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Cataclysm extinction event possible
I have challenged the entire scientific community and my controversial point of view is that I believe some dinosaurs were much more birdlike than previously spoken about. There is no doubt many were reptilian but I believe some species were much more like birds and an evolutionary shift occurred. And science recently discovered and published some evidence of these specific findings. A fossil, well preserved, was found in southern China of a nine inch very birdlike animal with long tail. I am not sure I entirely believe Darwin's theories but there are elements of it that make sense and I do believe his research has value. As far as I can tell at this point, the ice age, the weather shift that happened, stunted some of their growth into the smaller animals we have now. When food was abundant they fed until reaching those enormous sizes. There diet and meal time was uncontrolled as they did not personally regulate it and so competition with human beings in this respect caused an external regulation of their food consumption. They had no mental regulation controlled by their ID or Ego and lacked the complexity of reasoning that human beings have and developed, so whatever dinosaurs felt like doing is what they did especially when unchecked. They ate as often as they felt like and reached those enormous sizes. Man realized this was wicked as witness to the troubles and limits in those animals thinking which helped man emerge with a smarter sense of preservation and understanding of why. When you pluck a chicken of its feathers or any avian, if you will, the skin beneath can look very reptilian. If the heat kept them molted and featherless the skin would become more leathery from what we know are the effects of the sun's radiation. That would cause the differences in skin color and texture as well. When the cold came in food became less abundant also. Meals were limited. The animals had a harder time feeding when it was harder for them to figure out where to find food. There growth was stunted for survival. That is how modern birds like hawks and eagles came to be how they are. Crocodiles and snakes shrank down. We see examples now of when they more closely resemble the time of dinosaurs with Forty foot boa constrictors showing up in the jungle, huge crocodiles lurking in the Nile River as there meals are not limited or regulate so there growth potential is much larger. Now a dark army of bats are actually growing too large and we see this happening in or near Australia. Animal and human life will be effected by this. The bats can travel farther distances and are much larger. These were a fruit bat variety but they will become more vampirous. They will eat anything and have no concerns about killing, no guilt or remorse. They can travel on the thermal air waves farther distances and be a huge disruption and harder to detect. I believe there are real vampire stories out there now that a generation are too afraid to admit the first hand experience, knowing how they could be ostracized for reporting those things. But the large fruit bat that is the flying fox is without doubt a vampire. If human beings turn a blind eye to this as strange as it might sound that animal is poised to takeover. One has already reached about two and a half feet in size and there are one hundred thousand more of them that are 18 inch or so variety in size. In such a large group they could land like locusts and strip and devour a countryside. They would be hard to detect until it was too late and they were right upon you. People are often slow to believe and slow to respond to these things. Right now these animals have shown a distinct behavior of study, in that, they have landed nearby human beings and shown themselves to be learning their prey. They will battle with birds for food source and just to fight the large sized animal in a series of study and attempt for dominance. And birds aren't greatly equipped for that fight as in bats are more vicious and blood thirsty. I believe they have been in a fight with the whooping crane for awhile and these birds need our help. These animals need man's help. We can choose and need to choose the side of the whooping crane. We cannot allow that bird to lose. There is no doubt some dinosaurs were more birdlike rather than only reptilian. If you think about that, how wildly crazy the world was with these animals devoid of reasoning. These large vicious predators that felt nothing as they devoured whatever they felt like chewing on. We have to realize man survived these horrible conditions on the power of his mind more than just the power of his physical strength. In observations of bird behavior now and the way it eats, picks at the ground, picks up a worm I think what it must have been like as early man witnessing these heartless creatures peck and tear these things to pieces without thinking about or showing any sense of caring at all. Reptiles are just as cruel in their handling of life. So imagining the enormity of these animals stomping over the land the way they were, how they turned on each other to fight for fun, territory or aggression and compete for food or eat each other there are frightening aspects. The climate shift had calmed that wild away but it is still man's job to keep dominion over the wild of the world lest it race away out of our control and return to a time it was rampant. It takes an educated approach to achieve this success and even with all of the modern weaponry and advancements on weapons man needs to exhibit a real knowledge of tact. Tact will be man's greatest ally.
