these ancient creatures,
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  Speaker 1: so many questions that could only be answered through careful
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  Speaker 1: study and analysis. In the early 20th century, a new
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  Speaker 1: generation of paleontologists would take up this challenge, armed with
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  Speaker 1: an ever-growing body of fossil evidence and an increasing sophistication
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  Speaker 1: in their methods and techniques. Among them was a young
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  Speaker 1: scientist named John Ostrom, whose work would help to revolutionise
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  Speaker 1: our understanding of dinosaurs and their place in the natural world.
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  Speaker 1: Ostrom was fascinated by the question of how dinosaurs had
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  Speaker 1: lived and behaved, What kind of animals they really were,
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  Speaker 1: beyond the bare bones of their fossil remains? To answer
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  Speaker 1: this question, he turned to the study of modern animals,
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  Speaker 1: looking for clues that might shed light on the habits
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  Speaker 1: and lifestyles of their prehistoric counterparts. One of the key
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  Speaker 1: insights that Ostrom gleaned from this work was the importance
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  Speaker 1: of studying the anatomy and biomechanics of living creatures in
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  Speaker 1: order to understand their extinct relatives. By examining the way
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  Speaker 1: that muscles attach to bones, for example, he could make
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  Speaker 1: inferences about how dinosaurs might have moved and carried themselves.
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  Speaker 1: Ostrom also pioneered the use of new techniques like microscopic
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  Speaker 1: analysis of tooth wear patterns, which could provide clues about
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  Speaker 1: what kinds of foods different dinosaurs ate and how they
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  Speaker 1: processed their meals, and he was among the first to
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  Speaker 1: recognise the importance of studying dinosaur trackways the fossilised footprints
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  Speaker 1: and other traces that these animals left behind, as a
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  Speaker 1: way of understanding their behaviour and social dynamics. But perhaps
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  Speaker 1: Ostrom's most lasting contribution to the field of paleontology came
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  Speaker 1: from his work on a small predatory dinosaur called Deinonychus.
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  Speaker 1: In the 1960s, while studying this creature's anatomy, Ostrom began
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  Speaker 1: to notice some intriguing similarities between Deinonychus and modern birds,
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  Speaker 1: similarities that would ultimately lead him to propose a radical
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  Speaker 1: new idea about the evolutionary relationship between birds and dinosaurs.
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  Speaker 1: At the time, the prevailing view was that dinosaurs were sluggish,
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  Speaker 1: cold-blooded creatures, more akin to reptiles than to the active,
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  Speaker 1: warm-blooded birds we know today. But Ostrom's work suggested a
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  Speaker 1: different story. He argued that Deinonychus and other small, agile
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  Speaker 1: dinosaurs were actually more similar to birds in their anatomy
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  Speaker 1: and behaviour, that they were quick, active creatures with high
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  Speaker 1: metabolisms and complex social lives. This idea which came to
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  Speaker 1: be known as the Dinosaur Renaissance, would fundamentally transform our
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  Speaker 1: understanding of these ancient animals. Suddenly, the old image of
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  Speaker 1: dinosaurs as lumbering, dim-witted brutes gave way to a new
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  Speaker 1: vision of them as dynamic, intelligent creatures, more like birds
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  Speaker 1: than reptiles. In the decades that followed, new discoveries would
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  Speaker 1: only serve to strengthen this shifting perspective. Fossilised dinosaur nests
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  Speaker 1: and eggs provided evidence of complex parental care and social
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  Speaker 1: behaviours while rare impressions of skin and feathers hinted at
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  Speaker 1: the incredible diversity of these animals' appearances and lifestyles. Gradually,
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  Speaker 1: through painstaking detective work and a growing understanding of the
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  Speaker 1: connections between ancient and modern life, the prehistoric world began
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  Speaker 1: to come alive in scientists' minds, a vivid, pulsing ecosystem
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  Speaker 1: filled with creatures that were at once strange and familiar,
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  Speaker 1: alien and intimately connected to the living things we know today.
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  Speaker 1: Of course, Dinosaurs are only one part of the incredible
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  Speaker 1: story of ancient life on Earth. The fossil record is
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  Speaker 1: filled with countless other creatures that lived before, during and
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  Speaker 1: after the age of the dinosaurs, each with its own
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  Speaker 1: unique history and place in the grand tapestry of evolution.
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  Speaker 1: There were the early synapsids like Dimetrodon, for example. Not
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  Speaker 1: true dinosaurs, but rather a group of ancient reptiles characterised
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  Speaker 1: by the large sail-like structures on their backs. These creatures
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  Speaker 1: lived during the Permian period. more than 250 million years ago,
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  Speaker 1: and they were among the first vertebrates to evolve specialised
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  Speaker 1: teeth for different purposes, a key adaptation that would later
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  Speaker 1: allow mammals to diversify into a wide range of ecological niches.
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: During the age of the dinosaurs, the oceans were home
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  Speaker 1: to a dizzying array of marine reptiles, from the dolphin-like
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  Speaker 1: ichthyosaurs to the long-necked plesiosaurs. These creatures filled the roles
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  Speaker 1: that would later be taken over by whales and other
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  Speaker 1: marine mammals, chasing fish, squid, and other prey through the
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  Speaker 1: ancient seas. And in the skies above, pterosaurs, the first
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  Speaker 1: vertebrates to evolve powered flight, soared on leathery wings, some
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  Speaker 1: with wingspans as wide as a modern-day fighter jet. These
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  Speaker 1: incredible creatures were not dinosaurs, but rather a separate lineage
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  Speaker 1: of flying reptiles that diversified into a wide range of forms,
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  Speaker 1: from tiny insectivores to massive fish-eaters. But perhaps the most
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  Speaker 1: remarkable story of life after the dinosaurs belongs to the
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  Speaker 1: mammals the furry, warm-blooded creatures that we count among our
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  Speaker 1: closest evolutionary kin. For much of the age of the dinosaurs,
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  Speaker 1: mammals were small, unassuming creatures, eking out a living in
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  Speaker 1: the shadows of their larger, more dominant reptilian cousins. But
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  Speaker 1: after the great extinction event that wiped out the non-avian
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  Speaker 1: dinosaurs some 66 million years ago, mammals underwent an astonishing
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  Speaker 1: explosion of diversity and size. Within just a few million years,
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  Speaker 1: they had evolved into a bewildering array of forms, from
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  Speaker 1: tiny shrew-like creatures to massive lumbering behemoths. Among the most
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  Speaker 1: iconic of these ancient mammals were the woolly mammoths, the
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  Speaker 1: great shaggy elephants that roamed the frozen tundra of the
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  Speaker 1: Pleistocene era. These creatures were first recognised as a distinct
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  Speaker 1: species in the 1700s, thanks to the work of French
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: naturalist Georges Cuvier. Cuvier was a pioneering figure in the
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  Speaker 1: study of comparative anatomy, the science of understanding the relationships
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  Speaker 1: between living and extinct creatures, by studying their physical characteristics.
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  Speaker 1: When he first examined the fossilised bones of a mammoth,
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  Speaker 1: he realised that they were distinct from those of any
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  Speaker 1: living elephant, a discovery that helped to establish extinction as
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  Speaker 1: a real and ongoing process in the history of life
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  Speaker 1: on Earth. Other remarkable mammals of the Pleistocene included the
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  Speaker 1: giant ground sloths, which could grow as large as a
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  Speaker 1: modern-day elephant, the armadillo-like glyptodonts, with their bony, turtle-like shells,
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  Speaker 1: and the fearsome dire wolves, which were larger and more
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  Speaker 1: heavily built than any wolf alive today. These creatures were
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  Speaker 1: first described in the 1700s and 1800s, based on fossilised
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  Speaker 1: bones and tracks found in Europe, South America and North America.
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  Speaker 1: Paleontologists like Cuvier and his apprentice, Alcide d'Aubigny, helped to
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  Speaker 1: map out the incredible diversity of this lost megafauna, a
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  Speaker 1: menagerie of giants that would capture the public imagination and
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  Speaker 1: inspire countless works of art and literature. In more recent years,
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: the study of ancient life has been revolutionised by new
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: technologies and techniques that allow us to peer even deeper
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  Speaker 1: into the past. Advances in DNA sequencing, for example, have
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: made it possible to extract and analyse genetic material from
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  Speaker 1: fossils that are tens or even hundreds of thousands of
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  Speaker 1: years old. By studying this ancient DNA, scientists can gain
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  Speaker 1: insights into the evolutionary relationships between extinct and living species,
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: as well as into the physical characteristics and behaviours of
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  Speaker 1: long-vanished creatures. In some cases, they have even been able
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  Speaker 1: to determine the colour of an extinct animal's fur or feathers,
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  Speaker 1: details that were once thought to be lost forever in
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  Speaker 1: the depths of time. Other techniques, like stable isotope analysis,
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  Speaker 1: allow paleontologists to reconstruct the diets and environments of ancient
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  Speaker 1: animals based on the chemical signatures preserved in their bones
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  Speaker 1: and teeth. And new imaging technologies like CT scanning and
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  Speaker 1: 3D modelling are providing unprecedented views of the internal structures
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  Speaker 1: of fossils, revealing details of anatomy and function that were
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  Speaker 1: previously hidden from view. But perhaps the most important lesson
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  Speaker 1: that we can learn from the study of ancient life
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  Speaker 1: is the incredible dynamism and resilience of our planet's ecosystems.
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: Over the vast expanse of geological time, the Earth has
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: undergone countless transformations, from the shifting of continents to the
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  Speaker 1: rise and fall of sea levels to the dramatic fluctuations
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  Speaker 1: of global climate. Through it all, life has persisted, adapting,
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  Speaker 1: evolving and finding new ways to thrive in even the
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  Speaker 1: most challenging of circumstances. Mass extinctions, like the one that
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  Speaker 1: wiped out the dinosaurs, have at times decimated the planet's biodiversity.
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  Speaker 1: But in the aftermath of these catastrophic events, new forms
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  Speaker 1: of life have always emerged to take their place. By
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: studying the ancient past, we can gain a deeper appreciation
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  Speaker 1: for the complexity and fragility of the natural world. and
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  Speaker 1: for the incredible capacity of life to endure and adapt
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  Speaker 1: in the face of even the most profound challenges. From
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  Speaker 1: the lush, swampy forests of the Carboniferous period, to the icy,
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  Speaker 1: windswept tundra of the Pleistocene, every epoch of Earth's history
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  Speaker 1: has hosted its own unique assemblage of creatures and ecosystems,
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  Speaker 1: each one a testament to the endless creativity and resilience
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  Speaker 1: of life. And as we drift off to sleep. Through
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  Speaker 1: the pioneering work of early paleontologists like Georges Cuvier and
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  Speaker 1: Alcide d'Orbigny, a clearer picture began to emerge of the
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  Speaker 1: remarkable mammals that once roamed our planet. Among the most
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  Speaker 1: captivating of these ancient beasts was the Megatherium, a ground
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  Speaker 1: sloth of truly epic proportions. First described by Cuvier in
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  Speaker 1: 1796 based on a nearly complete skeleton sent to him
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  Speaker 1: from Argentina, the Megatherium stretched up to 20 feet from
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  Speaker 1: snout to tail tip, and weighed in at an impressive
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  Speaker 1: four tons. That's about as much as a modern Asian elephant.
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  Speaker 1: But this gentle giant was no mere scaled-up version of
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  Speaker 1: today's tree-dwelling sloths. It was built for power. Thick bones
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  Speaker 1: and robust muscular limbs allowed Megatherium to haul its massive
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  Speaker 1: bulk around as it browsed for tasty vegetation. And what
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  Speaker 1: a browse it must have been. Detailed studies of its
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  Speaker 1: jaw and teeth suggest Megatherium had a highly flexible lower lip,
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: almost like a short trunk. that it used to grasp
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: and pluck foliage. Couple that with an elongated tongue for
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: reaching succulent leaves and you have the makings of a
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: megafauna salad specialist per excellence. But Megatherium wasn't just a
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: gentle herbivore. It had claws. Massive, scimitar-like claws, each around
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: a foot long. These formidable implements were likely used for defence,
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: or perhaps to hook down branches and scrape bark from trees.
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: Some researchers have even suggested Megatherium could rear up on
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: its hind legs and tail, to reach lofty boughs, like
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: a furry sloth-shaped bipedal harvester. It's an evocative image, this
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: great shaggy beast lumbering across the South American landscape, rearing
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: up to tear vegetation asunder. And for a time, it
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: was one of the most successful mammals on the continent,
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: ranging from the pampas of Argentina to the mountain forests
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: of Peru. So what happened to the mighty Megatherium? As
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: with so many of its Ice Age contemporaries, the ground
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: sloth's fortunes seemed to have shifted with the climate. Around 10,000
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: years ago, as the great glaciers receded and seasonality in
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: plant growth and rainfall increased, Megatherium populations began to dwindle.
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: Competition with other herbivores, including the bizarre glyptodonts and toxodonts,
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: may have further stressed the species. But the killing blow
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: appears to have come from a newly arrived predator, one
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: with a penchant for hurling spears and a knack for
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: cooperative hunting. Yes, our own ancestors, the first humans to
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: venture into South America, likely played a role in pushing
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: Megatherium and its megafaunal brethren into oblivion. Archaeologists have found
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: butchered Megatherium bones at ancient human campsites, suggesting these early
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: hunter-gatherers occasionally enjoyed a sloth-stake supper. Even for a beast
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: as formidable as Megatherium, the combination of habitat change and
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: human predation proved too much. By around 8,000 years ago,
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: the ground sloths had disappeared, never to lumber across the
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: New World again. But while Megatherium is gone, it's far
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: from forgotten. Its bones have graced museum halls and captured
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: imaginations for over two centuries. And in recent years, New
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: scientific techniques have allowed us to peer even deeper into
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: its life and times. Analyses of Megatherium's teeth and bones,
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: for instance, have revealed chemical signatures that confirm its leafy
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: diet and hint at the types of plants it preferred.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: Scrutiny of its skull has uncovered evidence for surprisingly large
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: nasal turbinates, scroll-like structures that would have given this sloth
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: an acute sense of smell. Perhaps it used its schnoz
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: to sniff out particularly succulent greenery. Even more intriguingly, The
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: discovery of preserved megatherium dung has offered an unprecedented window
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: into its gut microbiome. Yes, you heard that right. Ancient
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: sloth poop, complete with identifiable plant remains and fossilised bacteria.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: These unassuming organic remnants are like time capsules, allowing scientists
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: to reconstruct the intricate dance of digestion and fermentation that
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: played out in megatherium's cavernous bowels. It's all a bit
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: surreal to imagine a team of intrepid researchers high-fiving over
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: primeval faeces, but that's the wonder and weirdness of paleontology.
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: Every fossil, from the most imposing skeleton to the humblest caprolite,
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: has a story to tell about the life and times
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: of creatures long extinct. For Megatherium, that story is one
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: of a mighty beast that once roamed the wilds of
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: South America, shaping the very landscape with its Balkan appetites.
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: It's a tale of changing climates and shifting fortunes, of
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: competition and predation, and ultimately of extinction. But it's also
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: a tale of survival, not of the creature itself, but
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: of the clues it left behind, in teeth and bone and, yes,
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: even in dung. So the next time you see a
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: Megatherium skeleton looming over you in some grand museum hall,
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: pause for a moment to consider the life it led.
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: Imagine it rearing up to tear down branches, its great
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: claws flashing in the sun. Picture it lumbering through primeval forests,
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: its sensitive snout twitching as it catches the scent of
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: tender leaves. and spare a thought for the bacteria that
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: once called its gut home, now immortalised in the stuff
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: of paleontological legend. This, then, is the legacy of Megatherium,
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: a window into a world both strange and familiar, where
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: giants walked the Earth and left their mark in ways
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: both grand and humble. It's a reminder of the power
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: of paleontology to bring even the most distant past to life,
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: one fossil at a time. Of course, Megatherium was just
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: one of the many marvellous mammals to grace the Pleistocene stage.
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: From the saber-toothed cats that stalked the plains to the
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: mastodons that trumpeted across the tundra, the Ice Age bestiary
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: was a parade of the peculiar and the grand. Consider
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: the glyptodonts, for instance, great armadillo-like creatures clad in bony
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: shells the size of small cars. These walking tanks trundled
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: across the pampas, their stubby legs and armoured hides making
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: them nearly impervious to predators. Only the most determined of attackers,
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: like the fearsome saber-tooth, could hope to crack their defences.
