At this point, I'd convict the asteroid for murdering the dinosaurs and the Deccan Traps for aiding and abetting. Thank you for guiding us through the new evidence. As always, you were clear and concise.
@GeoGirl Congrats on becoming a science communicator for the Geological Society of America! You're one of my favorite geoscience commentators on RUclips, always making things that are very complex easy to understand, even for a layman like me (but with enough depth and information and complexity that it's a real bit of learning, not a travel brochure on the topic). Cheers!
@@geosocietyyeah, congrats Rachel! Worm Wars guy here, how about a vid on what new insights Mars ExoGeologists have learned from pristine Mars, and how it has advanced thinking about Earths deep history? The insight that big enough asteroid impacts have volcanic traps at their antipode caught my eye, what else is there from geologists studying Mars? Anyhoo, if you're looking for a vid topic, file that one away😉. Been watching your channel since back when you were a Master's candidate, GREAT CHANNEL! From the beginning, too.
Thank you for this extremely informative video. As an adherent of the “impact amplified the eruptions” school of thought, I couldn’t resist commenting! Anomalously large eruptions in the Deccan Traps intensified very close to the time of the meteor impact and continued at an elevated frequency for 30,000 to 50,000 years following it, releasing about 70% of the magma during that relatively narrow period. The impact caused a brief hot period followed by an impact winter that initially lowered global temperatures in some areas by as much as 15°C, lasting up to two years. This cooling may have been partially offset by weathering, which sequesters CO₂, but weathering takes time, whereas a dramatic increase in CO₂ has more immediate effects. As a result, the increased volcanism raised CO₂ levels in the atmosphere, leading to an average global temperature rise of up to 8°C over several thousand years. Due to these dramatic temperature fluctuations, many plants and animals that survived the initial impact were ultimately killed off either by the intense cold or by the ensuing warming trend. In other words, this was a “double whammy” scenario, with the impact likely also playing a significant role in intensifying the volcanism in the Deccan Traps. The Traps were close to the antipode-the point on Earth opposite the impact-which would have experienced a focusing of seismic waves, likely contributing to the anomalously large eruptions post-impact. The bottom line is that Mother Nature was very, very angry-and humans were the beneficiaries. Humans probably wouldn’t exist without this impact event.
As several comments have noted, the question remains whether the Deccan Trapps were reactivated. I've seen some reconstructions putting them on the opposite side of the globe from the impact, where the seismic waves would converge. It's been asked so often I'm sure there's a team reconstructing their exact position at the time of impact, working out the physics of the shaking they would have received, comparing that to known volcanoes activated by large earthquakes or crustal rebound, and, most importantly, checking the layers for signs of a fresh pulse of flood basalts at that time. I also wonder if flood basalt eruptions that have been inactive a long time begin with a slightly different composition, like that rare slug of sticky andesite lava left over from a century-old event that Hawaii's 2018 eruption pushed to the surface down near the coast before switching to its usual effusive gushing. But even if all these clues answer whether the impact set off the Deccan Trapps (or other volcanism closer to thr impact site), I imagine it will be hard to distinguish the climate impacts of increased volcanism from the climate impacts of the carbonates and sulfates the impactor tossed into the atmosphere.
While the Deccan Traps eruptions may have made environmental conditions somewhat more difficult, from all the evidence I've seen (and it's been a research interest of mine for a long time, although at an amateur level) it was nowhere near severe enough to cause a major mass extinction. And while for a long time it was thought that dinosaur diversity was decreasing in the very latest Cretaceous before the impact, it seems that the more digging we do, the greater diversity we find leading right up to the impact event. The bottom line is that the Deccan Traps volcanism wasn't severe enough to cause the mass extinction, and the Chicxulub impact WAS severe enough to cause the mass extinction all by itself. It was both necessary and sufficient.
Thanks, Rachel. A few years ago The Atlantic wrote an article about Gerta Keller, and since then I’ve wondered whether we all jumped to conclusions about an asteroid wiping out the non-avian dinosaurs.
This big picture video does a great job of tying together all of the detailled videos about geologic composition and processes, especially on such an well known event. Well done GG. I have always been curious as to why the crocodilians survived but not the deep ocean reptiles. I would find a video about the difference of survival and demise of these two seemingly similar Archosaurs very interesting.