By James M. Piehl4 years ago in Earth
When in Drought
Tropical Forest, Queensland, Australia The wind rustles through our needles, barely holding onto our fragile limbs. Some fall, down, down to the earth. Light and drying into yellow, a breeze lifts them from our limbs and together they dance. Layers of dehydrated leaves and needles blanket our floor, too thick, too dry, too much. Dust billows, like sediment rising in the ocean, up through the brush and settles in the cracks of our bark. We haven't been this parched in centuries. Vines, twisting their lengths along the full height of our trunks, loosen their grips and dust settles in their drying bark, filtering through the cracks. Void of leaves, too barren for the season, they creak and settle around us. It already feels like summer, even though spring is just beginning. Swallows flit between our branches, wingtips just a breath away. Their song carries on the breeze and echoes between our trunks. We would smile if we could. An echidna, stout nose prodding gently at half-decomposed detritus and termite mounds, shuffles between us, feet tripping slightly on our surface roots. It can't even find insects to eat. Our brittle needles snap and give away under its gentle weight. The sun warms our canopy, breaking through to our floor between our shy crowns, and speckles the too-dry shrub with shifting, dappled, winking flecks of gold. We drink in its rays while wishing instead for rain, waiting for today's solstice night to fall.
By Tessa Markham4 years ago in Earth
Not Enough
Polar Bear Den, Ellesmere Island, Canada I blink furiously, eyes shimmering in the sunlight as I squint through its new brightness for the first time. The snow is soft beneath my paws and its countless flakes cling to the fur between my toepads. I turn my head, ears flicking, and look all around. It’s the solstice, the first day of spring, and the sky is so big. I thump into a sitting position, still looking at the cloud-dotted blue, and feel the breeze through my fur. Our mother said the days will only get longer from now until winter, but I can’t wait to see the stars. My brother starts to run off, kicking snow into my nose as he goes past, his head wagging excitedly from side-to-side. I respond in kind, shaking my head, and hop up to go after him. I can still barely see past the glare of sunlight on the snow. From behind, a low cuff, like an almost-growl. My brother and I skid to a stop, paws digging into the snowpack, and turn to our mother. She growls again and we return.
By Tessa Markham4 years ago in Earth
Floods
Puffin Colony, Maine, USA The wind rushes past, ruffling along the back edges of my feathers and stinging my eyes. My partner flies beside me, her wingstrokes almost in tandem with my own. We dip and glide between the ocean’s updrafts, flying in earnest towards the coastline far ahead, just below the horizon. The breeze shifts into warmer currents as we approach the shore, the one we see every year. Just a slope of green before the larger rocky coastline behind it, this island is where we come to breed; this is the island where I was born. We come back every year on the solstice, nesting before summer starts to come. Other pairs land first and latch their feet onto the land, one in front of the other, as they put their beaks to the ground, wings still outstretched. Some of them bump against one another and they part their beaks in momentary annoyance. Then their wings fold and they duck their heads into their burrows. My partner lands just before me and I follow. As she goes to inspect the outer edges of our burrow, the one we’ve used each year, I dip my head inside it.
By Tessa Markham4 years ago in Earth
Rising Seas
Iron Age Village, Orkney, Scotland Ocean waves crash to my left against ragged cliffs of stacked sedimentary rock only a few feet tall. Speckles of salty foam breach the too-tall berms and shower the yellowing marram grasses. Short blades fade into moss and then lichen along the rocky shore, stone and sand mixing in a gradient along the inshore berm. The lapping of waves on the beach melds with the whistling of wind across the island. Green hills tinged with fragmented yellow stretch out before me. They look flatter than I thought they were. A low wall stands to my right, sweeping through the grass in a rounded square, almost a circle. It’s rough and worn and doesn’t come up past my knees. I pivot and lean down over it, looking into the central indentation and the stone structures within. Small rectangles of packed earth bordered with thin stones line two walls and a doorway stands in the third, topped with the earth and grass that surrounds me. Dew gathers at the upper edges of the walls, teasing its droplets between the stiff grass and cold stone. There’s a half-open structure built into the wall farthest from me, and a hearth, empty and void of ashes, sits squarely in the middle of the room.