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: Then there were the mastodons, close cousins of the mammoths
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: that range from Eurasia to the Americas. With their long,
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: curving tusks and shaggy coats, these imposing herbivores cut a
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: striking figure on the Ice Age landscape. And like Megatherium,
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: they too have left us clues to their diets and behaviours.
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: Mastodon teeth, for example, are often scored with deep grooves
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: and pits, suggesting these beasts were serious bark chewers. and
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: in a few rare cases, spectacularly well-preserved mastodon carcasses have
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: been discovered, their stomach contents and even their dung intact.
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: Talk about a blast from the past. These incredible finds
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: offer us an unprecedented glimpse into the daily lives of
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: creatures that vanished 10,000 years ago. We can see what
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: they ate, how they moved, even what parasites plagued their guts.
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: It's like a window into a lost world, one where
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: giant sloths and armoured behemoths roamed alongside early humans, in
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: a landscape on the brink of change. And change it did.
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: As the glaciers retreated and the climate warmed, many of
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: these magnificent megafauna found themselves in a world transformed. Grasslands
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: gave way to forests, altering the menu for grazers and
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: browsers alike. Some species adapted, evolving into new forms better
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: suited to the shifting environment. Others, like Megatherium and its kin,
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: faded into extinction, leaving only their bones to tell the tale.
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: It's a sobering reminder of the fragility of even the
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: most imposing creatures, and of the power of climate and
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: human activity to reshape the world. But it's also a
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: testament to the resilience of life, to the way new
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: species and ecosystems arise from the ashes of the old.
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: And for us, the paleontologists and enthusiasts who study these
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: vanished worlds, it's an endless source of wonder and fascination.
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: With every fossil found, and every new technique developed, we
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: learn a little more about the creatures that once called
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: our planet home. From the tiniest microfossil to the mightiest
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: mastodon skull, each discovery adds a brushstroke to the grand
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: canvas of life's history. And as we piece together the
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: clues left behind by long-dead organisms, we gain a deeper
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: appreciation for the complexity and beauty of the natural world
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: in all its ever-changing forms. So as we drift off
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: to sleep tonight, let us dream of Megatherium and its
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: Pleistocene cohorts, of a world where giants walked the earth
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: and left their mark in tooth and bone and coprolite,
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: and let us marvel at the power of science to
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: bring that world back to life, one fossil at a time,
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: so that we may wander among the Ice Age ghosts
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: and commune with the megafauna of ages past. As we
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: delve deeper into the mysteries of ancient extinct animals, it's
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: worth noting that our understanding of these creatures is constantly evolving.
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: Each new fossil discovery has the potential to rewrite what
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: we thought we knew, filling in gaps and challenging long-held assumptions. Take,
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: for example, the curious case of the Spinosaurus. When its
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: remains were first discovered in Egypt in 1912 by German
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: paleontologist Ernst Stromer, it was initially thought to be a
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: fairly typical large predatory dinosaur, not unlike its more famous
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: cousin Tyrannosaurus rex. However, the original Spinosaurus fossils were sadly
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: destroyed during the bombing of Munich in World War II,
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: leaving only Stromer's notes and drawings to go on. It
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: wasn't until the early 2000s that new Spinosaurus fossils were found,
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: painting a very different picture of this enigmatic animal. The
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: bone suggested that Spinosaurus had several adaptations for an aquatic lifestyle,
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: including dense bones for buoyancy control and a long, narrow
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: snout filled with conical teeth for catching fish. This discovery
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: sent shockwaves through the paleontological community. The idea of a
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: semi-aquatic dinosaur was virtually unheard of at the time, and
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: it forced scientists to rethink what they thought they knew
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: about the ecological roles of large predatory dinosaurs, But the
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: Spinosaurus story didn't end there. In 2020, a comprehensive re-description
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: of the available fossil material proposed an even more radical interpretation,
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: that Spinosaurus was actually a fully aquatic animal, with a
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: tail fin and webbed feet for swimming. This controversial idea
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: is still being debated, but it highlights just how much
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: our understanding of even a single extinct species can shift
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: with new evidence. Of course, Spinosaurus is far from the
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: only ancient animal to undergo a radical reimagining in recent years.
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: The small, simple feathered dinosaur Sinosauropteryx, described in 1996 based
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: on exquisitely preserved fossils from China, helped solidify the now
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: widely accepted idea that many dinosaurs sported feathery coats. The
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: 1993 discovery of Ambulocetus, an early cetacean with limbs still
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: adapted for walking on land, shed light on the evolutionary
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: transition of whales from terrestrial to fully aquatic mammals, and
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: the 2017 description of Cayentopus, a trackway left by a
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: long-necked sauropod dinosaur, showed that these behemoths could rear up
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: on their hind legs, a feat previously thought impossible due
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: to their size and weight. All of these examples illustrate
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: the endlessly fascinating nature of paleontology. No matter how much
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: we think we know about the past, there are always
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: new surprises waiting to be unearthed. It's a humbling reminder
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: of the vastness and complexity of life's history on this planet.
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: And so, as we continue our journey through the annals
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: of ancient extinct animals, we must keep an open mind.
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: The creatures we'll encounter may seem familiar at first glance,
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: but a closer look often reveals them to be far
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: stranger and more wondrous than we ever could have imagined.
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: Take the giant ground sloth Megatherium, for instance. When its
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: bones were first studied by French naturalist Georges Cuvier in
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: the early 1800s, he recognised that they belonged to some
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: sort of enormous extinct mammal, but he couldn't quite figure
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: out what kind. It wasn't until later that more complete
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: skeletons revealed Megatherium's true nature as a lumbering, plant-eating relative
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: of modern tree sloths. But even then, the true strangeness
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: of this Ice Age beast was only beginning to come
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: into focus. Further studies of its anatomy suggested that Megatherium
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: could rear up on its hind legs to reach high branches,
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: using its massive clawed forearms to pull them down within
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: reach of its mouth. And then there are the mysteries
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: of its extinction. For a long time, it was assumed
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: that Megatherium and other large Ice Age mammals were wiped
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: out by the changing climate at the end of the
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: last glacial period. But more recent evidence, including spear points
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: found embedded in megatherium bones, suggests that human hunting may
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: have also played a role in their demise. It's a
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: sobering reminder that even the mightiest of creatures are not
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: immune to the forces of change, whether they be environmental
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: or at the hands of a clever upstart primate with
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: a knack for toolmaking. And what of the other great
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: beasts that roamed alongside megatherium in the Americas? the armoured glyptodonts,
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: like giant armadillos the size of small cars, the fearsome
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: dire wolves, larger and more heavily built than any wolf
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: alive today, the saber-toothed cats with their elongated canine teeth
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: that have captured the human imagination for centuries. Each of
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: these animals has a story to tell, a unique evolutionary
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: history that is only just beginning to be unravelled. Through
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: the tireless efforts of paleontologists and we are slowly but
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: surely piecing together the intricate web of life that once
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: thrived during the Pleistocene epoch. We can imagine a herd
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: of Colombian mammoths, their great tusks gleaming in the sun,
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: as they make their way across the grasslands of what
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: is now the western United States. In their midst, perhaps
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: a group of Palaeoloxodons, a smaller, more primitive species of
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: elephant joins the march. Nearby, a pack of dire wolves
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: may be on the prowl, their keen noses sniffing the
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: air for signs of prey. They move with a quiet intensity,
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: their muscular frames exuding an aura of coiled power. And
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: in the distance, a lone short-faced bear lumbers along the
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: edge of a forest. This massive omnivore, standing up to
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: twelve feet tall on its hind legs, is a formidable
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: presence on the prehistoric landscape. As the sun begins to set,
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: casting a warm glow over the ancient tableau, a sense
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: of timelessness descends. For a moment we can almost imagine
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: ourselves there, witnesses to a world that is at once
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: alien and achingly familiar. But the reverie is short-lived. The
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: reality is that this world and all the creatures that
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: called it home are long gone. They exist now only
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: in the fossil record and in our collective imagination. It's
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: a poignant reminder of the impermanence of life on Earth.
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: Species rise and fall, ecosystems shift and change, and even
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: the mighty can be laid low by the inexorable march
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: of time. And yet, in a strange way, This knowledge
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: only serves to deepen our appreciation for the natural world
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: around us. We are the inheritors of an incredible legacy,
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: the product of billions of years of evolution and adaptation.
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: Every creature alive today, from the tiniest microbe to the
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: largest whale, is a testament to the resilience and creativity
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: of life itself. And in studying the past, in seeking
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: to understand the lives and times of long-extinct animals, we
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: are really trying to understand ourselves and our place in
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: the grand scheme of things. So let us continue to explore,
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: to question, and to marvel at the wonders of the
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: prehistoric world. For in doing so, we honour the memory
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: of all the creatures that came before us, and we
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: reaffirm our own connection to the vast, intricate web of
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: life that stretches back to the very dawn of time.
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: As we drift off into the realm of dreams, may
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: we carry with us a sense of wonder at the
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: incredible story of life on earth. May we be inspired
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: to cherish and protect the living world around us. knowing
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: that we too are part of a lineage that stretches
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: back to the age of dinosaurs and beyond. And may
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: we never lose sight of the fact that, for all
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: our scientific knowledge and technological prowess, we are still just
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: one small part of a much larger and endlessly fascinating whole.
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: Good night, and sweet dreams of ancient creatures long past
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: but never forgotten. As we've seen, the pioneering work of
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: early paleontologists like Gideon Mantel, Mary Anning and Georges Cuvier
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: laid the foundation for our understanding of ancient extinct animals.
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: But the story of how we pieced together the lives
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: and worlds of these bygone creatures was just beginning. In
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: the late 1800s, the American West became a hotbed of
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: fossil hunting, thanks in large part to the intense rivalry
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: between two of the era's most prominent paleontologists, Othniel Charles
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: Marsh and Edward Drinker Cope. Marsh, a professor at Yale,
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: and Cope, a member of the Academy of Natural Sciences
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: in Philadelphia, engaged in a bitter competition to discover and
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: name as many new dinosaur species as possible. Their race,
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: which became known as the Bone Wars, was characterised by
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: hasty and sloppy science, underhanded tactics and even outright deception.
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: Cope and Marsh would often spy on each other's digs,
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: bribe workers to switch sides and even dynamite hillsides to
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: prevent the other from accessing fossils. In their rush to
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: outdo each other, they sometimes misidentified or mislabelled specimens leading
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: to confusion and errors that took decades to sort out.
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: Despite the less than noble motivations behind the Bone Wars,
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: the fierce competition between Marsh and Cope had a silver lining.
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: Their relentless fossil hunting greatly expanded the number of known
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: dinosaur species and put North America on the map as
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: a major centre for paleontological research. Among Marsh's most famous
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: finds were the first fossils of Stegosaurus, Triceratops and Apatosaurus,
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: initially named Brontosaurus. Cope, meanwhile, discovered and named dinosaurs like Camarasaurus,
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: Colophysis and the fearsome carnivore Demetrodon, which despite appearances was
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: actually more closely related to mammals than dinosaurs. As the
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: 19th century gave way to the 20th, the focus of
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: paleontology shifted from simply naming and cataloguing extinct species to
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: trying to understand how they actually lived. This required a
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: more nuanced approach, one that looked beyond the bones to
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: the clues left behind in the surrounding rock. and the
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: structure of the fossils themselves. One of the pioneers of
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: this new way of thinking was John Ostrom, a paleontologist
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: at Yale University. In the 1960s, Ostrom began studying a
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: small predatory dinosaur called Deinonychus, which had been discovered a
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: few decades earlier in Montana. As he pored over the fossils,
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: Ostrom noticed something curious. The animal's skeleton was remarkably bird-like,
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: with long slender limbs, a stiffened tail, and a large
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: sickle-shaped claw on each foot. Intrigued, Ostrom delved deeper, examining
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: the microscopic structure of Deinonychus' bones and comparing them to
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: those of modern birds. He found striking similarities, including hollow,
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: air-filled spaces in the skeleton and attachment points for powerful muscles.
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: Ostrom began to suspect that, far from being sluggish, cold-blooded reptiles,
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: some dinosaurs may have been quick, agile and even warm-blooded,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: more like birds than lizards. This idea, which became known
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: as the Dinosaur Renaissance, sent shockwaves through the paleontological community.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: It challenged the prevailing view of dinosaurs as plodding, dim-witted brutes,
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: and suggested that they were far more complex and dynamic
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: than previously thought. Ostrom's work on Deinonychus and other bird-like
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: dinosaurs helped to usher in a new era of paleontology,
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: one that looked at these ancient animals as living, breathing creatures,
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: not just dusty skeletons in a museum. As the 20th
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: century progressed, new discoveries and technologies helped to flesh out
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: this emerging picture of dinosaurs as active, vital members of
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: their ecosystems. In the 1970s and 80s, for example, the
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: discovery of fossilised dinosaur nests and eggs provided evidence that
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: many species engaged in complex parental behaviours, such as brooding
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: and caring for their young. Rare impressions of dinosaur skin
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: and feathers also began to surface, giving paleontologists a tantalising
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: glimpse of what these animals may have looked like in life. Meanwhile,
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: advances in areas like biomechanics and computer modelling allowed scientists
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: to simulate how dinosaurs moved and interacted with their environment.
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: By studying the shape and arrangement of bones, the structure
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: of muscles and the distribution of weight in the skeleton,
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: paleontologists could create detailed reconstructions of dinosaur posture, gait and
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: even speed. These analyses revealed that many dinosaurs were likely
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: far more nimble and athletic than the lumbering giants of
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: popular imagination, Some may have even been capable of bursts
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: of speed rivaling that of modern animals. Of course, dinosaurs
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: weren't the only stars of the prehistoric show. The fossil
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: record is full of other fascinating creatures that lived before,
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: during and after the age of the dinosaurs. Take, for instance,
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: the ancient marine reptiles that ruled the seas while dinosaurs
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: dominated on land. One of the most iconic of these
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: was the ichthyosaur, a sleek, dolphin-like predator that glided through
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: the water with powerful flippers and a long, toothy snout.
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: First described in the early 1800s by English paleontologist William Conibear,
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: ichthyosaurs were among the earliest extinct animals to capture the
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: public imagination. With their streamlined bodies and large, sensitive eyes,
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: they seemed almost tailor-made for a life of chasing fish
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: and squid through the Mesozoic oceans. Conny Bear and his colleague,
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: Henry de la Beche, helped to bring these remarkable creatures
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: to life through detailed scientific descriptions and evocative artwork, setting
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: the stage for a golden age of marine reptile paleontology.
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: Another group of ocean-dwelling predators that thrived during the time
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: of the dinosaurs were the plesiosaurs, These long-necked, paddle-limbed reptiles
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: ranged in size from a few metres to over 40
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: feet long, making them some of the largest animals of
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: their time. Plesiosaurs were first discovered by Mary Anning, the
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: pioneering English fossil hunter, who also unearthed the first complete
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: ichthyosaur skeleton. Anning's work in the early 1800s helped to
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: establish the scientific study of marine reptiles and inspired a
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: generation of paleontologists to follow in her footsteps. Her most
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: famous find was a nearly complete plesiosaur skeleton that she
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: uncovered in 1823, was so unusual that many experts initially
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: doubted its authenticity. Some even accused Anning of fabricating the fossil,
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: unable to believe that such a bizarre creature could have
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: ever existed. It was only through the careful study and
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: comparison of Anning's specimen with other fossils that the true
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: nature of plesiosaurs became clear. These weren't mythical sea serpents
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: or ancient dragons, but real plesiosaurs. flesh and blood animals
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: that had once swum through the Mesozoic seas, Anning's discovery
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: helped to cement the idea of extinction in the scientific
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: consciousness and opened up a whole new realm of inquiry
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: into the history of life on Earth. Of course, no
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: discussion of prehistoric marine life would be complete without mentioning
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: the giant shark Megalodon. This fearsome predator, which lived from
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: about 23 to 3.6 million years ago, was one of
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: the largest fish ever to exist. reaching lengths of up
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: to 60 feet or more. With its massive, serrated teeth
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: and powerful jaws, Megalodon was capable of taking down prey
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: as large as whales, making it the apex predator of
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: its time. Despite its fearsome reputation, however, Megalodon is known
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: only from a handful of fossil teeth and vertebrae. Because
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: shark skeletons are made mostly of cartilage, which doesn't fossilise well,
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: we have very little direct evidence of what this giant
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: predator looked like or how it lived. Instead, paleontologists have
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: had to rely on comparisons with modern sharks and other
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: lines of evidence, such as bite marks on fossilised whale bones,
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: to piece together a picture of Megalodon's ecology and behaviour.