I enjoy the way you teach this subject. It all makes more sense with all the data on this event. Both parts 1 and 2 on the mass extinction event 65M years ago are very informative.
3:40 the meteor didn’t cause the DTs, but the DT was very close to the antipode of the meteor impact. It very likely greatly increased the Vulcanism because most of the energy is focused at the antipode and the impact site, and that happens more than once as the seismic wave reverberates around the globe multiple times.
When I was a geology student it was call the K-T boundary. Congrats for this recognition from your peers of your talent and knowledge. Another comment mentions the possibility of the Deccan Traps second pulse happening by being at the antipode of the impact. Any research on that possibility? I picture (hear) the earth ringing like the Liberty Bell from the impact of a supersonic BB. An ear-splitting "ting."
Oz has a pretty long chain of extinct volcanoes running down a North-South line off the East Coast a ways, consistent with continental drift over a hotspot. It ends in something called the New Volcanics Province (I think) just around Bass Strait. I have no idea what geological epoch that ties with, sry.
those volcanoes spit up enough lava in one million years to cover the earth every square inch of earth ten feet thick. That’s insane. But we know the asteroid impact was not survivable by anything large.
Ah. I gave my lay opinion before watching this other half of your presentation. I take back my lay opinion and defer to your greater knowledge. I should just be quiet I guess. Thanks again Dr Phillips for another video packed with information.
How common is vulcanism on the scale of the Deccan traps in geologic history? Is it a huge coincidence that we were in a period of vulcanism when the asteroid hit? or is it reasonably probable that the two events coincided? I think a lot of the public might find this story unbelievable because the only other trap rock that's widely known is the Siberian traps. And the extinction that resulted from the vulcanism that created the Siberian traps is largely considered to be a "once in geologic history" kind of disaster.
Exogeologists who study Mars found massive traps at the antipode of major asteroid impacts, and the geologic record is usually clearer on Mars than Earth. Are they SURE the traps preceded the impact on Earth? India is roughly at the antipode of Mexico, isn't it?
India was at a totally different location at the end of the Cretaceous than it is today. But either way, it's not antipodal now, and it wasn't then. For it to be antipodal today, the Deccan Traps would have to be in the southern hemisphere but they are well north of the equator. For them to have been antipodal at the end Cretaceous, they would have had to be about 180 degrees in longitude away from Yucatan. But they were only about 135 degrees distant.
Ah. That's the info I needed. Have seen graphics of India leaving Antarctic/Australian/S. American land mass and heading North, wasn't sure how far it had slid north by 66 MY ago. Thanks. Btw, anybody figured out where Siberian Traps were on the globe for the Great Dying (End Permian), and looked at that antipode? Probably in the middle of a huge ocean, but big asteroid impacts and volcanic traps are officially a thing now, apparently.
A point that's missing is that the volcanic activity was pretty much as far as it can be from the impact, which means it had probably weakened life where it was more likely to survive the astroid impact. And, the area that's too far from the volcano was mostly obliterated by the astroid. Also, the shock waves from the astroid most probably impacted the volcanic activity (but that impact good have gone in both directions, more erruptions or blockage slowing down the eruptions). One important thing to note is that there is often more than one contributing factor to anything. There might have also been other things going that aren't obvious (or not visible at all) in the fossil and geological records.
Back in the late 80's there was a guy on PBS who wasn't main stream but described and talked about 'dinosaur's were dying off' before the asteroid hit. He went over his evidence - which I can't totally remember, but part was rock layers, numbers of fossils and some other things. He was probably 40 or 50 at the time. I don't know if he went to vulcanism as part of the decline. I've since tried to find his videos, info anything but can't. Thank you for the information!
great video! really loved the way you explained the theories. but honestly, i'm leaning more towards the volcanic activity being the main cause. it just seems like the continuous eruptions could've had a more devastating impact on the climate over time, rather than a single asteroid strike. what do you think?