By Tessa Markham4 years ago in Earth
Freedom within a Lie
Freedom within a Lie The ocean, how vast it is. The end is not seen from the beginning nor is the beginning seen from the end. Adonia reach out to touch the horizon but was unable to grasp it. The ocean is the great freedom that so many yearn for, but are never able to obtain. The wind danced through her auburn hair as she stood on the precipice longing to go out into the great abyss. The sound of the ocean was like a lullaby to her as it called her, asking her to follow it out into the great wide fortress. “What waited for me? What do I wait for?” Her heart twists and turned as the saltation of sapphire and jade colors played within her mind. The salty sea pressed hard upon her lips; she can taste it the sweetness combined with bitterness, she could taste freedom. Oh, how she knew that if she ran to what she desire she would never stop running; for one cannot truly reach that which they yearn for within their hearts. The ocean; the ocean is like a siren speaking, asking, crying, calling with softens, like one would call to a lover. Unbearable pain burned through her chest; for she knew the truth, but could not bear to believe it. “What if? What if I am wrong? What if this knowledge was not freedom but a curse? What if!” Tears fell softly from her eyes as she crumbled to the hard cold ground. She had nothing, her soul felt empty as the unknown memories rushed through her mind again. She bit her tung and clenched her eyes, “Stop it,” She whispered, but the memories continued. A face of a man she never met, a battle she never fought, a moment she never had continued. “Stop it!” She screamed. The sound of thunder broke her trance as she looked up to see dark clouds making their way to her. The wind kisses her ice-cold skin as rain drops began moistening the ground. Tears continue to roll down her cheeks, “Help me,” She muttered as she kept her eyes to sky. The ocean dances between her legs, calling her to come in, calling her to follow. She pressed her hands hard against the muddy sand as she grasped as much sand as she could in her grip. Tears continue to roll down her face as she let out a silent scream. The sensation of soft sand and cold bitter water submerges her hands and feet. “I can’t.” She whimper. Her heart and mind were torn between reality and fiction, between the truth and a lie. But which one was it? What was the lie and what was the truth? The sound of crashing filled her mind again with memories she should not have. The bitter taste of war, of fighting, of loss was almost unbearable. Tears stream faster down her checks, they refused to let up not giving in, not giving her a second of peace.” Why?” She muttered under my own sorrow. She looked up to watch a glimpse of the sun fairies shinning above the water. “I can’t do this.” She muttered as her body became limp and she fell to the cold sand. She rolled over onto her back allowing the rain to calm her mind. Slowly she began to drifted off into the land of no return.
By Brianna Gliori4 years ago in Earth
Omicron may induce a less severe illness. A laboratory research provides some insight into why this is the case.
Early observations of human cells in a lab dish reveal that the omicron variation of SARS-CoV-2 is less effective at entering the lungs and propagating from cell to cell than other variants of the coronavirus.
By Prasad Madusanka Herath4 years ago in Earth
Arctic - the Winners and Losers of Climate Change
No other region of the world has transformed as rapidly as the Arctic in the recent past. Global warming has led to a loss of ice cover in the north, which exposes the dark-colored ground. This ground absorbs more heat from sunlight and further leads to heating up of the region, leading to further depletion of ice cover. Arctic amplification, as this process is commonly known, has been the leading cause of what has been the steepest temperature rise in the world. Images of malnourished polar bears, to which most of us are desensitized by now, are literally just the tip of the iceberg. The temperature rise, loss of ice sheets, growth of vegetation, and opening of trade activities along the North Sea route, Northwest and Northeast passages are all creating a positive feedback loop of unprecedented changes in one of the last and the most pristine safeguarded ecosystems of our planet.
By Rishi Rathi4 years ago in Earth
Lalita and the Banyan Tree
Lalita never planned to fall in love with a tree. The women noticed first. They could not fail to observe Lalita’s glow, skin lit as if she'd swallowed one of her diyas--tiny brass candleholders with ghee-soaked wicks--and the flame illuminated her from within. The women’s faces, however, drooped like sunflowers abandoned by sun as Lalita’s had also once done. They watched and wondered at the tree.
By S. Venugopal 4 years ago in Earth