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: What they've found is that Megalodon was likely a highly
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: specialised hunter, adapted for a life of chasing down large,
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: fast-moving prey. Its teeth, which could reach over seven inches
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: in length, were perfectly shaped for piercing and slicing through flesh,
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: while its powerful tail and streamlined body would have made
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: it a formidable swimmer. Some researchers have even suggested that
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: Megalodon may have been warm-blooded, allowing it to maintain a
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: high level of activity and pursue its prey over long distances.
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: But while Megalodon may have been one of the most
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: impressive predators of the ancient seas, it was far from
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: the only one. The oceans of the past were home
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: to a dizzying array of strange and wonderful creatures, from
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: massive crocodile-like Thalatosuchians to long-snouted, needle-toothed fish like Xiphactinus. Each
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: of these animals played a unique role in the complex
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: web of life that existed in the prehistoric oceans, and
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: each has a story to tell about the incredible diversity
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: and resilience of life on Earth. As we move from
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: the water to the land, we find ourselves in the
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: realm of some of the most iconic extinct animals of
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: all time. The mammoths, mastodons and other megafauna that roamed
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: the Earth during the most recent ice ages. These massive,
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: shaggy creatures were some of the last of the great
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: prehistoric giants, and their sudden disappearance around 10,000 years ago
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: has long been one of the great mysteries of paleontology.
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: The first hints of these vanished beasts came in the
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: early 1800s, when the French naturalist Georges Cuvier began studying
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: the fossilised bones and teeth of strange, elephant-like creatures that
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: had been found across Europe and Siberia. Cuvier was struck
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: by the similarities between these fossils and the bones of
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: modern elephants, but he also noticed some key differences. The
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: ancient creatures had longer, more curved tusks, and their teeth
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: were adapted for grinding up tough vegetation. Cuvier proposed that
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: these fossils belonged to a new species of elephant that
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: had gone extinct in the distant past, a bold claim
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: at a time when the idea of extinction was still controversial.
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: He named the creature Elephas primigenius, or the first-born elephant,
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: and argued that it had once roamed the steppes of Eurasia,
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: before being wiped out by some unknown catastrophe. Cuvier's work
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: helped to establish the study of extinct mammals as a
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: legitimate scientific pursuit, and his ideas about the mammoth and
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: other Ice Age giants influenced a generation of naturalists and paleontologists.
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: One of the most famous of these was the French
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: paleontologist Alcide d'Aubigny, who travelled extensively throughout South America in
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: the early 1800s, collecting fossils and studying the geology of
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: the region. d'Aubigny's most famous discovery came in 1840. when
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: he uncovered the remains of a massive ground sloth in Argentina.
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: The creature, which Daubigny named Megatherium, was unlike anything that
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: had ever been seen before. It was the size of
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: an elephant, with huge curved claws and a long, powerful tail.
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: Daubigny's description of the creature captured the imagination of the
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: scientific world and helped to spark a new interest in
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: the strange and wonderful mammals of the Ice Age. In
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: the decades that followed, More and more fossils of Ice
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: Age giants were uncovered across the Americas, Europe and Asia.
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: There were mastodons and woolly mammoths, sabre-toothed cats and cave bears,
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: giant beavers and armadillo-like glyptodonts. Each new discovery added to
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: the growing sense that the Ice Age world had been
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: a very different place than the one we know today.
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: A place where massive, shaggy beasts roamed the landscape and
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: where humans were just one small part of a much
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: larger ecosystem. But even as paleontologists were piecing together the
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: story of these incredible creatures, they were also grappling with
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: the mystery of their disappearance. What had caused these giants
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: to vanish from the face of the Earth, seemingly overnight?
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: Was it climate change, human hunting, or some combination of factors?
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: To answer these questions, scientists have turned to a variety
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: of tools and techniques, from ancient DNA analysis to the
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: study of pollen and other environmental indicators. What they've found
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: is that the story of the Ice Age extinctions is
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: a complex one, with no single cause or culprit. In
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: some cases, such as with the mammoths of North America,
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: human hunting may have played a key role in their demise.
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: In others, such as with the giant ground sloths of
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: South America, climate change and habitat loss may have been
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: the primary drivers. Regardless of the specific causes, however, the
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: disappearance of the Ice Age giants marks a turning point
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: in the history of life on Earth. It was the
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: end of an era a time when the world was
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: ruled by massive shaggy beasts that had no equal, and
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: it was the beginning of a new age, one in
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: which humans would emerge as the dominant force on the planet,
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: shaping the landscape and the ecosystem in ways that would
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: have been unimaginable to the giants of the past. As
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: we ponder the fate of these incredible creatures, it's worth
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: remembering that extinction is a natural part of the history
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: of life on Earth. Species come and go, ecosystems change
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: and evolve. and the world is constantly in flux. But
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: it's also worth remembering that today, in the 21st century,
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: we are living through an extinction event of our own making,
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: one that threatens to wipe out countless species and reshape
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: the planet in ways that we are only beginning to understand.
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: In this context, the story of the ancient extinct animals
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: takes on a new urgency and relevance. By studying the past,
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: we can gain insights into the present and the future,
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: and we can begin to grapple with the challenges and
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: opportunities that lie ahead. Whether it's through the lens of paleontology, ecology,
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: or conservation biology, the study of ancient extinct animals has
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: much to teach us about the incredible resilience and adaptability
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: of life on Earth, and about the role that we
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: play in shaping the world around us. As we drift
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: off to sleep tonight, let us dream of the giants
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: that once roamed the Earth, the mammoths and mastodons, the
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: saber-toothed cats and dire wolves, the ground sloths and glyptodonts,
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: Let us imagine them as they were in life, roaming
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: the vast, icy steps of the Pleistocene, their breath steaming
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: in the cold air, their footsteps shaking the ground beneath them.
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: And let us remember that even though they are gone,
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: they are not forgotten, that they live on in the
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: fossil record, in the stories we tell, and in the
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: unending cycle of life, death, and renewal that has shaped
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: the Earth for millions of years, and will shape it
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: for millions more. In the end, the study of ancient
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: extinct animals is a testament to the power of science
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: to uncover the secrets of the past, and to the
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: enduring fascination that we humans have with the natural world
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: around us. It is a reminder that even in the
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: face of great change and upheaval, life finds a way,
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: that it adapts, evolves, and persists, leaving behind a record
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: of its passing in the rocks and fossils beneath our feet.
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: So let us continue to explore this record, to uncover
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: the stories of the creatures that once roamed the earth,
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: and to marvel at the incredible diversity and resilience of
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: life in all its forms. For in doing so, we
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: not only gain a deeper understanding of the past, but
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: also a greater appreciation for the present, and a clearer
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: vision of the future that we hope to create. Picture
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: a vast, windswept plain stretching as far as the eye
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: can see. Bison graze peacefully in the distance, their shaggy
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: coats gleaming in the late afternoon sun. A sense of
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: timeless tranquility pervades the scene, but this serenity is shattered
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: by a sudden commotion in the tall grass nearby. A
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: pack of dire wolves, larger and more powerfully built than
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: any wolf alive today, emerges in hot pursuit of a
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: lone bison separated from the herd. These formidable predators, now
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: lost to time, once roamed across much of the Americas
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: and Eurasia during the Pleistocene epoch. Dire wolves were well
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: adapted to taking down large prey like bison, horses, and
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: even young mammoths, thanks to their sizeable canine teeth and
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: robust skulls capable of delivering bone-crushing bites. The La Brea
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: Tar Pits in Los Angeles have yielded thousands of dire
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: wolf skeletons, hinting at their abundance in Ice Age North America.
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: Yet despite their fearsome reputation, Dire wolves weren't always the
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: apex predators of their domain. They faced stiff competition from
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: the likes of saber-toothed cats and giant short-faced bears. These
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: massive carnivores, which could stand over ten feet tall on
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: their hind legs, were the largest bears to ever walk
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: the earth. Their long limbs suggest they were fast runners,
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: perhaps chasing down fleet-footed prey like wild horses. Saber-toothed cats
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: were also formidable hunters. armed with elongated canine teeth that
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: protruded menacingly from their jaws. For a long time, paleontologists
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: assumed these outsized fangs were used to deliver slashing attacks,
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: but more recent biomechanical studies suggest they were better suited
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: for a precise stabbing bite to the throat. Different species
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: of saber-toothed cats stalked the Americas, Europe, Asia and Africa
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: at various times throughout the Pliocene and Pleistocene. Imagine a
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: tense confrontation between these fierce competitors A pack of dire
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: wolves squaring off against a giant short-faced bear or saber-toothed cat,
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: each vying for the rights to a hard-won kill. Clues
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: from fossil skeletons like healed wounds and fractures show these
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: ancient predators often led dangerous lives. Many bear the scars
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: of violent clashes, either with prey fighting for their lives
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: or rivals contesting a carcass. These epic scenes played out
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: against the backdrop of the Ice Age. a time of
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: seesawing climate changes when glaciers advanced and retreated across the continents.
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: Around 2.5 million years ago, dropping temperatures allowed cold-adapted animals
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: to expand out of the polar regions and into lower latitudes.
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: Herds of shaggy-coated creatures like mammoths, mastodons, woolly rhinos and
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: steppe bison spread across the chilly steppes of Eurasia and
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: North America. But the Ice Age wasn't uniformly cold. the
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: Pleistocene climate oscillated between colder glacial periods and warmer interglacial times.
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: These fluctuations shaped the world inhabited by Ice Age beasts,
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: with shifting vegetation patterns and rising and falling sea levels
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: altering the landscape over millennia. During warmer spells, creatures like
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: hippos and elephants even roamed as far north as the
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: British Isles. One of the most iconic Ice Age animals,
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: the woolly mammoth, was especially well suited to the chilly
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: climes of Pleistocene Eurasia, With their dense coats of long
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: outer hairs and soft inner wool, compact ears and abbreviated tails,
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: mammoths were built to withstand the cold. Digs in the
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: Siberian permafrost have revealed frozen mammoth carcasses, with much of
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: their soft tissue still intact, offering unprecedented glimpses into their adaptations.
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: Paleontologists have pored over these rare finds, uncovering remarkable details
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: about mammoth biology. The chemical makeup of their bones and
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: teeth shows mammoths were grazers, feeding mainly on grasses and sedges,
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: where patterns on their massive flat-topped molars hint that these
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: behemoths were fond of abrasive foods, using their long, dexterous
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: trunks and tusks to clear snow and dig for roots
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: and tubers. In 2013, a beautifully preserved mammoth carcass was
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: unearthed by a family in Siberia, who named the juvenile
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: male Zhenya, after their son. Studies of Zhenya's remains revealed
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: incredible insights. like the presence of baby fat behind his
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: neck that may have helped him stay warm. Chemical signatures
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: in Jenya's bones even suggest he was breastfed for the
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: first year of his life, hinting at the strong maternal
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: bonds in mammoth family units. But how did such magnificently
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: adapted creatures ultimately meet their demise? The causes behind the
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: extinction of the woolly mammoth and other Ice Age megafauna
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: have long been debated. Climate change, human hunting pressure, habitat loss...
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: and even a cataclysmic meteor impact have all been proposed
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: as potential culprits. As the Pleistocene gave way to the
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: Holocene around 11,700 years ago, the world began to warm,
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: ice sheets retreated, and sea levels rose, drowning coastal plains.
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: With the last big freeze coming to an end, cold
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: adapted animals faced shrinking habitats and changing vegetation. At the
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: same time, human hunters with sophisticated weaponry like throwing spears
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: were spreading across the globe, Taking a toll on megafaunal populations,
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: on isolated islands like Wrangel off the Siberian coast, pockets
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: of woolly mammoths managed to hang on until as recently
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: as 4,000 years ago. But eventually these last holdouts vanished,
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: marking the end of a spectacular era in Earth's history.
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: The majestic mammals that thundered across vast Ice Age steppes
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: had finally succumbed, whether to a changing climate, human impacts,
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: or a combination of factors. Today, All that remains of
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: these vanished beasts are scattered bones and the occasional astonishingly
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: preserved specimen like Jenya, tantalising time capsules hinting at lost worlds.
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: Through the dedicated efforts of paleontologists, we're slowly piecing together
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: a clearer picture of how they lived and what might
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: have spelled their ultimate doom. As we contemplate the plight
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: of the woolly mammoth and other extinct marvels, it's hard
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: not to draw parallels with the challenges facing many species today.
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: Climate change, habitat loss and human pressures continue to shape
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: the fate of creatures great and small. By better understanding
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: the demise of the Ice Age megafauna, we may yet
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: find clues to help us navigate an uncertain future. But
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: for now, we can take solace in the remarkable story
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: of life on Earth, with all its twists, turns and
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: unexpected marvels. As we drift off to sleep, the echoes
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: of these long-lost giants may still rumble through our dreams.
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: Reminders of the fleeting grandeur of those who walked before us,
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: and the preciousness of every creature in nature's ever-unfolding saga.
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: For part three, let's explore the ancient mammals and other
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: mesmerising creatures that came before and after the reign of
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: the dinosaurs. Picture the Earth some 290 million years ago,
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: during the Permian period. In those distant times, long before
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: the first dinosaurs, a remarkable group of reptiles known as
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: synapsids held sway. Among the most iconic was Dimetrodon, a
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: predator with a tall, sail-like crest along its back. For
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: many years, Dimetrodon was commonly mistaken for a dinosaur. But
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: as paleontologists studied its anatomy more closely, they realised it
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: was actually more closely related to mammals like us. The
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: key clue was in its skull. Dimetrodon had differentiated teeth,
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: with incisors, canines and cheek teeth, a trait seen in
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: mammals but not in dinosaurs. Dimetrodon and its synapsid kin
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: were just some of the strange early cousins of mammals.
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: When the first proto-mammals appeared on the scene around 200
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: million years ago, dinosaurs were already well-established. These early mammals
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: were typically small, rodent-like creatures scurrying beneath the feet of giants.
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: But after the non-avian dinosaurs met their sudden end some
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: 66 million years ago, the mammals seized their chance to
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: take centre stage. In the wake of the dinosaurs' demise,
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: mammals underwent an explosion of diversity, evolving into a dizzying
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: array of shapes and sizes. Let's set the stage with
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: the work of Georges Cuvier, the brilliant French zoologist and
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: paleontologist who first recognised the reality of extinction. In 1796,
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: Cuvier was studying elephant bones and molars that had been
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: unearthed in Europe and Siberia. Previous scholars believe these remains
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: must have belonged to elephants brought northward by the armies
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: of ancient Rome or Hannibal. But as Cuvier examined the
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: teeth more closely, he realised they were distinct from those
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: of living elephants. The mystery was solved when he matched
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: the molars to the fossilised cranium of a woolly mammoth,
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: an extinct species of elephant adapted to the frigid climes
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: of the Ice Age. Cuvier's groundbreaking work on the woolly
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: mammoth was just the tip of the iceberg. As fossil
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: finds accelerated in the 1700s and 1800s, naturalists began to
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: recognise that many unfamiliar bones belonged to prehistoric species that
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: no longer roamed the earth. The remains of giant ground sloths,
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: like the Megatherium first described by Cuvier in 1796, were
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: among the most awe-inspiring. Imagine a sloth the size of
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: an elephant, rearing up on its hind legs to tear
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: leaves from trees with its long claws. Equally imposing was
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: the glyptodont, an armoured relative of armadillos, with a massive
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: domed shell studded with spiky protrusions. Cuvier's apprentice, Alcide d'Orbigny,
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: followed in his footsteps, making extensive fossil expeditions to South
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: America in the 1820s. There, he unearthed numerous extinct mammals,
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: from Toxodon, a hippo-like ungulate, to Macrochenia, a long-necked relative
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: of horses and rhinos. D'Aubigny's productive field campaigns helped flesh
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: out the diversity of prehistoric South American fauna. Of course,
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: no discussion of Ice Age mammals would be complete without
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: mentioning the carnivores that hunted them. Few extinct predators have
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: captured the imagination quite like the saber-toothed cat Smelodon. Known
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: for its fearsome elongated canine teeth, Smelodon may have used
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: these natural daggers to deliver a lethal stabbing bite to
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: the throat of its prey. But despite its popular depiction
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: as a merciless killing machine, studies of Smelodon bones and
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: tracks suggest it may have actually been a social animal.