Very interesting video, thanks! I wonder what sort of time lag there was between volcanism and the related weathering/C sequestration. You said the latter may actually outweigh the former in climate effects, but if it is on a very protracted timeline, would many extinctions occur before the sequestration moderated the climate again? Not in this event, which seems to be complicated by the impact, but during other large volcanic events of this sort.
An interesting question would be if the Deccan traps allowed some SOME species to have already developed SOME adaptations which were useful in the post impact world.
This is an idea postulated by some paleontologists. Note, however, that the formation of the Deccan Traps took hundreds of thousands of years, with each eruption originating in fissures miles long and lasting months to years, pouring millions of tons of CO2 and SO2 into the atmosphere. This, undoubtedly, would have affected the global climate and various ecosystems negatively, but the time scale of the event allowed most species room to adapt, so, while some species would have died out, I'm not sure a mass extinction was in the offing.
It doesn't take much of a temperature change for fish to stop/start breeding. Here's a thought, Aves incubate their eggs. Just how prevalent among the other dinosaur was brood incubation? The food chain was disrupted, was the reduced sun light and its lower climate temperatures (initially ejecta dust in the upper atmosphere, right?) hit a primary metabolism driver like an oxygen secreting bacteria (just for example), or a staple micro-organism that fed filter feeders, and so on. Vulcanism triggered by the impact, gases that had photochemical or other light filtering effect stacking the Winter effect. ..
Well, if the Deccan traps occured hundreds of thousands of years before the Cretacious impact, then obvious the impact did not cause the Deccan traps But, the Dinosaurs did not go extinct because of the Deccan traps. Obviously, whatever dinosuars were in India of the time had to of been affected, and maybe Dinosaurs around the world as I'm sure the global weather had to of been affected. But note! The Dinosaurs took over because of a similar traps event in the Permian extinction. The traps then caused a million year rain which selected them to survive in such conditions. So, I don't think the Deccan traps would have caused the Dinosaurs to go extinct. Finally, we know the Dinosaurs did not survive the Cretacious impact. After the Cretacious impact, the Dinosaur age ended. So, it was the asteroid impact that caused the extinction of the Dinosaurs!
No, the question is not whether the traps caused dinosaurs to go extinct, it is just whether the traps contributed to their extinction (even if it was a 10% contribution compared to the impact's 90% contribution). I think many scientists agree that the traps caused some rapid global climate changes leading up to the KPg boundary and these changes may have caused declines in many species, which ultimately made them more vulnerable to the effects of the asteroid impact (thus, contributing to their ulimate extinction by making them more vulnerable). But of course, more research is required to determine the actual relative contribution of the traps compared to the impact before we can say any of that, that is just the idea. I hope that makes sense! :)
As you are surely well aware, Princeton’s Professor Gerta Keller has for some time been perhaps the most prominent and energetic proponent of the hypothesis that Deccan volcanism was the principal factor in the end-Cretaceous extinction, and skeptic of the model that a celestial-body impact was the main direct cause of that extinction event. Do you know if she, or colleagues allied with her on these questions, have weighed in on the research reported in the recent GSA Bulletin paper?
The fossil presents and composition of the rock layer supports a sudden cataclysmic event that covered the planet, whether or not that included volcanoes with the impact of an asteroid is debated.
Those quetzalcoatluses (quetzalcoatli?) from the palaeoart at like 1:05 lack wing membranes connecting to their ankles and it looks hilarious. I would seriously be so embarrassed if I were them rn, like looking down in a dream and seeing you’re not wearing any pants
Hi, I was wondering if you’ve heard of antipodal volcanism as applied to the Chicxulub impact? In this case, the shockwaves from the impact initiating a substantial acceleration of Deccan volcanism? Does the paper you link to discuss this relationship? Thank you. 🌎 ☄️
I study animal life in the Cenozoic, so the K-Pg extinctions is really just background noise for most of what I do. But someone once described this conundrum to me as "Every other mass extinction seems to have been caused by a large igneous province eruption, and no other asteroid impact seems to have caused a mass extinction... But this is the smallest igneous province eruption, so we're not sure it was enough, and the larges asteroid impact, so it likely had more of an effect." I'm curious how that sounds to someone more deeply embedded in the geology?
