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Can We Be Sure We're the First Industrial Civilization on Earth?
In a new paper, Gavin Schmidt of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Adam Frank from the University of Rochester ask a provocative question [open, DOI: 10.1017/S1473550418000095] [DX]: Could there have been an industrial civilization on Earth millions of years ago? And if so, what evidence of it would we be able to find today?
The authors first considered what signs of industrial civilization would be expected to survive in the geological record. In our own time, these include plastics, synthetic pollutants, increased metal concentrations, and evidence of large-scale energy use, such as carbon-based fossil fuels. Taken together, they mark what some scientists call the Anthropocene era, in which humans are having a significant and measurable impact on our planet.
The authors conclude, however, that it would be very difficult after tens of millions of years to distinguish these industrial byproducts from the natural background. Even plastic, which was previously thought to be quite resistant, can be degraded by enzymes relatively quickly. Only radiation from nuclear power plants—or from a nuclear war—would be discernible in the geological rock record after such a long time.
Anonymous Coward says "I told you so!" and starts babbling about megaliths.
Related: Homo Sapiens Began Advanced Toolmaking, Pigment Use, and Trade Earlier Than Previously Thought
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday April 19 2018, @08:46PM (8 children)
Like kinks in the evolutionary history markers in DNA?
Like exploitation of the coal seams from the carboniferous period which ended 300M years ago?
If they're talking about a happy hundred thousand creatures on the sub-continent of Atlantis who never colonized the globe - yeah, maybe.
Consider that, by the invention of the steam engine, homo sapiens were numerous in everywhere that wasn't ocean, mountainside or glacier.
A lot of what we are doing is shallow and short-lived, but 300M years from now another civilization as numerous, advanced and widespread as we are should easily be able to find traces of us. https://www.quora.com/If-humanity-died-today-how-long-would-the-pyramids-of-Giza-last [quora.com]
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Thursday April 19 2018, @09:11PM (7 children)
Given that humans have only been extant for a couple hundred thousand years, any technological *human* civilization would most likely have remnants that are identifiable today.
That said, who's to say that other beings didn't create a technological civilization 100 million years ago or more? That we have no evidence for such a civilization doesn't mean it didn't exist.
Given that large-brained mammals evolved to create a technological civilization over the past 10-15 million years leaves plenty of time in the geological past for large-brained creatures to have done the same over the past 500 million years.
Did it happen? We don't know. We have no evidence that it did, but absence of evidence is not evidence of absence in uncontrolled systems.
If we can hypothesize that there are extraterrestrial civilizations, hypothesizing that pre-human terrestrial civilizations existed seems a no-brainer, given the time scales involved.
Were there "dinosaur" civilizations? Your guess is as good as mine. Probably better as you haven't imbibed any green crack [leafly.com].
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday April 19 2018, @09:16PM (3 children)
If the technological civilization had the drive to expand (which is pretty much inbred in all of our DNA, from algae through dinosaurs and up), they would have left a visible mark.
If they were mammals ~10M years ago, they would have abundant skeletal remains (unless they were fastiduous cremators...), and with technology come signs of medicine...
Now, if they're just a little clique with a hydro-electric dam and they never left the valley - yeah, we could be missing that.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Thursday April 19 2018, @09:30PM (2 children)
Sure. Everything you wrote is plausible. However, you have no evidence to support your assertions.
I don't have any evidence to disprove them either. But that doesn't make you correct. My assertion (in the absence of contrary evidence), that a pre-human civilization *could* have existed is just as plausible.
The most reasonable answer is that it's unlikely but possible. And that's probably the best answer we'll ever get unless some actual evidence of a terrestrial, pre-human technological civilization is found.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 20 2018, @09:09PM (1 child)
Nah man. The more extraordinary the claim, the more burden of proof there is. You have no proof I didn't eat meat/gunk from an green alien with huge eyes for breakfast. Just because I equally have no proof I did eat an alien, doesn't mean people are going to believe me.
Lots of stuff has been preserved from the long distant past of this planet. To say an intelligent civilization, which would likely be able to make more durable materials (like we can), left no trace is unlikely.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Friday April 20 2018, @10:24PM
Thanks for agreeing with me. As I said in the comment to which you replied:
Now what, exactly, was your point, other than to agree with my amazing analytical skills?
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday April 20 2018, @12:17AM (2 children)
Depends on how hard you looked. Here, it's pretty damning since we've looked a lot. You not only have to hide fossils of the creatures of the civilization, but also any closely related species.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Friday April 20 2018, @12:32AM (1 child)
Perhaps some of these might be descendants of such an intelligent species?
https://www.thoughtco.com/smartest-dinosaurs-1091961 [thoughtco.com]
Or not. Likely not, in fact.
But proving that it's not is nearly impossible. And every piece of evidence we *don't* find doesn't make such a hypothesis less plausible. Contrariwise, just *one* piece of verified evidence of a pre-human civilization is all that's required to validate it.
As such, it's foolish to reject such a hypothesis out of hand.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday April 20 2018, @01:53AM
What is "proof" here? You can't prove mathematically, that the entire universe isn't a delusion imposed on you by an evil god.
We're at zero pieces of verified evidence.