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: perhaps even hunting in lion-like prides. Smilodon was far from
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: the only prehistoric predator that vanished at the end of
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: the Ice Age. The dire wolf, larger than its modern
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: grey wolf counterpart, once prowled the Americas in packs. Its
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: remains have been found in the La Brea Tar Pits
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: in California, naturally mummified in the sticky asphalt alongside its prey,
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: and in Europe, the cave hyena and cave lion, both
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: now sadly extinct, once reigned as apex predators. The end
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: of the Ice Age, around 11,000 years ago, saw the
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: extinction of many of these magnificent megafauna. Mammoths, mastodons, giant
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: ground sloths and sabre-toothed cats all disappeared in a relatively
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: short span of time. The reasons are still debated, but
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: a combination of climate change and human hunting pressure likely
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: played a role. As the world warmed and ice sheets receded,
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: habitats shifted and food sources changed. At the same time,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: human hunters with sophisticated stone tools were spreading across the globe,
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: potentially adding to the stress on vulnerable populations. In more
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: recent years, the study of ancient DNA preserved in fossils
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: is allowing scientists to probe even deeper into the lives
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 1: and fates of these extinct mammals. By extracting and sequencing
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 1: genetic material from bones and teeth, researchers can trace evolutionary relationships,
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: gauge genetic diversity, and even pinpoint the timing and location
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: of population declines. For example, a 2021 study of fossilized
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: mammoths and mastodons suggested North American populations were stable until
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: just a few thousand years before their extinction, when they
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: suddenly crashed, perhaps due to human pressures. Proteins preserved in
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: fossils are also providing new insights. In 2021, scientists were
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: able to reconstruct the haemoglobin protein of extinct South American ungulates,
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: like toxodon and macroscinae, from amino acids preserved in their bones.
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 1: The biochemical properties of the proteins suggested these animals were
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: adapted to low oxygen conditions at extremely high altitudes, much
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: like modern-day alpacas and vicunias. It's a compelling example of
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: how the molecular fossils inside ancient bones can reveal details
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: about how extinct creatures lived. As we've seen, the mammals
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: of the Ice Age were a remarkable bunch, from lumbering
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: woolly mammoths and ground sloths to ferocious sabre-toothed predators. but
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: they were just the latest in a long line of
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: magnificent extinct mammals that once roamed our planet, from the
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: sail-backed Demetrodon of the Permian to the scurrying shrew-like ancestors
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: that lived in the shadow of dinosaurs. Through the tireless
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: efforts of paleontologists and fossil hunters, we're able to reconstruct
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 1: their worlds in ever greater detail, marvelling at the twists
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: and turns of life on Earth. As we rest our
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: weary heads... May dreams of these Ice Age giants and
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: their extraordinary lives carry us off to a peaceful slumber.
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: As we ponder these vanished worlds and the magnificent creatures
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: that once inhabited them, it's worth reflecting on the remarkable
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: individuals who have dedicated their lives to unravelling these ancient mysteries.
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: One such luminary was the brilliant British paleontologist Mary Anning,
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: born in 1799 in the seaside town of Lyme Regis.
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: From a young age, Mary had a keen eye for
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: spotting fossils along the rugged cliffs of the Jurassic Coast.
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: Her father, a cabinetmaker and amateur fossil collector, taught her
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: the tricks of the trade, how to carefully extract delicate
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: bones from the crumbling shale and limestone. But tragedy struck
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: when Mary was just 11 years old. Her father fell
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: to his death from a cliff while fossil hunting, leaving
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: the family destitute. To make ends meet, Mary and her
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: brother Joseph began selling curiosities, fossils, shells and other natural wonders,
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 1: to the wealthy tourists who flocked to Lime Regis for
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: the sea air. It was back-breaking work, scouring the treacherous
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: cliffs for marketable specimens. But Mary had a rare gift.
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: She seemed to know just where to look, as if
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: guided by some preternatural instinct. In 1811, Joseph unearthed a
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 1: strange skull poking out from the cliffs, a skull that
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 1: would change the course of Mary's life and paleontology forever.
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: With painstaking care, Mary set about extracting the rest of
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 1: the skeleton. It took months of toil, but finally she
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: had it, fearsome marine reptile the first of its kind
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: ever discovered. The creature was an ichthyosaur, a sleek dolphin-like
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: predator with immense eyes and a long-toothed snout. Mary sold
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: the specimen to a private collector, fetching enough to support
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: her family for six months. News of Mary's remarkable find
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 1: spread quickly through the tight-knit geological community. Before long, scientists
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: and collectors from all over Europe were descending on Lyme Regis.
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: hoping to acquire fossils from the young woman who seemed
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: to have a supernatural knack for sniffing them out. And
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: Mary did not disappoint. Over the next decade, she would
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: unearth a trove of spectacular marine reptiles, more ichthyosaurs, long-necked plesiosaurs,
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: and even a pterosaur, a flying reptile that must have
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: been a wondrous sight soaring over the ancient seas. But
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: perhaps Mary's most significant find came in 1823, when she
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: discovered the first complete skeleton of a plesiosaurus. a marine
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: reptile with a tiny head perched improbably atop a long
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: sinuous neck. The peculiar anatomy of the creature caused a
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: sensation among the scientific establishment. The French anatomist Georges Cuvier,
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: the most eminent paleontologist of the day, was so baffled
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 1: by the skeleton that he dismissed it as a fake,
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: a crude composite cobbled together from various animals. But Mary
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: knew better. She had painstakingly excavated the plesiosaurus with her
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: own hands, carefully noting the exact position of every bone.
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 1: This was no forgery, but a revolutionary discovery that would
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 1: help convince even the most hardened sceptics that extinction was
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 1: indeed a reality. Despite her groundbreaking finds, Mary Anning struggled
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 1: for recognition in the male-dominated world of 19th century science.
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: As a working-class woman with little formal education, she was
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: barred from joining the learned societies where her discoveries were
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 1: debated and discussed. Many of the wealthy collectors who bought
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: her fossils failed to credit her in their scientific papers
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: or even acknowledge her existence. But among her fellow fossil hunters,
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: Mary was a legend, the princess of paleontology, a woman
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: with an almost supernatural gift for conjuring extinct monsters from
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 1: the unforgiving cliffs. In her later years, Mary's fortunes waxed
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: and waned with the fossil trade. She continued to make
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: important discoveries, including the first British pterosaur and several new
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: species of fish, but competition from other collectors and the
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: fickle taste of the market made for a precarious living.
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: When Mary died of breast cancer in 1847, she left
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: little behind beyond her remarkable fossil collection and a trove
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: of letters chronicling her lifelong love affair with the ancient past. Today,
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: Mary Anning is remembered as a pioneering paleontologist, a woman
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: who defied the conventions of her time to shed light
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 1: on the vanished worlds of long ago. Her story is
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: one of perseverance, passion and an unshakable dedication to the
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 1: pursuit of knowledge. In her dogged quest to wrest secrets
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: from the stones, she helped lay the foundation for our
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: modern understanding of the Earth's history and the incredible creatures
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 1: that once roamed its surface. As we drift deeper into
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: the embrace of sleep, let us dream of fearsome ichthyosaurs
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: churning through primordial seas and long-necked plesiosaurs undulating gracefully through
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: Mesozoic waterways. Let us imagine pterosaurs soaring on leathery wings
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 1: above a world more wondrous and strange than we can
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: scarcely imagine. And let us pay tribute to the remarkable
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: men and women, like Mary Anning, who have dedicated their
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: lives to bringing these vanished worlds back to life, one
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: fossil at a time. For it is through their tireless
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: efforts that we are able to glimpse the awe-inspiring pageant
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: of life on Earth. A story written in stone, a
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: tale as old as time itself. And though we may
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: never know all the secrets of the distant past, we
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 1: can take comfort in the knowledge that each generation of
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: fossil hunters and paleontologists brings us a little closer to
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: understanding the incredible journey that has led us to this moment,
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: here on the knife's edge of eternity. So let us
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: embrace the mystery and the wonder of all that came
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 1: before us. Let us revel in the impossible strangeness and
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: beauty of the ancient earth and all the fantastic creatures
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: that once called it home. And as we slip into
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: the welcoming arms of slumber, let us dream of a
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: world more wild and wondrous than we can possibly imagine.
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: A world where anything is possible, and where the only
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 1: limit is the boundless reaches of our own curiosity and imagination.
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: Good night, and sweet dreams of ancient wonders. Moving on
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 1: from the remarkable life and legacy of Mary Anning, let
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: us turn our attention to another pioneer in the field
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: of paleontology. The brilliant and eccentric American scientist, Edward Drinker Cope.
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: Born into a wealthy Quaker family in Philadelphia in 1840,
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 1: Cope was a precocious child with an insatiable appetite for knowledge.
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: By the age of six, he was already collecting fossils
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: and studying the natural world with a passionate intensity that
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: would come to define his entire life. As a young man,
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: Cope attended the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied anatomy
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: and paleontology under the renowned scientist Joseph Leedy. But Cope
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: was a restless soul, and he soon grew frustrated with
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 1: the staid confines of academia. In 1864, at the age
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: of just 24, he set out on a series of
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: ambitious fossil-hunting expeditions to the American West, determined to make
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: his mark on the burgeoning field of paleontology. It was
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 1: on these expeditions that Cope would make some of his
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 1: most significant discoveries. In 1868, while exploring the Badlands of
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: New Jersey, he unearthed the first nearly complete skeleton of
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: a carnivorous dinosaur ever found in North America. The creature,
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: which Cope named Lalaps aqualunguis, later renamed Dryptosaurus, was a
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: fearsome predator, with sharp claws and saw-like teeth adapted for
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 1: slicing through flesh. But Cope's most famous discovery came a
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 1: few years later, in 1877, when he uncovered the partial
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 1: remains of a massive herbivorous dinosaur in Colorado. The creature,
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 1: which Cope named Camarasaurus supremus, was one of the largest
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: land animals that had ever lived, with a long neck
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: and tail and a body that stretched over 60 feet
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: from nose to tail tip. The discovery of Camarasaurus was
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: a sensation, and it helped to cement Cope's reputation as
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: one of the leading paleontologists of his generation. But Cope's
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 1: success was not without controversy. In 1877, he became embroiled
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: in a bitter feud with his rival, Othniel Charles Marsh,
• 1:10:24
  Speaker 1: over the discovery and naming rights to a new species
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: of extinct mammal. The dispute, which became known as the
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 1: Bone Wars, would consume both men for the next two decades,
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 1: as they raced to outdo each other in the field
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: and in the halls of academia. The Bone Wars were
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 1: a time of ruthless competition and dirty tricks, as Cope
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 1: and Marsh sought to undermine each other at every turn.
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 1: They spied on each other's digs, bribed each other's workers,
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 1: and even resorted to outright theft and sabotage in their
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: quest for scientific supremacy. In one infamous incident, Marsh secretly
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 1: bought up all the train tickets to a remote fossil site,
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: forcing Cope and his team to make a gruelling overland
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 1: journey on foot. Despite the acrimony of the Bone Wars,
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 1: the feud between Cope and Marsh ultimately proved to be
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: a boon for paleontology. Between them, the two men discovered
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 1: and named over 130 new species of dinosaurs, as well
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: as countless other prehistoric creatures. Their rivalry spurred them to
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: work harder and dig deeper than they ever would have
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 1: on their own, pushing the boundaries of what was possible
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 1: in the field of paleontology. In the end, however, the
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: Bone Wars took a heavy toll on both men. Cope,
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: in particular, was left deeply in debt and struggling to
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: keep his head above water. He became increasingly erratic and paranoid,
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 1: convinced that Marsh was out to destroy him. In 1897,
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 1: at the age of just 56, Cope died alone in
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: his home, surrounded by the fossils that had been his
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 1: life's work. Today, Edward Drinker Cope is remembered as one
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: of the most brilliant and influential paleontologists of the 19th century,
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 1: a man whose passion and determination helped to revolutionise our
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: understanding of the prehistoric world. His discoveries continue to inspire
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: and amaze us, providing a tantalising glimpse into the incredible
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 1: diversity and complexity of life on Earth millions of years ago.
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 1: As we let the tale of Cope and Marsh's fierce
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: rivalry drift through our minds, we can't help but marvel
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 1: at the incredible lengths to which these two men were
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: willing to go in pursuit of scientific knowledge. Their story
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: is a testament to the enduring power of human curiosity,
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 1: and to the unshakable drive that compels us to seek
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 1: out the secrets of the universe, no matter the cost.
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 1: So let's raise a glass to Edward Drinker Cope, and
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 1: to all the other brilliant and eccentric scientists who have
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: dedicated their lives to unravelling the mysteries of the past.
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 1: May their passion and their perseverance continue to inspire us
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: as we strive to build upon their incredible legacy and
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 1: push the boundaries of human knowledge ever further. And with that,
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 1: let us slip once more into the welcoming embrace of sleep,
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 1: our minds filled with visions of fierce dinosaurs and duelling paleontologists,
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: locked in an eternal struggle for truth and glory. Good night,
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 1: and may your dreams be filled with the wonders of
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: the ancient world. While the bone wars raged on between
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 1: Cope and Marsh, another remarkable figure was quietly making his
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 1: own groundbreaking contributions to the field of paleontology. His name
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: was Charles Doolittle Walcott, and his story is one of perseverance,
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 1: ingenuity and an unshakable commitment to the pursuit of scientific truth.
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 1: Born in 1850 in New York Mills, New York, Walcott
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: was the son of a farmer and a schoolteacher. From
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 1: an early age he showed a keen interest in the
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 1: natural world, collecting fossils and minerals from the fields and
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 1: streams around his home. But Walcott's true passion lay in
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: the study of ancient life, and he dreamed of one
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: day becoming a professional paleontologist. Walcott's path to scientific success
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 1: was not an easy one. He had little formal education,
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 1: and he struggled to find work in his chosen field.
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: But he refused to be deterred. In 1876, at the
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: age of 26, he took a job as a labourer
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 1: with the US Geological Survey, hoping to work his way
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: up the ranks and gain the experience he needed to
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 1: pursue his dreams. it was during his time with the
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: survey that Wolcott made his most famous discovery. In 1909,
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 1: while exploring the Burgess Shale formation in the Canadian Rockies,
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: he stumbled upon an extraordinary trove of fossilised remains, a
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 1: virtual time capsule of life from the Cambrian period, some
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 1: 505 million years ago. The Burgess Shale fossils were unlike
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 1: anything that had ever been seen before. They included strange
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: soft-bodied creatures that had no hard parts, and thus had
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 1: rarely been preserved in the fossil record. There were worms
• 1:14:47
  Speaker 1: with spines and arthropods with extra limbs, and even a
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: bizarre creature that looked like a cross between a pineapple
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 1: and a kitchen brush. Walcott spent years studying the Burgess
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 1: Shale fossils, carefully extracting them from the rock and painstakingly
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: documenting their anatomy and morphology. He recognised that these creatures
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 1: represented a pivotal moment in the history of life on Earth,
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: a time when complex multicellular organisms first began to diversify
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 1: and spread across the globe. But Wolcott's work on the
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: Burgess Shale was just one part of his long and
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 1: distinguished career. He also made important contributions to the study
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 1: of trilobites, a group of extinct marine arthropods that flourished
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: during the Paleozoic era. And he played a key role
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 1: in the establishment of the Smithsonian Institution as a leading
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 1: centre for paleontological research. Perhaps most importantly, Walcott helped to
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: lay the foundation for the modern field of evolutionary biology.
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 1: Through his careful study of the fossil record, he demonstrated
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: the incredible diversity and complexity of ancient lifeforms, and he
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: provided compelling evidence for the gradual evolution of species over time. Today,
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 1: Charles Doolittle Walcott is remembered as one of the giants
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 1: of American paleontology, a man whose tireless dedication and scientific
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 1: brilliance helped to shape our understanding of the history of
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 1: life on Earth. His legacy lives on in the countless
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 1: researchers who have followed in his footsteps, seeking to unravel
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 1: the secrets of the ancient past and to shed light
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: on the incredible story of our planet's evolution. As we
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: drift off to sleep, let us take a moment to
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 1: reflect on the incredible contributions of scientists like Wolcott, who
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 1: have dedicated their lives to expanding the frontiers of human knowledge.