The Chicxulub impact was kind of a perfect storm of horrors. Not only was it very large, and MAYBE occurred at a very sensitive time, but it also hit at what might have been the worst possible location: A shallow carbonate bank comprised of limestone and evaporites such as gypsum, the perfect raw material to supercharge the atmosphere with CO2 and sulfur compounds. Had it struck farther from shore over deep oceanic crust, we'd have had big tsunamis and dust fallout, but probably not the long-term climate disaster that did occur.
First came the impact which was localized. Then came the aftermath of same which spread all around the world and did most of the killing for the next year or so. Most dinosaurs died of starvation as plant life died out. If any volcanoes popped off, that wou;ld have added to the doomsday shroud that enveloped the planet.
Well I think that just the volcanism wouldn't have wiped out the dinos. I think they went through more environmental stresses throughout their over 165 million years of existence. I think it's likely that even if they wouldn't have suffered the stress of the Deccan traps, which was perfectly reversible, they would still have been doomed by the asteroid. Or at best very very few of them would have survived, very hard to bounce back....
Why would dinosaurs and similar species have gone extinct entirely, regardless of the impact’s specific nature? How many other species faced extinction due to the same event, and is there evidence of a widespread extinction affecting various species? Could nature have been preparing an environment for modern species, including humans, to survive and thrive?
The extinction was not limited to dinosaurs. Lots of reptiles, most birds, and many mammal species also went extinct, as well as many specie of marine life. The patterns of extinction and survivorship indicate that the species most likely to survive the event were those that could burrow and/or hibernate, and could survive on scavenging and insects. Dinosaurs were largely too big and too specialized to get through the extreme impact and post-impact conditions. A few crocodilians, lizards, burrowing mammals, and a very few species of birds, possibly living in remote island refugia, were able to weather the disaster. It's possible there may have been a few non-avian dinosaur survivors in the immediate aftermath, but as their ecosystem was destroyed, they were basically re-starting from scratch, as were all other life forms. They were no longer in a dominant competitive position, and their survival or extinction may have been a matter of chance, as it was for many other short-term surviving species. To your last question, nature wasn't "preparing" anything, the species that survived evolved and diversified because that's what species do when introduced to new and relatively empty niches. They are "modern" species only because they happen to exist in the present, and calling them modern is strictly a bias coming from our own limited point of view. Lots of "modern" species: alligators, turtles, lizards, garfish, sturgeon, ants, pine trees, magnolias, etc.etc., still look and live very similarly to their Cretaceous ancestors.
9:00 re weathering and drawing CO2 sounds much like the plant life cycle, almost like this natural, chemical effect led to higher forms of carbon-based ... anyway, interesting stuff
CHoosing one or the other is a pointless argument. Having been responsible for troubleshooting on production lines you soon learn that it is never one variable that causes the problem but the interaction of several variables
Dr Phillips: You may want to check authoritative sources for the pronunciation of the word, “Deccan”. I was surprised to hear you pronouncing it, throughout this video, as “DEEK-uhn” - like the word, “deacon”. I’ve always heard it pronounced, “DECK-uhn”, although I grant I can’t state with absolute certitude that that is •the• correct pronunciation.
Why is there a debate. Clearly it was both. Hell, perhaps either on their own would have been survivable, but together, it's good bye, thanks for all the fish.
Subduction causes volcanisim ...🏝️🌎☄️🍽️🌍🌋 It would make sense after the earth consuming a large section of sea crust into the mantle that shortly thereafter the boiling water would turn to steam and erupt somewhere else depending on spin and impact velocity through the mantle
The debate between asteroid caused extinction vs volcanism caused extinction vs some combination caused extinction is not new and is not unknown to anyone who pays attention to science. What would be new is if physical evidence which helps to resolve the debate.
Why are you saying Deekan? The E here is clearly short, as it is followed by a double C. It comes from the Sanskrit word dakkan. There is absolutely no reason to change the short E to a long one.
Was dinosaurs stressed and decline because of the Deccan volcanos? I think we need evidence of this before making any conclusions about the volcanos impact on the extinction.
Did you watch the video? This new study was trying to help answer that question, although it's focused on how much or how little the eruptions affected the climate, which is easier to quantify than how they affected the dinosaurs.
