Eons: Surviving Deep Time

The swamps of the Late Carboniferous Period teemed with giant insects, but it’s time for the amniotes - the ancestors of all reptiles, birds, and mammals to come - to earn the title of Fully Terrestrial Vertebrates. It’s getting more crowded on land - could you survive?

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Eons is a production of Complexly for PBS Digital Studios.

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The End-Ordovician Extinction was the first of the so-called ‘Big Five’ mass extinctions in the history of life on Earth - more than 80% of species in the oceans died out. But could you survive its aftermath?

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Eons is a production of Complexly for PBS Digital Studios.

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In the ocean, the Cambrian Period was one of startling evolutionary innovations, but on land, it was barren, with no vegetation of any kind. In this strange world before plants made their way onto land… could you survive?

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Eons is a production of Complexly for PBS Digital Studios.

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By the end of the Devonian Period, the land had exploded with plant life and ancient invertebrates. There was also Tiktaalik - one of the first known vertebrates able and willing to move from the water to land. Our distant relative figured out how to survive in this dramatically different environment, can you? 

--

Eons is a production of Complexly for PBS Digital Studios.

If you'd like to support the show, head over to Patreon and pledge for some cool rewards!

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Introducing Eons: Surviving Deep Time! Season 2 of the Eons podcast is a longform exploration of a question we’re often asked: how long could a human survive if they were dropped into a particular period of the geologic past? 

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Eons is a production of Complexly for PBS Digital Studios.

If you'd like to support the show, head over to Patreon and pledge for some cool rewards!

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Season 2 of the Eons podcast is coming soon! This season will be a longform exploration of a question we’re often asked: how long could a human survive if they were dropped into a particular period of the geologic past? 

Studies have found Neandertal DNA in people living in - and descended from - populations in Europe, Asia, and, most recently, Africa. So, in a way, these ancient relatives of ours are somehow both here and gone. We know we shared the planet with them in the not-so-distant past… But what happened to them?

Eons: Mysteries of Deep Time is produced by Complexly for PBS.

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The Denisovans are a human relative discovered just over a decade ago. The DNA from the very small number of fossils found suggest they were around as long as the Neanderthals. Yet anthropologists have gathered way more evidence for Neanderthals. Where are the Denisovans hiding?

Eons: Mysteries of Deep Time is produced by Complexly for PBS.

How do we start to reconstruct the soundscapes of the past? Using modern environments, living representatives of ancient groups, and fossil anatomy, paleontologists have attempted to figure out what the past sounded like. And so far we’ve found the lead singers change, but the backup singers remain familiar.

Eons: Mysteries of Deep Time is produced by Complexly for PBS.

Between 1927 and 1937, paleontologists excavated fossils from about 40 members of the species that today we call Homo erectus from a site in China known as Dragon Bone Hill. And then World War II broke out and the fossils were lost. In this episode, we trace their path as far as the historical record will take us and explore what might’ve happened to them after their last sighting in early December, 1941.

Eons: Mysteries of Deep Time is produced by Complexly for PBS.