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 1: Through their tireless efforts and their unwavering commitment to the
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 1: pursuit of truth, they have helped to open our eyes
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 1: to the wonders of the natural world, and to the
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 1: incredible complexity and beauty of life in all its forms.
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 1: So let us dream of strange, soft-bodied creatures swimming through
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 1: Cambrian seas, and of trilobites scuttling across ancient sea floors.
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 1: Let us marvel at the incredible diversity of life that
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 1: has existed on our planet over the eons, and at
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 1: the endless mysteries that still await our discovery. And let
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: us give thanks for the brilliant and dedicated scientists who
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 1: have made it all possible. the men and women who
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 1: have devoted their lives to unravelling the secrets of the
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 1: universe and to sharing the wonders of the natural world
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 1: with all of humanity. Good night, and may your dreams
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 1: be filled with the beauty and the mystery of the
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 1: ancient Earth. The study of ancient extinct animals is in
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 1: many ways like assembling a jigsaw puzzle, one where most
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 1: of the pieces are missing and the picture on the
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 1: box has long since faded away. Paleontologists must use every
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 1: scrap of evidence available, from fossilised bones and teeth to
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 1: trackways and burrows, to painstakingly reconstruct the anatomy, behaviour and
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: ecology of these enigmatic creatures. One of the most iconic
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 1: extinct animals of all time is the woolly mammoth. With
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 1: their long curved tusks and shaggy coats, these imposing Ice
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 1: Age behemoths have captured our imaginations for centuries. But what
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 1: was life really like for a woolly mammoth? Thanks to
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 1: the remarkable preservation of some specimens, we can catch a
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 1: glimpse into their world. In the early 1900s, a group
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 1: of Siberian reindeer herders made an astonishing discovery. The frozen
• 1:18:09
  Speaker 1: carcass of a mammoth calf, almost perfectly preserved in the permafrost.
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 1: This incredible find, nicknamed Dima, provided scientists with a wealth
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 1: of information about mammoth anatomy and diet. Dima's stomach contents
• 1:18:22
  Speaker 1: revealed that mammoths grazed on a variety of vegetation, including grasses,
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 1: sedges and wildflowers. Pollen grains embedded in his fur hinted
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: at the chilly steppe environment he inhabited. But perhaps the
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: most remarkable window into the world of woolly mammoths comes
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 1: from a truly extraordinary find. A pair of mammoths, an
• 1:18:42
  Speaker 1: adult female and a juvenile, discovered locked together in the
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 1: Siberian permafrost. Nicknamed Lyuba and Chroma, these mammoths died around 42,000
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 1: years ago and were found almost completely intact, their skin,
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 1: hair and internal organs exquisitely preserved by the frigid temperatures. Lyuba,
• 1:19:01
  Speaker 1: the younger of the two at only 30 to 35
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 1: days old, is the most complete mammoth specimen ever found.
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 1: Her trunk was still pliable, her toenails soft and translucent.
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 1: Even the milk from her mother curdled in her belly
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 1: could still be discerned. Cromer, in her mid-fifties at the
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 1: time of her death, was equally well preserved, her reddish-brown
• 1:19:23
  Speaker 1: pelt still bearing the scars of past tussles. The discovery
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 1: of Lyuba and Cromer was a revelation for paleontologists. Never
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 1: before had the fine details of mammoth life been so
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 1: vividly captured. Lyuba's final meal of milk and tender vegetation
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 1: spoke to the close bond between mammoth mothers and calves.
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 1: The texture and colour of Chroma's coat, adapted for the
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 1: harsh Siberian cold, could be studied in unprecedented detail. But
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 1: the most tantalising clues lay hidden within Luba and Chroma's
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 1: bones and tissues. By extracting ancient DNA and proteins from
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 1: these preserved remains, scientists have begun to unlock the secrets
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 1: of mammoth evolution and biology. They've traced the mammoth family tree,
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 1: discovering that the woolly mammoth's closest living relative is the
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 1: Asian elephant. Proteins from mammoth haemoglobin have shed light on
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 1: how these creatures thrived in the Ice Age cold, their
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 1: blood superbly adapted for delivering oxygen in frigid conditions. The
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 1: study of luba, chroma and other spectacularly preserved specimens is
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 1: part of the burgeoning field of paleobiology, using cutting-edge techniques
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 1: to probe the biology of extinct organisms. By applying tools
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 1: from molecular biology, geochemistry and imaging to fossils, paleobiologists are
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: bringing the ancient world to life in ways Victorian bone
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 1: hunters like Mary Anning could only have dreamed of. Another
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 1: creature whose biology has been profoundly illuminated by paleobiology is
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 1: the Tyrannosaurus rex. The T-rex has long been renowned as
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 1: one of the largest and most fearsome predators to ever
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 1: walk the earth, but for much of the 20th century
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 1: paleontologists could only speculate about the details of its predatory prowess.
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 1: How fast could T. rex run? How powerful was its bite?
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 1: And perhaps most intriguingly, did T. rex have feathers? In
• 1:21:10
  Speaker 1: recent decades, a string of remarkable discoveries has allowed scientists
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 1: to paint an ever more vivid picture of T. rex
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 1: as a living, breathing animal. One key line of evidence
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 1: comes from biomechanical studies using the laws of physics and
• 1:21:23
  Speaker 1: engineering to model how T. rex bones and muscles work
• 1:21:25
  Speaker 1: together in life. For example, by CT scanning a beautifully
• 1:21:29
  Speaker 1: preserved T. rex skull... paleontologists were able to reconstruct the
• 1:21:33
  Speaker 1: shape and attachment points of the jaw muscles. Coupled with
• 1:21:37
  Speaker 1: studies on tooth shape and wear patterns, a fearsome picture emerged.
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 1: The T-Rex had a bite force of over six tons,
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 1: the strongest of any known terrestrial animal. This crushing power,
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 1: combined with a mouthful of sore-edged teeth, would have allowed
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 1: T-Rex to crack open the bones of its prey to
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 1: access the nutritious marrow within. But while formidable, the T-Rex
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: was no speed demon. Contrary to the fleet-footed predators depicted
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 1: in Jurassic Park, careful studies of T-Rex leg proportions and
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 1: probable muscle mass suggest this seven-ton behemoth likely had a
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 1: top speed of around 25 kilometres per hour. Impressive for
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 1: an animal of its size, but no match for the
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 1: fastest humans today. Instead, the T-Rex was probably an ambush hunter,
• 1:22:22
  Speaker 1: using its keen senses and powerful jaws to take down prey.
• 1:22:26
  Speaker 1: And what of the question of feathers? For many years,
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 1: the idea of a feathered T. rex seemed far-fetched, more
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 1: science fiction than science fact. But a series of groundbreaking
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 1: discoveries in the 1990s and 2000s turned that view on
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 1: its head. Paleontologists in China began unearthing a menagerie of
• 1:22:44
  Speaker 1: feathered dinosaurs, many of them small, agile predators closely related
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: to birds. These finds sparked a re-evaluation of dinosaur biology
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 1: and evolution, suggesting that feathers may have been widespread among
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 1: the theropod dinosaurs. the group that includes T. rex. In 2012,
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 1: the debate was settled in spectacular fashion with the discovery
• 1:23:05
  Speaker 1: of Euteranus huali, a 1.5-tonne relative of T. rex from
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 1: early Cretaceous China, bearing the unmistakable imprints of primitive feathers.
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 1: While no T. rex fossil has yet been found with
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 1: preserved feathers, the presence of feathers in its close relatives
• 1:23:19
  Speaker 1: makes it almost certain that the tyrant king was, in life,
• 1:23:23
  Speaker 1: magnificently plumed. The discovery of feathered dinosaurs has been a
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 1: revolution in paleontology, forcing us to reimagine these creatures not
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 1: as scaly reptilian monsters, but as something far more bird-like
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: and dynamic. It's a sobering reminder of how much our
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 1: understanding of extinct animals has changed over time, and how
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: much more there still is to learn. Indeed, for all
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 1: the remarkable advances in paleobiology in recent years, we've still
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 1: only scratched the surface of the New fossil discoveries challenge
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 1: our assumptions and expand our understanding of ancient life. From
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 1: the recent discovery of a 100 million year old dinosaur
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 1: nesting site in Argentina, to the unearthing of a 2.6
• 1:24:04
  Speaker 1: million year old jawbone in Ethiopia that may represent a
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 1: new species of early human, the past continues to surprise us.
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 1: As we look to the future of paleontology, one of
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 1: the most exciting frontiers is the study of ancient biomolecules.
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 1: While DNA degrades quickly after death, Proteins and other organic
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 1: compounds can sometimes survive for millions of years, providing a
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 1: treasure trove of information about long-extinct organisms. In 2015, a
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 1: team of researchers made headlines by extracting collagen protein from
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 1: the fossilised femur of a duck-billed dinosaur, allowing them to
• 1:24:39
  Speaker 1: confirm the evolutionary link between dinosaurs and modern birds. More recently,
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 1: scientists have recovered proteins from 3.8 million-year-old ostrich eggshells in Africa.
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 1: shedding light on the environmental conditions our early human ancestors faced.
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 1: As techniques for recovering and analysing ancient biomolecules continue to improve,
• 1:24:58
  Speaker 1: we may one day be able to reconstruct the genomes
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 1: of extinct creatures, opening up new vistas on their biology
• 1:25:04
  Speaker 1: and evolution. Some scientists even dream of using this genetic
• 1:25:08
  Speaker 1: information to resurrect vanished species, a Jurassic Park of the
• 1:25:12
  Speaker 1: mind if not in reality. But even without such flights
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 1: of fancy, the study of ancient life continues to captivate
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 1: and inspire us. In the stony bones of long-dead creatures,
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 1: we catch glimpses of worlds both achingly familiar and utterly alien,
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 1: reminders of the endless forms life has taken over the eons.
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 1: From the towering majesty of the sauropods to the delicate
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: tracery of a fossilised fern, each find is a testament
• 1:25:38
  Speaker 1: to the resilience and creativity of nature enduring through the ages.
• 1:25:42
  Speaker 1: As we wrap up our journey through the lost worlds
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 1: of the prehistoric past, it's worth reflecting on the legacy
• 1:25:47
  Speaker 1: of the great fossil hunters and paleontologists who have brought
• 1:25:51
  Speaker 1: these vanished realms back to life. From Mary Anning's groundbreaking
• 1:25:55
  Speaker 1: discoveries on the windswept cliffs of Lyme Regis to Roy
• 1:25:59
  Speaker 1: Chapman Andrews' swashbuckling expeditions in the Gobi Desert, these intrepid
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 1: explorers have expanded our understanding of the natural world and
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 1: our place within it. Today, a new generation of paleontologists
• 1:26:11
  Speaker 1: is carrying on that legacy, armed with tools and techniques
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 1: the early bone hunters could only have dreamed of. With
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 1: every new fossil discovered, every ancient protein sequenced, they are
• 1:26:22
  Speaker 1: piecing together the grand puzzle of life's history, revealing the
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 1: awe-inspiring complexity and diversity of the living world. So tonight,
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 1: as we drift off to sleep, let us dream of
• 1:26:32
  Speaker 1: lost worlds and vanished beasts, secure in the knowledge that
• 1:26:35
  Speaker 1: their stories live on in the fossil record and in
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 1: the imaginations of those who study it. For in the
• 1:26:41
  Speaker 1: bones of the past we find not just the remnants
• 1:26:43
  Speaker 1: of ancient life, but a reflection of our own place
• 1:26:46
  Speaker 1: in the vast tapestry of time. Sweet dreams, dear listener,
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 1: and may your journeys through the prehistoric realms be ever
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 1: wondrous and strange. As we peer back through the mists
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 1: of time, it's hard not to be humbled by the
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 1: sheer scale and strangeness of the creatures that once called
• 1:27:03
  Speaker 1: Earth home. From the tiniest trilobite to the most titanic sauropod,
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 1: Each of these animals was exquisitely adapted to its own
• 1:27:10
  Speaker 1: time and place, a product of millions of years of
• 1:27:13
  Speaker 1: evolutionary fine-tuning. But for all their differences, there are some
• 1:27:18
  Speaker 1: themes that emerge again and again in the fossil record.
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 1: One is the power of contingency, the idea that the
• 1:27:24
  Speaker 1: course of life on Earth has often been shaped by
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 1: chance events, from the drift of continents to the fall
• 1:27:30
  Speaker 1: of meteors. Another is the resilience of life itself, the
• 1:27:34
  Speaker 1: way it has always managed to bounce back from even
• 1:27:36
  Speaker 1: the most devastating setbacks. Perhaps no group of animals embodies
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 1: these themes quite like the dinosaurs. For over 150 million years,
• 1:27:45
  Speaker 1: they dominated the planet, evolving into a dizzying array of
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 1: forms and colonising every corner of the globe. There were
• 1:27:52
  Speaker 1: the towering sauropods, whose massive bodies were sustained by industrial-scale
• 1:27:56
  Speaker 1: digestive systems. The fleet-footed theropods, with their razor-sharp teeth and
• 1:28:02
  Speaker 1: keen senses. The heavily armoured ankylosaurs, walking fortresses built to
• 1:28:06
  Speaker 1: withstand the fiercest attacks. But for all their success, the
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 1: dinosaurs were not invincible. When a massive asteroid slammed into
• 1:28:13
  Speaker 1: the Earth 66 million years ago, it unleashed a hellish
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 1: cascade of destruction, searing heat, choking dust, acid rain, global wildfires.
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 1: In a geological heartbeat, the great dynasties of the Mesozoic
• 1:28:27
  Speaker 1: were toppled, and the age of reptiles gave way to
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 1: the age of mammals. In the aftermath of the extinction,
• 1:28:33
  Speaker 1: our furry ancestors underwent their own explosive radiation, evolving to
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 1: fill the ecological niches left vacant by the vampire. giants.
• 1:28:41
  Speaker 1: From tiny, shrew-like insectivores, they ballooned in size and diversity,
• 1:28:46
  Speaker 1: giving rise to everything from bat-winged gliders to lumbering ground
• 1:28:50
  Speaker 1: sloths to sabre-toothed predators. And of course, one lineage of
• 1:28:54
  Speaker 1: mammals would give rise to a species with the ability
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 1: to ponder its own origins. to dig up the bones
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 1: of long-dead creatures and marvel at the worlds they once inhabited.
• 1:29:04
  Speaker 1: The science of paleontology has allowed us to peer through
• 1:29:06
  Speaker 1: the keyholes of time, to reconstruct entire ecosystems from the
• 1:29:10
  Speaker 1: most fragmentary of clues. But for every question we answer,
• 1:29:15
  Speaker 1: new ones arise. What did a stegosaurus sound like? What
• 1:29:18
  Speaker 1: colour was a velociraptor's feathers? How did the first whales
• 1:29:22
  Speaker 1: make the transition from land to sea? With each new discovery,
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 1: the picture shifts and changes, reminding us how much we
• 1:29:29
  Speaker 1: still have to learn, and that, perhaps, is the greatest
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 1: lesson of all. The story of life on Earth is
• 1:29:35
  Speaker 1: not a simple linear march of progress, but a vast
• 1:29:39
  Speaker 1: branching tree, with twists and turns and dead ends along
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 1: the way. The creatures of the past were not just
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 1: waypoints on the road to the present, but wonders in
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 1: their own right, each one a masterpiece of adaptation and survival.
• 1:29:54
  Speaker 1: So as we contemplate the sweep of geological time let
• 1:29:57
  Speaker 1: us remember to approach the past with humility and wonder.