This has been a matter of debate for decades now. Study is ongoing to clarify the sequence of events leading up to the Chicxulub impact and what happened afterwards. Some studies say the non-avian dinosaurs were doing fine up to that point, while others say they were in decline at the time. It'll take a few more decades, at least, to figure it out. Studying the fossil record and reconstructing environments and events from the distant past is like trying to figure out the plot of a movie when all you have to work with is scattered tiny fragments of individual frames. Perhaps one fragment only shows a piece of what seems to be a glass or a door, while another shows only a finger, and you only have a few dozen of these fragments out of the thousands of whole frames that compose the movie. From these, you have to deduce the movie's title, plot, the cast, director, etc. That's paleoarcheology in a nutshell, and it's why there's so much debate over what happened to the dinosaurs and other ancient animals.
![Digital Circus Episode 4 [TRAILER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/abZtsmMUbJo/mqdefault.jpg)
At this point, I'd convict the asteroid for murdering the dinosaurs and the Deccan Traps for aiding and abetting. Thank you for guiding us through the new evidence. As always, you were clear and concise.
@GeoGirl Congrats on becoming a science communicator for the Geological Society of America! You're one of my favorite geoscience commentators on RUclips, always making things that are very complex easy to understand, even for a layman like me (but with enough depth and information and complexity that it's a real bit of learning, not a travel brochure on the topic). Cheers!
Thank so much (this is Rachel/geo girl)! That is so great to hear! Comments like these keep me going :)
@@geosocietyyeah, congrats Rachel!
Worm Wars guy here, how about a vid on what new insights Mars ExoGeologists have learned from pristine Mars, and how it has advanced thinking about Earths deep history? The insight that big enough asteroid impacts have volcanic traps at their antipode caught my eye, what else is there from geologists studying Mars? Anyhoo, if you're looking for a vid topic, file that one away😉.
Been watching your channel since back when you were a Master's candidate, GREAT CHANNEL! From the beginning, too.
Thank you for this extremely informative video. As an adherent of the “impact amplified the eruptions” school of thought, I couldn’t resist commenting! Anomalously large eruptions in the Deccan Traps intensified very close to the time of the meteor impact and continued at an elevated frequency for 30,000 to 50,000 years following it, releasing about 70% of the magma during that relatively narrow period. The impact caused a brief hot period followed by an impact winter that initially lowered global temperatures in some areas by as much as 15°C, lasting up to two years. This cooling may have been partially offset by weathering, which sequesters CO₂, but weathering takes time, whereas a dramatic increase in CO₂ has more immediate effects. As a result, the increased volcanism raised CO₂ levels in the atmosphere, leading to an average global temperature rise of up to 8°C over several thousand years.
Due to these dramatic temperature fluctuations, many plants and animals that survived the initial impact were ultimately killed off either by the intense cold or by the ensuing warming trend. In other words, this was a “double whammy” scenario, with the impact likely also playing a significant role in intensifying the volcanism in the Deccan Traps. The Traps were close to the antipode-the point on Earth opposite the impact-which would have experienced a focusing of seismic waves, likely contributing to the anomalously large eruptions post-impact.
The bottom line is that Mother Nature was very, very angry-and humans were the beneficiaries. Humans probably wouldn’t exist without this impact event.
So, the dinosaurs went extinct because of A Series of Unfortunate Events.
As several comments have noted, the question remains whether the Deccan Trapps were reactivated. I've seen some reconstructions putting them on the opposite side of the globe from the impact, where the seismic waves would converge.
It's been asked so often I'm sure there's a team reconstructing their exact position at the time of impact, working out the physics of the shaking they would have received, comparing that to known volcanoes activated by large earthquakes or crustal rebound, and, most importantly, checking the layers for signs of a fresh pulse of flood basalts at that time.
I also wonder if flood basalt eruptions that have been inactive a long time begin with a slightly different composition, like that rare slug of sticky andesite lava left over from a century-old event that Hawaii's 2018 eruption pushed to the surface down near the coast before switching to its usual effusive gushing.
