Climate change in the last 10,000 years
Here in the Holocene, the name given to the epoch representing the last 10,000 years or so, our planet is experiencing a period of relatively cold weather in geological terms. The planet has cooled constantly since the end of the Mesozoic and the time of the dinosaurs (65 million years ago).
It is true that if a graph of the average global temperatures were drawn, the line representing the temperature would not always tilt down to the present, for example, the world warmed up considerably during the early Eocene after the dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals as the Pterosaur had become extinct.
During this time in Earth’s long history, global temperatures are estimated at 2 degrees Celsius higher than in the geologic period of the Cretaceous, the time when Tyrannosaurus rex lurked the American plains of the North. However, there has been a trend in the last 65 million years or so for the average temperature on the planet to fall. Despite the fears related to global warming and climate change, the average global temperature is 14 degrees Celsius, compared to almost 19 degrees and 15 million years. Prehistoric Climate Change The geology of climate change has a huge impact on life, the difference between the changes we are seeing today and some of the changes in the past is the speed of change.
If the scientific predictions are correct, global temperatures could rise to about 5 degrees in 100 years. A radical change, which would have devastating consequences for a large part of the planet, many species could follow the path of the dinosaurs and become extinct.
The geological period in which we live today is called the Quaternary, it is divided into two epochs, the Pleistocene that began approximately 1.8 million years ago and the Holocene (recent time, the last 10,000 years). The Quaternary was divided into two parts, with a limit of 10,000 years ago because that was when there was a significant thaw in the ice sheets of the world, without taking more than 15-50 years.
This dramatic warming led to a series of extinctions, particularly among large mammals and other mega fauna. Iconic creatures from the Ice Age such as the Woolly Rhino and the Woolly Mammoth became extinct. Since this sudden warming, Earth’s climate has actually been more stable than during any other interval of 10,000 years in at least the last 200,000 years. Such conditions have helped our own species H. sapiens to thrive and current estimates suggest that the human population on our planet could reach a maximum in about fifty years in about nine billion people.
However, the impact of dramatic climate change could change all that. Last 10,000 years Relatively Stable Time This relatively stable period of global climate has allowed the human species to flourish, soon our population will surpass 7 billion. Our numbers and the subsequent demand for finite resources plus the effect that our species is having on the environment could generate problems in the future, not only for the so-called vulnerable species, such as some of the large mammals with which we share the Earth, but We remember that we are a large mammal too. Not only dinosaurs are vulnerable to extinction, our species could also suffer a similar fate.
Currently, according to biologists, the next largest large mammal on the planet at this time is the harp seal. This seal lives in Antarctica and there may be up to four million of these large mammals. Our species is extremely numerous compared to other mega fauna. Due to our predatory status and our dense population, our species could be exceptionally sensitive to sudden changes in climate.
