Earth life in half a billion years

[Potoooooooo]

I was re-reading the Chtorr series a a while back http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Gerrold#The_War_Against_the_Chtorr_2 , and mention was made of the invading ecology being half a billion years older than Earth life. Just what could be predicted about life on our world so far in our future?What forms could animal life take after so vast an amount of time?

 

[repoman]

Bad news, Potoooooooo...

In 1 billion years from now, the sun will be about 10% stronger and most life on earth will be extinct. Especially multicellular life. Only through a sunshade or getting the earth in a further out orbit can that be prevented. Good news is that there will be a lot of time to do that.

Peter Ward is an interesting researcher who talks about this.

 

[steve_bnk]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_of_the_Earth

The projected beginning of the end is in 100s of millions of years.

 

[fromderinside]

Bring in the sooth sayers.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I was re-reading the Chtorr series a a while back http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Gerrold#The_War_Against_the_Chtorr_2 , and mention was made of the invading ecology being half a billion years older than Earth life. Just what could be predicted about life on our world so far in our future?What forms could animal life take after so vast an amount of time?

The Chtorr had half a billion more years to evolve better ways to compete. That's not going to happen here, while there still will be life it's going to be a pale shadow of what we have now--C3 photosynthesis will be shutting down, leaving only the C4 plants. 7,600 of them compared to the vast numbers of C3 plants out there now.

 

[Potoooooooo]

The Chtorr had half a billion more years to evolve better ways to compete. That's not going to happen here, while there still will be life it's going to be a pale shadow of what we have now--C3 photosynthesis will be shutting down, leaving only the C4 plants. 7,600 of them compared to the vast numbers of C3 plants out there now.

On a related note, have you or anyone else here read the book series?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

On a related note, have you or anyone else here read the book series?

What book series are you talking about? Obviously we have read at least some of the Chtorr books if we are discussing them!

 

[Potoooooooo]

On a related note, have you or anyone else here read the book series?

What book series are you talking about? Obviously we have read at least some of the Chtorr books if we are discussing them!

The Chtorr series (sorry for not clarifying) I know the ecosystem was designed by a respected biology professor. I was trying to figure out the ideas behind it with out much luck. I corresponded briefly with David Gerrold but he is understandably cryptic. Given how long ago the last book in the series was published there is understandably little discussion of it on the web.

 

[Jokodo]

I was re-reading the Chtorr series a a while back http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Gerrold#The_War_Against_the_Chtorr_2 , and mention was made of the invading ecology being half a billion years older than Earth life. Just what could be predicted about life on our world so far in our future?What forms could animal life take after so vast an amount of time?

The Chtorr had half a billion more years to evolve better ways to compete. That's not going to happen here, while there still will be life it's going to be a pale shadow of what we have now--C3 photosynthesis will be shutting down, leaving only the C4 plants. 7,600 of them compared to the vast numbers of C3 plants out there now.[emphasis added]

Plants evolve too, and 500 years is a bloody long time. If you read Wikipedia's article on  C4_carbon_fixation, you'll find that it's 15-20 more time than since C4 first arose, and around 80 times longer than it took C4 to rise from ecological insignificance to it's current status of being responsible for up to 30% of the CO2 fixation (80% in some ecosystems).

C4 plants arose around 25 to 32 million years ago[11] during the Oligocene (precisely when is difficult to determine) and did not become ecologically significant until around 6 to 7 million years ago, in the Miocene Period.

500 million years ago, there were no land plants. Evolving something like today's biodiversity with C4 plants only -- given the relatively large and varied stock of existing C4 plants -- is a piece of cake in comparison.