But even if all these clues answer whether the impact set off the Deccan Trapps (or other volcanism closer to thr impact site), I imagine it will be hard to distinguish the climate impacts of increased volcanism from the climate impacts of the carbonates and sulfates the impactor tossed into the atmosphere.
While the Deccan Traps eruptions may have made environmental conditions somewhat more difficult, from all the evidence I've seen (and it's been a research interest of mine for a long time, although at an amateur level) it was nowhere near severe enough to cause a major mass extinction. And while for a long time it was thought that dinosaur diversity was decreasing in the very latest Cretaceous before the impact, it seems that the more digging we do, the greater diversity we find leading right up to the impact event. The bottom line is that the Deccan Traps volcanism wasn't severe enough to cause the mass extinction, and the Chicxulub impact WAS severe enough to cause the mass extinction all by itself. It was both necessary and sufficient.
Thank you. " Why did the continents split up? They were drifting apart, so they decided to keep things tectonic."
You gave a top notch explanation. Nice job!
Thanks, Rachel. A few years ago The Atlantic wrote an article about Gerta Keller, and since then I’ve wondered whether we all jumped to conclusions about an asteroid wiping out the non-avian dinosaurs.
Interesting. I can't help thinking that shock waves from the impact probably trigger a global increase in volcanism, including the Decan Trap.
And the opposite side of the planet is where the shock waves would converge.
This big picture video does a great job of tying together all of the detailled videos about geologic composition and processes, especially on such an well known event. Well done GG. I have always been curious as to why the crocodilians survived but not the deep ocean reptiles. I would find a video about the difference of survival and demise of these two seemingly similar Archosaurs very interesting.
Thanks Rachel, your referenced paper is newer than the one I had originally found on the timing of the Deccan Traps vs. the Chicxulub impact.
I enjoy the way you teach this subject. It all makes more sense with all the data on this event. Both parts 1 and 2 on the mass extinction event 65M years ago are very informative.
3:40 the meteor didn’t cause the DTs, but the DT was very close to the antipode of the meteor impact. It very likely greatly increased the Vulcanism because most of the energy is focused at the antipode and the impact site, and that happens more than once as the seismic wave reverberates around the globe multiple times.
When I was a geology student it was call the K-T boundary.
Congrats for this recognition from your peers of your talent and knowledge.
Another comment mentions the possibility of the Deccan Traps second pulse happening by being at the antipode of the impact. Any research on that possibility?
I picture (hear) the earth ringing like the Liberty Bell from the impact of a supersonic BB. An ear-splitting "ting."
If you haven't yet, check out the part 1 to this video here: ruclips.net/video/xCMHQFXrO-8/видео.html ! ;D
I started from there.
Oz has a pretty long chain of extinct volcanoes running down a North-South line off the East Coast a ways, consistent with continental drift over a hotspot. It ends in something called the New Volcanics Province (I think) just around Bass Strait. I have no idea what geological epoch that ties with, sry.
those volcanoes spit up enough lava in one million years to cover the earth every square inch of earth ten feet thick. That’s insane. But we know the asteroid impact was not survivable by anything large.
Ah. I gave my lay opinion before watching this other half of your presentation. I take back my lay opinion and defer to your greater knowledge. I should just be quiet I guess. Thanks again Dr Phillips for another video packed with information.
I'm ready for part 2!
Cool, gratulations to your new job.
Hurray, part two! Just watched part one on Rachel's channel @GeoGirl
good job explaining the big picture. congratulations on your new position. FYI you have some really beautiful specimens on your shelves.
Thank you for the fantastic content. 👏👏
How common is vulcanism on the scale of the Deccan traps in geologic history? Is it a huge coincidence that we were in a period of vulcanism when the asteroid hit? or is it reasonably probable that the two events coincided?
I think a lot of the public might find this story unbelievable because the only other trap rock that's widely known is the Siberian traps. And the extinction that resulted from the vulcanism that created the Siberian traps is largely considered to be a "once in geologic history" kind of disaster.
Wow, I didn't know that osmium is so useful for geological events identification 😌
Thanks for the story !
P.S. This hairstyle fits you so well ! 👍❤
Exogeologists who study Mars found massive traps at the antipode of major asteroid impacts, and the geologic record is usually clearer on Mars than Earth. Are they SURE the traps preceded the impact on Earth? India is roughly at the antipode of Mexico, isn't it?