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 1: The fossils we study are not just dusty relics, but
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 1: echoes of a world more rich and strange than we
• 1:30:06
  Speaker 1: can possibly imagine. And as we drift off to sleep,
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 1: may we dream of ancient forests and primordial seas, of
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 1: creatures both familiar and fantastical, all part of the endlessly
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 1: unfolding tapestry of life on this pale blue dot we
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 1: call home. As we ponder these lost worlds and the
• 1:30:22
  Speaker 1: incredible creatures that once inhabited them, it's worth reflecting on
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 1: the remarkable journey of discovery that has brought them back
• 1:30:29
  Speaker 1: to life in our imaginations. The quest to understand ancient
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 1: extinct animals has been driven by a passionate, eccentric and
• 1:30:36
  Speaker 1: fiercely determined cast of characters over the centuries. Take Mary Anning,
• 1:30:41
  Speaker 1: the humble cabinetmaker's daughter from the seaside town of Lyme
• 1:30:44
  Speaker 1: Regis in England. Born in 1799, Anning had a knack
• 1:30:49
  Speaker 1: for spotting and extracting the strange stone Curiositas, that would
• 1:30:53
  Speaker 1: occasionally tumble out of the towering cliffs near her home.
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: She and her brother Joseph would sell these fossils to
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 1: tourists to supplement the family's meagre income. But Anning's sharp
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 1: eye and careful collecting soon caught the attention of the
• 1:31:05
  Speaker 1: scientific community. In 1811, at the tender age of 12,
• 1:31:10
  Speaker 1: she unearthed an intact skull of what would later be
• 1:31:12
  Speaker 1: recognised as an ichthyosaur, a sleek, fish-like marine reptile that
• 1:31:17
  Speaker 1: sliced through the Jurassic Seas. A few years later, she
• 1:31:21
  Speaker 1: discovered the first complete plesiosaur, with its improbably long neck
• 1:31:26
  Speaker 1: and paddle-shaped fins. Anning went on to make a series
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: of groundbreaking finds over her lifetime, including the first pterosaur
• 1:31:33
  Speaker 1: skeleton outside of Germany, and key evidence of extinct species
• 1:31:37
  Speaker 1: of fish, sharks and mollusks. Her fossils were eagerly sought
• 1:31:42
  Speaker 1: out by the great geologists and paleontologists of the day,
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 1: who would make the trek to her seaside shop to
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 1: marvel at her latest discoveries. Yet as a working-class woman
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 1: in Victorian England, Anning faced an uphill battle to be
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 1: taken seriously by the scientific establishment. She was barred from
• 1:31:58
  Speaker 1: joining the Geological Society of London on account of her gender,
• 1:32:02
  Speaker 1: and often saw her finds published under the names of
• 1:32:05
  Speaker 1: the male collectors who had purchased them. Anning's story reflects
• 1:32:09
  Speaker 1: the challenges and prejudices faced by many early pioneers of paleontology,
• 1:32:13
  Speaker 1: who had to fight to have their work recognised and respected.
• 1:32:17
  Speaker 1: but it also speaks to the sheer force of will
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 1: and determination that drove these individuals to keep searching for
• 1:32:23
  Speaker 1: clues to our planet's past, even in the face of
• 1:32:26
  Speaker 1: scepticism and adversity. This same spirit of dogged persistence can
• 1:32:31
  Speaker 1: be seen in the fierce rivalries that sometimes sprung up
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 1: between competing paleontologists, each vying to make the next big discovery.
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 1: Perhaps the most infamous of these was the Bone Wars
• 1:32:41
  Speaker 1: of the late 1800s, which pitted two wealthy and eccentric
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 1: American fossil hunters against each other, in a bitter struggle
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 1: for scientific supremacy. Edward Drinker Cope and Othniel Charles Marsh
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 1: were both born into privileged East Coast families and educated
• 1:32:57
  Speaker 1: at the finest universities, but their shared passion for paleontology
• 1:33:02
  Speaker 1: would lead them down a path of ruthless competition and
• 1:33:05
  Speaker 1: mutual destruction. The Bone Wars began in earnest in 1877,
• 1:33:10
  Speaker 1: when Marsh humiliated Cope by publicly pointing out that he
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 1: had mistakenly placed the skull of an Elasmosaurus on the
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 1: wrong end of its body. Cope was furious and vowed revenge.
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 1: Over the next two decades, the men would race each
• 1:33:22
  Speaker 1: other to dig up and name as many new dinosaur
• 1:33:25
  Speaker 1: species as possible, often resorting to bribery, theft and sabotage
• 1:33:29
  Speaker 1: to gain the upper hand. Their teams of fossil hunters
• 1:33:32
  Speaker 1: would crisscross the American West, scouring the badlands of Colorado,
• 1:33:36
  Speaker 1: Nebraska and Wyoming for the remains of ancient monsters. They
• 1:33:40
  Speaker 1: would blast open hillsides with dynamite, hastily excavate skeletons and
• 1:33:44
  Speaker 1: ship them back east by the wagon load, often with
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 1: scant regard for proper scientific documentation. In the end, Cope
• 1:33:51
  Speaker 1: and Marsh's feud would take a heavy toll on both
• 1:33:54
  Speaker 1: men's reputations and finances, but their relentless search for fossils
• 1:33:58
  Speaker 1: would also transform North America into a paleontological powerhouse, unearthing
• 1:34:02
  Speaker 1: a dizzying array of new dinosaurs like Allosaurus, Stegosaurus, Triceratops
• 1:34:07
  Speaker 1: and Diplodocus that captured the public imagination. The Bone Wars
• 1:34:12
  Speaker 1: marked a turning point in the science of paleontology. As
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 1: the trickle of new fossil discoveries turned into a flood,
• 1:34:18
  Speaker 1: museums and universities across Europe and North America began mounting
• 1:34:22
  Speaker 1: their own expeditions to the western United States, scrambling to
• 1:34:26
  Speaker 1: fill their exhibit halls with the bones of fearsome beasts.
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 1: But even as the great dinosaurs became household names, there
• 1:34:33
  Speaker 1: were still many lingering questions about what these animals were
• 1:34:36
  Speaker 1: actually like in life. For much of the early 20th century,
• 1:34:40
  Speaker 1: the prevailing view was that dinosaurs were plodding, sluggish creatures,
• 1:34:44
  Speaker 1: cold-blooded behemoths that lumbered through a hot, swampy landscape before
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: going extinct. It would take a new generation of paleontologists,
• 1:34:52
  Speaker 1: armed with novel techniques and a fresh perspective, to begin
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 1: to overturn this image and bring dinosaurs into the modern era.
• 1:35:00
  Speaker 1: One of the key figures in this dinosaur renaissance was
• 1:35:02
  Speaker 1: John Ostrom, a young professor at Yale University with a
• 1:35:06
  Speaker 1: keen interest in animal behaviour and anatomy. In the 1960s,
• 1:35:11
  Speaker 1: Ostrom began studying a small, agile predatory dinosaur called Deinonychus,
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 1: which had been discovered a few decades earlier in Montana.
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 1: As he examined its fossilised bones and claws, Ostrom became
• 1:35:22
  Speaker 1: convinced that this animal was no sluggish reptile, but a quick,
• 1:35:26
  Speaker 1: active hunter that likely had a high metabolism and complex
• 1:35:29
  Speaker 1: social behaviour. Ostrom's work on Deinonychus led him to propose
• 1:35:34
  Speaker 1: a radical new hypothesis, that birds were the direct descendants
• 1:35:37
  Speaker 1: of certain types of dinosaurs, This idea flew in the
• 1:35:41
  Speaker 1: face of the conventional wisdom at the time, which held
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 1: that birds had evolved separately from dinosaurs, perhaps from an
• 1:35:47
  Speaker 1: earlier group of reptiles. But Ostrom persisted, marshalling a growing
• 1:35:51
  Speaker 1: body of evidence to support his case. He pointed to
• 1:35:54
  Speaker 1: the striking anatomical similarities between birds and certain small meat-eating dinosaurs,
• 1:36:00
  Speaker 1: from their lightweight, hollowed-out bones to their three-toed feet and
• 1:36:03
  Speaker 1: grasping hands. He also argued that the presence of wishbones,
• 1:36:08
  Speaker 1: or foculae, in some dinosaurs was a clear sign of
• 1:36:11
  Speaker 1: their kinship with birds. Ostrom's theory was met with scepticism
• 1:36:15
  Speaker 1: at first, but over time, more and more paleontologists began
• 1:36:19
  Speaker 1: to come around to his way of thinking. Discoveries of
• 1:36:22
  Speaker 1: fossilised feathers and nesting sites further strengthened the dinosaur-bird connection,
• 1:36:27
  Speaker 1: painting a picture of these animals as dynamic, warm-blooded creatures
• 1:36:31
  Speaker 1: that lived fast and died young. Today, the idea that
• 1:36:35
  Speaker 1: birds are living dinosaurs is widely accepted among paleontologists, a
• 1:36:39
  Speaker 1: testament to the power of fresh thinking and dogged pursuit
• 1:36:42
  Speaker 1: of evidence. And as new technologies like CT scanning and
• 1:36:46
  Speaker 1: ancient DNA analysis have come online, we're learning more than
• 1:36:50
  Speaker 1: ever before about the biology and behaviour of these captivating creatures.
• 1:36:54
  Speaker 1: But of course, dinosaurs are just one piece of the
• 1:36:57
  Speaker 1: vast puzzle of prehistoric life. The fossil record is filled
• 1:37:01
  Speaker 1: with all manner of strange and wonderful organisms, from giant
• 1:37:04
  Speaker 1: insects and towering trees to armour-plated fish and carnivorous kangaroos,
• 1:37:09
  Speaker 1: One of the most iconic groups of ancient animals are
• 1:37:12
  Speaker 1: the mammals that lived during the last ice age, which
• 1:37:15
  Speaker 1: peaked around 20,000 years ago. These megafauna, or giant animals,
• 1:37:20
  Speaker 1: included familiar creatures like woolly mammoths and saber-toothed cats, as
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 1: well as more obscure beasts like the car-sized armadillo relative
• 1:37:27
  Speaker 1: Glyptodon and the marsupial lion Thylacolio. The first hints of
• 1:37:32
  Speaker 1: these lost giants came to light in the early 1800s,
• 1:37:36
  Speaker 1: as fossilised bones and teeth began to turn up across
• 1:37:39
  Speaker 1: Europe and the Americas. In 1796, the French anatomist Georges
• 1:37:44
  Speaker 1: Cuvier became the first to recognise that the elephant-like remains
• 1:37:48
  Speaker 1: found in Siberia belonged to a distinct extinct species that
• 1:37:52
  Speaker 1: he dubbed the woolly mammoth. Cuvier's insight was groundbreaking at
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 1: the time, as it challenged the prevailing view that animal
• 1:37:59
  Speaker 1: species were fixed and unchanging. If mammoths had once roamed
• 1:38:03
  Speaker 1: the earth but were now gone, it meant that the
• 1:38:06
  Speaker 1: history of life was far more dynamic and unpredictable than
• 1:38:08
  Speaker 1: previously thought. As more and more Ice Age fossils were
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 1: unearthed in the following decades, scientists began to piece together
• 1:38:16
  Speaker 1: a picture of a world that was at once familiar
• 1:38:18
  Speaker 1: and alien. Herds of shaggy mammoths and woolly rhinos trampled
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 1: across the frozen steppes of Eurasia, while cave bears and
• 1:38:26
  Speaker 1: cave lions stalked the shadows. In North America, towering mastodons
• 1:38:31
  Speaker 1: and stilt-legged camels shared the landscape with giant ground sloths
• 1:38:35
  Speaker 1: and fearsome dire wolves. The La Brea Tar Pits in
• 1:38:38
  Speaker 1: Los Angeles have proven to be a particularly rich trove
• 1:38:41
  Speaker 1: of Ice Age fossils. Over the millennia, countless animals became
• 1:38:45
  Speaker 1: mired in the sticky asphalt seeps, their bones preserved for posterity.
• 1:38:50
  Speaker 1: Since excavations began in the early 1900s, more than a
• 1:38:53
  Speaker 1: million fossils have been recovered from the pits, representing over
• 1:38:57
  Speaker 1: 600 species of plants and animals. But even as we
• 1:39:00
  Speaker 1: marvel at the diversity and size of these Ice Age beasts,
• 1:39:04
  Speaker 1: we're also confronted with a sobering reality. They're all gone,
• 1:39:08
  Speaker 1: victims of a mass extinction event that began around 50,000
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 1: years ago and peaked at the end of the last
• 1:39:13
  Speaker 1: glacial period. The exact causes are still debated, but it's
• 1:39:17
  Speaker 1: clear that a combination of climate change, Habitat loss and
• 1:39:21
  Speaker 1: human overhunting played a role in the megafauna's demise. In
• 1:39:25
  Speaker 1: a sense, the story of the Ice Age giants is
• 1:39:27
  Speaker 1: a cautionary tale, a reminder of the fragility of life
• 1:39:30
  Speaker 1: in the face of rapid environmental change. And as we
• 1:39:33
  Speaker 1: grapple with the ongoing biodiversity crisis today, with species disappearing
• 1:39:38
  Speaker 1: at an alarming rate, it's more important than ever to
• 1:39:40
  Speaker 1: understand the lessons of the past. But the Ice Age
• 1:39:43
  Speaker 1: megafauna are just one chapter in the long, strange history
• 1:39:46
  Speaker 1: of mammalian evolution. The first true mammals emerged around 200
• 1:39:51
  Speaker 1: million years ago, in the shadow of the dinosaurs. These
• 1:39:54
  Speaker 1: early pioneers were small, nocturnal insect-eaters, scurrying beneath the feet
• 1:39:59
  Speaker 1: of the great archosaurs. But as the reign of the
• 1:40:01
  Speaker 1: dinosaurs came to a cataclysmic end 66 million years ago,
• 1:40:05
  Speaker 1: the mammals seized their moment in the sun. In the
• 1:40:08
  Speaker 1: aftermath of the extinction, they rapidly diversified and evolved, filling
• 1:40:13
  Speaker 1: the ecological niches left vacant by the vanished reptiles. Over
• 1:40:17
  Speaker 1: the ensuing millions of years, mammals would expand into a
• 1:40:20
  Speaker 1: dizzying array of forms and lifestyles, from tiny burrowing shrews
• 1:40:24
  Speaker 1: to gigantic grazing elephants, from swift cheetahs to soaring bats.
• 1:40:29
  Speaker 1: They would return to the seas as whales and dolphins,
• 1:40:32
  Speaker 1: take to the skies as the only flying mammal, colonise
• 1:40:36
  Speaker 1: every corner of the globe from the Arctic to the Sahara.
• 1:40:39
  Speaker 1: And of course, one lineage of mammals would give rise
• 1:40:41
  Speaker 1: to our own species, Homo sapiens, the upright ape with
• 1:40:45
  Speaker 1: an outsized brain, and a knack for manipulating its environment.
• 1:40:50
  Speaker 1: The story of human evolution is itself a fascinating and
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 1: ever-unfolding saga, from the earliest bipedal hominins roaming the African
• 1:40:57
  Speaker 1: savannah to the global technological civilisation we have built today.
• 1:41:02
  Speaker 1: But that, perhaps, is a tale for another night. For now,
• 1:41:06
  Speaker 1: as we prepare to drift off into dreamland, let us
• 1:41:09
  Speaker 1: take a moment to reflect on the incredible sweep of
• 1:41:11
  Speaker 1: life's history on this planet we call home. From the
• 1:41:15
  Speaker 1: humblest single-celled organisms to the most majestic beasts that ever
• 1:41:19
  Speaker 1: trod the earth, every creature has played its part in
• 1:41:22
  Speaker 1: the grand evolutionary drama. And as we continue to uncover
• 1:41:26
  Speaker 1: new fossils and decipher their secrets, we are reminded that
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 1: our own existence is just a tiny blip in the
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 1: vast expanse of deep time. We are the lucky inheritors
• 1:41:36
  Speaker 1: of a world shaped by countless generations of living things,
• 1:41:40
  Speaker 1: each leaving its mark on the ever-changing tapestry of life.
• 1:41:44
  Speaker 1: So as we close our eyes and let sleep overtake us,
• 1:41:47
  Speaker 1: let us dream of the ancient worlds and vanished creatures
• 1:41:50
  Speaker 1: that have come before, and let us marvel at the
• 1:41:53
  Speaker 1: extraordinary journey that has brought us to this moment, poised
• 1:41:57
  Speaker 1: on the brink of new discoveries and wonders yet to come.
• 1:42:00
  Speaker 1: Good night, and sweet dreams of dinosaurs, mammoths, and all
• 1:42:04
  Speaker 1: the incredible beasts that have shared this earth with us. Ah,
• 1:42:08
  Speaker 1: the woolly mammoth, an icon of the Ice Age if
• 1:42:10
  Speaker 1: ever there was one. Standing up to 11 feet tall
• 1:42:13
  Speaker 1: at the shoulder and weighing as much as 6 tonnes,
• 1:42:16
  Speaker 1: this shaggy behemoth was truly a sight to behold. But
• 1:42:20
  Speaker 1: for all its impressive size, the woolly mammoth was remarkably
• 1:42:23
  Speaker 1: well adapted to the harsh cold climate of its Pleistocene domain.
• 1:42:26
  Speaker 1: That thick, luxurious coat of long outer hairs and dense
• 1:42:30
  Speaker 1: inner wool for which it's so famous. That was key
• 1:42:33
  Speaker 1: to its survival, providing unparalleled insulation against the biting winds
• 1:42:37
  Speaker 1: and sub-zero temperatures of the tundra. and those magnificent curving tusks.
• 1:42:42
  Speaker 1: They were multi-purpose tools used for foraging, defence and even
• 1:42:45
  Speaker 1: moving aside snow to reach the tasty grasses and sedges
• 1:42:49
  Speaker 1: buried beneath. But perhaps one of the most fascinating aspects
• 1:42:53
  Speaker 1: of woolly mammoth biology was its diet. You see, by
• 1:42:57
  Speaker 1: studying the chemical composition of fossilised mammoth teeth and bones,
• 1:43:01
  Speaker 1: paleontologists have been able to piece together a surprisingly detailed
• 1:43:04
  Speaker 1: picture of what these giants ate. The evidence suggests that
• 1:43:07
  Speaker 1: woolly mammoths were primarily grazers, relying on the tough, nutrient-poor
• 1:43:11
  Speaker 1: grasses and sedges that dominated their treeless Ice Age habitat.
• 1:43:15
  Speaker 1: But here's the interesting bit. Isotopic analysis of their teeth
• 1:43:19
  Speaker 1: also shows spikes in nitrogen-15, a heavier form of the
• 1:43:23
  Speaker 1: element that tends to accumulate in the tissues of mammals
• 1:43:26
  Speaker 1: during times of extreme nutritional stress. This tells us that
• 1:43:30
  Speaker 1: woolly mammoths likely experienced regular periods of near-starvation as the
• 1:43:34
  Speaker 1: bitter cold of the Pleistocene winter set in, and food
• 1:43:37
  Speaker 1: became scarce. They were survivors, these mammoths, eking out a
• 1:43:41
  Speaker 1: living in some of the harshest conditions nature could throw
• 1:43:44
  Speaker 1: at them. But in the end, even their remarkable resilience
• 1:43:48
  Speaker 1: wasn't enough to save them from extinction. The exact cause
• 1:43:51
  Speaker 1: of the woolly mammoth's demise is still a matter of
• 1:43:53
  Speaker 1: some debate among paleontologists. Some point to climate change at
• 1:43:57
  Speaker 1: the end of the last ice age, which transformed the
• 1:44:00
  Speaker 1: mammoth's grassland habitat into birch and conifer forests, ill-suited to
• 1:44:04
  Speaker 1: their grazing lifestyle. Others place more blame on human hunting.
• 1:44:08
  Speaker 1: which may have put unsustainable pressure on already stressed mammoth populations.
• 1:44:13
  Speaker 1: Whatever the ultimate cause, the last of these majestic beasts
• 1:44:16
  Speaker 1: is thought to have vanished from mainland Siberia and North
• 1:44:19
  Speaker 1: America around 10,000 years ago, with a few isolated populations
• 1:44:23
  Speaker 1: hanging on until as recently as 4,000 years ago on
• 1:44:26
  Speaker 1: arctic islands like Wrangell Island and St Paul Island. But
• 1:44:29
  Speaker 1: while the woolly mammoth may be gone, it's far from forgotten.
• 1:44:33
  Speaker 1: In fact, this extinct icon has captured the human imagination
• 1:44:37
  Speaker 1: like few other ancient animals. Its likeness adorns everything from
• 1:44:41
  Speaker 1: cave paintings to modern-day monuments, a testament to our enduring
• 1:44:45
  Speaker 1: fascination with this lost giant of the Ice Age. And
• 1:44:49
  Speaker 1: that fascination has fuelled some truly audacious scientific endeavours in
• 1:44:52
  Speaker 1: recent years. As we'll explore later, researchers are even working
• 1:44:57
  Speaker 1: on the possibility of bringing the woolly mammoth back from
• 1:44:59
  Speaker 1: extinction through cutting-edge genetic engineering and cloning techniques. It's a
• 1:45:04
  Speaker 1: controversial idea, to be sure, but one that speaks to
• 1:45:07
  Speaker 1: the powerful allure these bygone beasts still hold for us.
• 1:45:11
  Speaker 1: But the woolly mammoth is just one of many remarkable
• 1:45:13
  Speaker 1: creatures that once roamed the frigid landscape of Pleistocene Eurasia
• 1:45:17
  Speaker 1: and North America. Another was the Irish elk, a misnomer
• 1:45:21
  Speaker 1: if ever there was one. You see, despite its common name,
• 1:45:24
  Speaker 1: the Irish elk was neither exclusively Irish nor an elk
• 1:45:27
  Speaker 1: at all. In fact, this majestic creature, the largest deer
• 1:45:31
  Speaker 1: to ever live, ranged across Europe and Asia. from Siberia
• 1:45:34
  Speaker 1: to the Atlantic coast. Standing up to seven feet tall
• 1:45:38
  Speaker 1: at the shoulder, the Irish elk was a truly imposing sight.
• 1:45:41
  Speaker 1: But what really set it apart was the male's spectacular headgear.
• 1:45:45
  Speaker 1: Imagine a set of antlers spanning up to 12 feet
• 1:45:48
  Speaker 1: from tip to tip, weighing as much as 90 pounds.
• 1:45:52
  Speaker 1: That's what an Irish elk stag sported atop his head,
• 1:45:55
  Speaker 1: the largest antlers of any known deer, living or extinct.
• 1:45:59
  Speaker 1: It's thought that these extravagant appendages evolved through sexual selection,
• 1:46:04
  Speaker 1: with females favouring males sporting the most impressive racks. But
• 1:46:08
  Speaker 1: while those massive antlers may have been a boon when
• 1:46:10
  Speaker 1: it came to attracting mates, they also came with a
• 1:46:12
  Speaker 1: hefty energy cost. Growing and carrying around such outsized headgear
• 1:46:17
  Speaker 1: required a lot of nutrients, which may have put the
• 1:46:19
  Speaker 1: Irish elk at a disadvantage as the climate shifted, and
• 1:46:22
  Speaker 1: its preferred habitat of open woodlands gave way to dense forest.
• 1:46:26
  Speaker 1: Like the woolly mammoth, the Irish elk ultimately succumbed to
• 1:46:29
  Speaker 1: extinction as the Pleistocene drew to a close, The last
• 1:46:33
  Speaker 1: of these magnificent deer died out around 7,700 years ago,
• 1:46:37
  Speaker 1: though their legacy lives on in the countless specimens gracing
• 1:46:40
  Speaker 1: museum halls around the world. And what child hasn't gazed
• 1:46:44
  Speaker 1: up in wonder at those awe-inspiring antlers, imagining the sight
• 1:46:47
  Speaker 1: of a mighty Irish elk stag striding through the misty
• 1:46:51
  Speaker 1: woodlands of a bygone age? In a way, that sense
• 1:46:55
  Speaker 1: of wonder is the greatest gift these extinct marvels have
• 1:46:57
  Speaker 1: left us. a reminder of the incredible diversity and resilience
• 1:47:01
  Speaker 1: of life on our ever-changing planet. But the Pleistocene bestiary
• 1:47:05
  Speaker 1: was more than just mammoths and mega-deer. Fierce predators also
• 1:47:09
  Speaker 1: stalked the frigid landscapes of the Ice Age, perhaps none
• 1:47:13
  Speaker 1: more iconic than the saber-toothed cats. Now, it's a common
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 1: misconception that these fearsome felines were all members of the
• 1:47:21
  Speaker 1: genus Smilodon, the famous saber-toothed tiger. In fact, saber-toothed cats
• 1:47:26
  Speaker 1: were a diverse bunch, with several different genera spread across
• 1:47:29
  Speaker 1: the Americas, Europe and Asia. The most famous of these
• 1:47:32
  Speaker 1: was indeed Smilodon, which prowled the Americas from the southern
• 1:47:35
  Speaker 1: United States all the way down to Uruguay. But there
• 1:47:39
  Speaker 1: were others, like Homotherium, the so-called Scimitar cat, and Megantyrion,
• 1:47:44
  Speaker 1: a smaller but no less formidable hunter. What united these
• 1:47:49
  Speaker 1: various saber-toothed species were those unmistakable canine teeth, long, flattened,
• 1:47:54
  Speaker 1: serrated fangs that could reach up to seven inches in length,
• 1:47:58
  Speaker 1: These fearsome dental daggers have long fuelled speculation about how
• 1:48:01
  Speaker 1: sabre-toothed cats hunted and dispatched their prey. Some paleontologists have
• 1:48:06
  Speaker 1: suggested that they used their sabres to slash the throats
• 1:48:09
  Speaker 1: of their victims, severing the jugular vein and causing rapid
• 1:48:13
  Speaker 1: blood loss. Others have proposed that the cats use their
• 1:48:16
  Speaker 1: teeth to puncture and crush the windpipe, suffocating their prey.
• 1:48:20
  Speaker 1: Still others have argued for a canine shear bite, in
• 1:48:23
  Speaker 1: which the cat would use its powerful neck muscles to
• 1:48:26
  Speaker 1: drive its sabres into the soft tissue behind the prey's ribcage,
• 1:48:29
  Speaker 1: then yank back to create devastating tears. The truth is,
• 1:48:33
  Speaker 1: we may never know for certain how these ancient predators
• 1:48:36
  Speaker 1: employed their most iconic weapons. What we do know is
• 1:48:40
  Speaker 1: that Sabertooth cats were formidable hunters, preying on a wide
• 1:48:43
  Speaker 1: range of Ice Age herbivores, from bison and horses to
• 1:48:47
  Speaker 1: giant ground sloths and even juvenile mammoths. And like so
• 1:48:50
  Speaker 1: many of their Pleistocene contemporaries, they too vanished as the
• 1:48:54
  Speaker 1: great glaciers receded and the world began to warm. The
• 1:48:57
  Speaker 1: last of the Sabertooths, a North American species of Smilodon,
• 1:49:01
  Speaker 1: is thought to have gone extinct around 10,000 years ago.
• 1:49:05
  Speaker 1: But their legend lives on. enshrined in countless works of
• 1:49:08
  Speaker 1: art and popular media. From the unforgettable attack sequence in
• 1:49:12
  Speaker 1: the 1966 film One Million Years B.C. to Diego, the
• 1:49:17
  Speaker 1: lovable saber-toothed sidekick in the Ice Age animated franchise, these
• 1:49:22
  Speaker 1: extinct predators continue to stalk the human imagination. But while
• 1:49:26
  Speaker 1: saber-toothed cats may be the most famous of the Pleistocene predators,
• 1:49:30
  Speaker 1: they were far from the only ones. The Ice Age
• 1:49:32
  Speaker 1: was a time of giants, and that applied to the
• 1:49:35
  Speaker 1: carnivores as well as the herbivores, Take the giant short-faced bear,
• 1:49:38
  Speaker 1: for example. Standing up to 11 feet tall on its
• 1:49:41
  Speaker 1: hind legs and weighing in at a whopping 2,000 pounds,
• 1:49:45
  Speaker 1: the giant short-faced bear was one of the largest terrestrial
• 1:49:48
  Speaker 1: carnivores to ever live. Its long legs and slender build
• 1:49:51
  Speaker 1: suggest it was built for speed, perhaps chasing down prey
• 1:49:55
  Speaker 1: in short bursts across the open grasslands of Ice Age
• 1:49:57
  Speaker 1: North America. But the giant short-faced bear wasn't just a
• 1:50:01
  Speaker 1: speedy sprinter. It was also a powerful predator. with jaws
• 1:50:06
  Speaker 1: and teeth capable of crushing bone, and a muscular build
• 1:50:09
  Speaker 1: that would have made it a formidable grappler. Some paleontologists
• 1:50:13
  Speaker 1: have even suggested that it may have been a specialised
• 1:50:15
  Speaker 1: hunter of other bears, using its size and strength to
• 1:50:18
  Speaker 1: overpower its smaller ursine cousins. Alas, like so many of
• 1:50:22
  Speaker 1: its Ice Age contemporaries, the giant short-faced bear was not
• 1:50:26
  Speaker 1: long for this world. The last of these impressive predators
• 1:50:29
  Speaker 1: disappeared around 11,000 years ago, as the Pleistocene gave way
• 1:50:33
  Speaker 1: to the Holocene, and the world began to warm. But
• 1:50:37
  Speaker 1: the giant short-faced bear was just one of many oversized
• 1:50:40
  Speaker 1: carnivores to stalk the Ice Age landscape. There was also
• 1:50:44
  Speaker 1: the dire wolf, a larger and more heavily built relative
• 1:50:47
  Speaker 1: of the modern grey wolf that once roamed across much
• 1:50:49
  Speaker 1: of the Americas. Weighing up to 175 pounds and sporting
• 1:50:53
  Speaker 1: a more massive skull and teeth than its living cousins,
• 1:50:56
  Speaker 1: the dire wolf was a formidable predator in its own right.
• 1:50:59
  Speaker 1: It's thought to have been a pack hunter. working together
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 1: to bring down large prey like horses, bison, and perhaps
• 1:51:06
  Speaker 1: even the occasional ground sloth or mammoth calf. Like the
• 1:51:09
  Speaker 1: giant short-faced bear, the dire wolf met its demise as
• 1:51:13
  Speaker 1: the Ice Age drew to a close. The last of
• 1:51:15
  Speaker 1: these impressive canids died out around 9,500 years ago, though
• 1:51:20
  Speaker 1: their smaller cousins, the grey wolves, managed to survive and
• 1:51:23
  Speaker 1: thrive into the present day. But perhaps the most unusual
• 1:51:27
  Speaker 1: of the Pleistocene predators was a creature that blurred the
• 1:51:29
  Speaker 1: line between cat and dog, I'm talking, of course, about
• 1:51:33
  Speaker 1: the fearsome marsupial lion. Now, before you start picturing a
• 1:51:38
  Speaker 1: lion with a pouch, let me clarify. The marsupial lion
• 1:51:41
  Speaker 1: was not a true lion at all, nor was it
• 1:51:44
  Speaker 1: closely related to any living feline. Instead, this remarkable creature
• 1:51:48
  Speaker 1: was a pouched mammal, more closely akin to kangaroos and
• 1:51:51
  Speaker 1: koalas than to any cat or dog. But convergent evolution,
• 1:51:55
  Speaker 1: the process by which unrelated species evolve similar traits and
• 1:51:59
  Speaker 1: had shaped the marsupial lion into a formidable predator, complete
• 1:52:03
  Speaker 1: with blade-like teeth, powerful jaws and a muscular build. The
• 1:52:07
  Speaker 1: largest of these marsupial lions was a species known as
• 1:52:10
  Speaker 1: Thylacoleo carnifex, which stalked the forests and grasslands of Australia
• 1:52:15
  Speaker 1: during the Pleistocene. Weighing up to 200 pounds and sporting
• 1:52:19
  Speaker 1: a pair of elongated thumb claws that could have put
• 1:52:21
  Speaker 1: Wolverine to shame, Thylacoleo was the undisputed top predator of
• 1:52:25
  Speaker 1: its time and place. but like so many of the
• 1:52:28
  Speaker 1: magnificent beasts we've encountered on our journey through the Pleistocene,
• 1:52:32
  Speaker 1: the marsupial lion was ultimately doomed to extinction. The last
• 1:52:37
  Speaker 1: of these unique predators disappeared from the Australian mainland around 46,000
• 1:52:41
  Speaker 1: years ago, with a final population persisting on the island
• 1:52:44
  Speaker 1: of Tasmania until as recently as 2,000 years ago. The
• 1:52:49
  Speaker 1: exact cause of the marsupial lion's demise is still a
• 1:52:52
  Speaker 1: matter of debate among paleontologists, Some point to climate change
• 1:52:55
  Speaker 1: and the increasing aridity of the Australian landscape, which may
• 1:52:59
  Speaker 1: have taken a toll on the prey species the marsupial
• 1:53:01
  Speaker 1: lions depended on. Others have suggested that competition with newly
• 1:53:05
  Speaker 1: arrived human hunters, or even direct persecution by early Aboriginal Australians,
• 1:53:10
  Speaker 1: may have played a role. Whatever the cause, the loss
• 1:53:13
  Speaker 1: of the marsupial lion marked the end of an era,
• 1:53:16
  Speaker 1: the last gasp of a unique evolutionary experiment that had
• 1:53:19
  Speaker 1: produced one of the most remarkable predators the world has
• 1:53:21
  Speaker 1: ever seen. but while Thylacoleo and its kin may be gone,
• 1:53:25
  Speaker 1: they continue to capture the imagination of scientists and laypeople alike,
• 1:53:29
  Speaker 1: a testament to the enduring allure of these ancient wonders.
• 1:53:33
  Speaker 1: As we've seen time and again on our journey through
• 1:53:35
  Speaker 1: the Pleistocene, the Ice Age was a time of giants,
• 1:53:39
  Speaker 1: a world where evolution seemed to favour the big, the
• 1:53:41
  Speaker 1: bold and the bizarre. But amidst all the woolly mammoths
• 1:53:44
  Speaker 1: and sabre-toothed cats, there was one creature that stood out
• 1:53:47
  Speaker 1: as a true oddball, the Glyptodon. Imagine, if you will,
• 1:53:51
  Speaker 1: a giant armadillo the size of a small car covered
• 1:53:54
  Speaker 1: in a thick bony shell of interlocking plates. That's the
• 1:53:58
  Speaker 1: glyptodon in a nutshell. A creature so strange, so utterly
• 1:54:02
  Speaker 1: unlike anything alive today that it almost defies belief. But
• 1:54:05
  Speaker 1: the glyptodon was very much real, and for millions of
• 1:54:08
  Speaker 1: years these lumbering beasts trundled across the grasslands and savannas
• 1:54:12
  Speaker 1: of South America, grazing on vegetation and using their heavily
• 1:54:16
  Speaker 1: armoured bodies to deter would-be predators. Some species even had
• 1:54:20
  Speaker 1: armoured tails tipped with fearsome clubs, which they could have
• 1:54:23
  Speaker 1: used to defend themselves or settle disputes with rival glyptodons.
• 1:54:27
  Speaker 1: The glyptodon's unique armour was its most striking feature, but
• 1:54:30
  Speaker 1: it was also a marvel of evolutionary engineering. Each bony
• 1:54:34
  Speaker 1: plate was covered in a thin layer of horn-like material
• 1:54:37
  Speaker 1: called keratin, the same stuff that makes up our own
• 1:54:40
  Speaker 1: hair and nails. This keratinous coating helped to strengthen and
• 1:54:44
  Speaker 1: protect the plates, while also allowing for a small degree
• 1:54:47
  Speaker 1: of flexibility between them But the Glyptodon's armour wasn't just
• 1:54:51
  Speaker 1: for show. It served a vital defensive purpose in a
• 1:54:54
  Speaker 1: world where danger lurked around every corner. With saber-toothed cats,
• 1:54:58
  Speaker 1: dire wolves and giant short-faced bears on the prowl, an
• 1:55:02
  Speaker 1: unprotected Glyptodon would have been an easy meal. But with
• 1:55:06
  Speaker 1: its bony shell and armoured tail, the Glyptodon was a
• 1:55:09
  Speaker 1: formidable opponent, even for the most fearsome of Pleistocene predators. Alas,
• 1:55:15
  Speaker 1: even the Glyptodon's impressive defences were not enough to save
• 1:55:17
  Speaker 1: it from the ravages of time. Like so many of
• 1:55:20
  Speaker 1: its Ice Age contemporaries, the Glyptodon ultimately succumbed to extinction,
• 1:55:25
  Speaker 1: with the last of these remarkable creatures disappearing around 10,000
• 1:55:28
  Speaker 1: years ago. But while the Glyptodon may be gone, it's
• 1:55:32
  Speaker 1: far from forgotten. Its striking appearance and unique adaptations have
• 1:55:36
  Speaker 1: made it a favourite among paleontologists and the public alike,
• 1:55:39
  Speaker 1: and its fossils can be found in museums and collections
• 1:55:42
  Speaker 1: all over the world. And who knows? With the rapid
• 1:55:45
  Speaker 1: advances being made in the field of ancient DNA research,
• 1:55:49
  Speaker 1: It's not impossible to imagine a future where the glyptodon's
• 1:55:52
  Speaker 1: genome is sequenced and studied, shedding new light on this
• 1:55:55
  Speaker 1: remarkable creature and its place in the grand tapestry of life.
• 1:56:00
  Speaker 1: But the glyptodon is just one of many extinct marvels
• 1:56:03
  Speaker 1: that have captured our imaginations and fuelled our fascination with
• 1:56:06
  Speaker 1: the past. From the towering height of the giant moa
• 1:56:09
  Speaker 1: to the alien appearance of the opperbinia, the fossil record
• 1:56:12
  Speaker 1: is filled with creatures that seem to defy explanation or belief.
• 1:56:16
  Speaker 1: And yet, through the tireless efforts of generations of paleontologists,
• 1:56:20
  Speaker 1: we've been able to piece together a remarkably detailed picture
• 1:56:23
  Speaker 1: of these ancient wonders and the worlds they inhabited. From
• 1:56:27
  Speaker 1: the scorching deserts of the Permian to the lush rainforests
• 1:56:30
  Speaker 1: of the Eocene, we've traced the story of life on
• 1:56:32
  Speaker 1: Earth through countless twists and turns, extinctions and radiations. But
• 1:56:37
  Speaker 1: perhaps the most remarkable thing about this story is the
• 1:56:39
  Speaker 1: way it continues to unfold even today. With each new
• 1:56:43
  Speaker 1: fossil discovery and technological advance, we're able to peer ever
• 1:56:46
  Speaker 1: deeper into the mysteries of the past, uncovering new wonders
• 1:56:49
  Speaker 1: and rewriting old assumptions. Who knows what the next great
• 1:56:52
  Speaker 1: discovery will be? Perhaps it will be a feathered dinosaur
• 1:56:56
  Speaker 1: even more spectacular than the ones we know today, or
• 1:56:58
  Speaker 1: a bizarre new species of ancient mammal that challenges everything
• 1:57:02
  Speaker 1: we thought we knew about the history of our own lineage.
• 1:57:05
  Speaker 1: Or perhaps it will be something even more extraordinary, a
• 1:57:08
  Speaker 1: window into a world so alien, so utterly unlike our own,
• 1:57:12
  Speaker 1: that it defies our ability to even imagine it. After all,
• 1:57:16
  Speaker 1: the history of life on Earth is filled with surprises,
• 1:57:19
  Speaker 1: and there's no telling what strange and wonderful creatures may
• 1:57:21
  Speaker 1: yet lie hidden in the rocks beneath our feet. But
• 1:57:25
  Speaker 1: one thing is certain. As long as there are fossils
• 1:57:27
  Speaker 1: to be found and mysteries to be solved, there will
• 1:57:30
  Speaker 1: be paleontologists and other scientists working tirelessly to uncover the
• 1:57:35
  Speaker 1: secrets of the past. And as long as there are
• 1:57:37
  Speaker 1: people willing to listen and learn, there will be stories
• 1:57:40
  Speaker 1: to be told about the incredible creatures that once roamed
• 1:57:43
  Speaker 1: this Earth. So as we drift off to sleep tonight,
• 1:57:46
  Speaker 1: let us dream of lost worlds and forgotten wonders, of
• 1:57:50
  Speaker 1: giants and dragons and creatures beyond our wildest imaginings, and
• 1:57:54
  Speaker 1: let us give thanks for the remarkable minds and indomitable
• 1:57:57
  Speaker 1: spirits of those who have dedicated their lives to bringing
• 1:58:00
  Speaker 1: these ancient marvels back to life, if only in our imaginations.
• 1:58:05
  Speaker 1: For it is through their efforts, and through the enduring
• 1:58:07
  Speaker 1: power of science and storytelling, that the great beasts of
• 1:58:10
  Speaker 1: the past will never truly be lost. They will live
• 1:58:13
  Speaker 1: on in our hearts and minds, a testament to the
• 1:58:16
  Speaker 1: incredible diversity and resilience of life on this ever-changing planet.
• 1:58:20
  Speaker 1: And who knows? Perhaps someday, through the miracles of science
• 1:58:24
  Speaker 1: and technology, we may even be able to bring some
• 1:58:26
  Speaker 1: of these incredible creatures back from the brink of extinction.
• 1:58:30
  Speaker 1: to once again roam the wilds of our world as
• 1:58:32
  Speaker 1: they did so long ago. But even if that day
• 1:58:35
  Speaker 1: never comes, we can still take solace in the knowledge
• 1:58:38
  Speaker 1: that these ancient wonders will always be with us, in
• 1:58:41
  Speaker 1: the fossils and fragments that bear witness to their existence,
• 1:58:44
  Speaker 1: and in the stories and legends that keep their memories alive.
• 1:58:48
  Speaker 1: So let us treasure these tales of the past and
• 1:58:50
  Speaker 1: hold them close as we drift off into the welcoming
• 1:58:52
  Speaker 1: arms of sleep. For in the end, it is the
• 1:58:55
  Speaker 1: stories we tell and the wonders we imagine that, As
• 1:58:59
  Speaker 1: we've seen, the more we learn about extinct animals through
• 1:59:01
  Speaker 1: fossil discoveries and scientific analysis, the more we realise how
• 1:59:05
  Speaker 1: much there is still to uncover. Each new find has
• 1:59:08
  Speaker 1: the potential to rewrite our understanding of ancient life and
• 1:59:11
  Speaker 1: the worlds it inhabited. Take the remarkable case of the
• 1:59:15
  Speaker 1: Siberian unicorn, Elasmatherium. For centuries, this creature was known only
• 1:59:20
  Speaker 1: from fragmentary remains and mysterious legends. But in 2016, a
• 1:59:26
  Speaker 1: well-preserved skull was discovered in the Pavlodar region of Kazakhstan.
• 1:59:30
  Speaker 1: From it, scientists were able to determine that this lumbering,
• 1:59:33
  Speaker 1: shaggy beast survived much longer than previously thought, overlapping with
• 1:59:37
  Speaker 1: early humans before finally dying out around 39,000 years ago.
• 1:59:42
  Speaker 1: The Elasmotherium was just one of many megafauna that roamed
• 1:59:45
  Speaker 1: the mammoth steppe during the Pleistocene epoch. This now-vanished ecosystem
• 1:59:49
  Speaker 1: stretched from Spain to Siberia, supporting a vast array of
• 1:59:53
  Speaker 1: giant creatures exquisitely adapted to the cold, dry conditions. There
• 1:59:58
  Speaker 1: were cave bears, larger than any bear species alive today,
• 2:00:02
  Speaker 1: and fearsome cave hyenas that prowled for prey. Giant beavers
• 2:00:06
  Speaker 1: the size of black bears gnawed on wood with teeth
• 2:00:09
  Speaker 1: over six inches long, and herds of steppe bison, wild
• 2:00:14
  Speaker 1: asses and horses thundered across the grasslands. But perhaps the
• 2:00:18
  Speaker 1: most iconic Ice Age mammal was the woolly mammoth, Standing
• 2:00:22
  Speaker 1: up to 11 feet tall at the shoulder and weighing
• 2:00:24
  Speaker 1: as much as six tons, these mighty beasts were covered
• 2:00:28
  Speaker 1: in a thick coat of shaggy hair and possessed enormous
• 2:00:31
  Speaker 1: curved tusks. They range from Western Europe to North America,
• 2:00:35
  Speaker 1: thriving in the harsh glacial conditions. For centuries, their remains
• 2:00:39
  Speaker 1: were a source of wonder and a mystery. The indigenous
• 2:00:42
  Speaker 1: Evenk people of Siberia believed the mammoth was a giant
• 2:00:45
  Speaker 1: mole-like creature that died if it was exposed to sunlight.
• 2:00:49
  Speaker 1: When the first intact frozen mammoth was discovered in 1806,
• 2:00:52
  Speaker 1: it caused a scientific sensation. The naturalist Georges Cuvier used
• 2:00:57
  Speaker 1: it to prove the reality of extinction and establish the
• 2:01:00
  Speaker 1: field of paleontology. Since then, many more spectacularly preserved mammoths
• 2:01:06
  Speaker 1: have emerged from the permafrost. In 1977, a baby mammoth
• 2:01:10
  Speaker 1: named Dima was found by a gold miner in eastern Siberia.
• 2:01:14
  Speaker 1: Nearly intact, with strawberry blonde hair and long eyelashes still visible,
• 2:01:18
  Speaker 1: DEMA gave scientists an unprecedented look at mammoth anatomy and adaptations.
• 2:01:23
  Speaker 1: More recently, new genomic techniques have allowed researchers to sequence
• 2:01:27
  Speaker 1: the woolly mammoth genome from frozen tissue. These molecular studies
• 2:01:31
  Speaker 1: are revealing the genetic changes that allowed mammoths to adapt
• 2:01:34
  Speaker 1: to the cold, from small ears to specialised haemoglobin and
• 2:01:37
  Speaker 1: fat deposits. Scientists are even exploring the possibility of using
• 2:01:42
  Speaker 1: mammoth DNA to resurrect the species in a process known
• 2:01:44
  Speaker 1: as de-extinction. Of course, the ethics and feasibility of such
• 2:01:48
  Speaker 1: a project are hotly debated. Would a mammoth cloned from
• 2:01:52
  Speaker 1: ancient DNA be the same creature that once roamed the Earth?
• 2:01:56
  Speaker 1: How would it adapt to our modern world so different
• 2:01:58
  Speaker 1: from the one its ancestors knew? These are questions that
• 2:02:01
  Speaker 1: paleontologists and the public will grapple with as our ability
• 2:02:05
  Speaker 1: to manipulate ancient DNA advances. What is clear is that
• 2:02:09
  Speaker 1: the study of ancient extinct animals continues to captivate our
• 2:02:13
  Speaker 1: collective imagination. From the first fragmentary fossils that hinted at
• 2:02:17
  Speaker 1: lost worlds, to the cutting-edge molecular techniques allowing us to
• 2:02:21
  Speaker 1: reconstruct genomes and appearance, each discovery adds a new piece
• 2:02:25
  Speaker 1: to the puzzle of life on Earth. In a way,
• 2:02:28
  Speaker 1: by studying these long-dead creatures, we are also studying ourselves.
• 2:02:33
  Speaker 1: We are the inheritors of an evolutionary legacy stretching back
• 2:02:36
  Speaker 1: billions of years, shaped by cataclysmic events and changing climates.
• 2:02:41
  Speaker 1: The same processes that moulded the dinosaurs, the mammoths and
• 2:02:44
  Speaker 1: the myriad forms of ancient life have also made us
• 2:02:46
  Speaker 1: who we are. As we drift off to sleep, let
• 2:02:49
  Speaker 1: us dream of the wondrous creatures that came before us,
• 2:02:52
  Speaker 1: the marvels still waiting to be discovered in the fossil record,
• 2:02:55
  Speaker 1: and the stories they have to tell about our planet's
• 2:02:58
  Speaker 1: long and colourful history. And when we wake, may we
• 2:03:01
  Speaker 1: greet the day with renewed curiosity about the natural world
• 2:03:04
  Speaker 1: around us, knowing that we are part of an unbroken
• 2:03:07
  Speaker 1: chain of life stretching back to the dawn of time.
• 2:03:10
  Speaker 1: And with that, we come to the end of our
• 2:03:12
  Speaker 1: journey into the world of ancient extinct animals. If you
• 2:03:16
  Speaker 1: enjoyed exploring the mysteries of the prehistoric past, be sure
• 2:03:19
  Speaker 1: to like this video and subscribe to the channel for
• 2:03:22
  Speaker 1: more science stories to lull you into slumber. Sweet dreams,
• 2:03:26
  Speaker 1: and until next time, may your nights be filled with
• 2:03:29
  Speaker 1: the soft sounds of Cretaceous crickets and the gentle snores
• 2:03:32
  Speaker 1: of snoozing Stegosaurus.