India was at a totally different location at the end of the Cretaceous than it is today. But either way, it's not antipodal now, and it wasn't then. For it to be antipodal today, the Deccan Traps would have to be in the southern hemisphere but they are well north of the equator. For them to have been antipodal at the end Cretaceous, they would have had to be about 180 degrees in longitude away from Yucatan. But they were only about 135 degrees distant.
Ah. That's the info I needed. Have seen graphics of India leaving Antarctic/Australian/S. American land mass and heading North, wasn't sure how far it had slid north by 66 MY ago. Thanks. Btw, anybody figured out where Siberian Traps were on the globe for the Great Dying (End Permian), and looked at that antipode? Probably in the middle of a huge ocean, but big asteroid impacts and volcanic traps are officially a thing now, apparently.
In 1985 I proposed that the impact caused the increased volcanic activity in other parts of the world, demonstrating how.
This theory certainly makes sense
Really interesting
A point that's missing is that the volcanic activity was pretty much as far as it can be from the impact, which means it had probably weakened life where it was more likely to survive the astroid impact. And, the area that's too far from the volcano was mostly obliterated by the astroid. Also, the shock waves from the astroid most probably impacted the volcanic activity (but that impact good have gone in both directions, more erruptions or blockage slowing down the eruptions).
One important thing to note is that there is often more than one contributing factor to anything. There might have also been other things going that aren't obvious (or not visible at all) in the fossil and geological records.
Back in the late 80's there was a guy on PBS who wasn't main stream but described and talked about 'dinosaur's were dying off' before the asteroid hit. He went over his evidence - which I can't totally remember, but part was rock layers, numbers of fossils and some other things. He was probably 40 or 50 at the time. I don't know if he went to vulcanism as part of the decline. I've since tried to find his videos, info anything but can't. Thank you for the information!
Wonderful. Cheers.
great video! really loved the way you explained the theories. but honestly, i'm leaning more towards the volcanic activity being the main cause. it just seems like the continuous eruptions could've had a more devastating impact on the climate over time, rather than a single asteroid strike. what do you think?
Part two!! 🍿 🍻
Very interesting video, thanks! I wonder what sort of time lag there was between volcanism and the related weathering/C sequestration. You said the latter may actually outweigh the former in climate effects, but if it is on a very protracted timeline, would many extinctions occur before the sequestration moderated the climate again? Not in this event, which seems to be complicated by the impact, but during other large volcanic events of this sort.
An interesting question would be if the Deccan traps allowed some SOME species to have already developed SOME adaptations which were useful in the post impact world.
FWIW, it seems plausible that dinos were in trouble due to volcanism and the impact was the 'coup de grace'
This is an idea postulated by some paleontologists. Note, however, that the formation of the Deccan Traps took hundreds of thousands of years, with each eruption originating in fissures miles long and lasting months to years, pouring millions of tons of CO2 and SO2 into the atmosphere. This, undoubtedly, would have affected the global climate and various ecosystems negatively, but the time scale of the event allowed most species room to adapt, so, while some species would have died out, I'm not sure a mass extinction was in the offing.
Geo Girl is such a dreamboat!
It doesn't take much of a temperature change for fish to stop/start breeding. Here's a thought, Aves incubate their eggs. Just how prevalent among the other dinosaur was brood incubation? The food chain was disrupted, was the reduced sun light and its lower climate temperatures (initially ejecta dust in the upper atmosphere, right?) hit a primary metabolism driver like an oxygen secreting bacteria (just for example), or a staple micro-organism that fed filter feeders, and so on. Vulcanism triggered by the impact, gases that had photochemical or other light filtering effect stacking the Winter effect. ..
Well, if the Deccan traps occured hundreds of thousands of years before the Cretacious impact, then obvious the impact did not cause the Deccan traps But, the Dinosaurs did not go extinct because of the Deccan traps.
Obviously, whatever dinosuars were in India of the time had to of been affected, and maybe Dinosaurs around the world as I'm sure the global weather had to of been affected. But note! The Dinosaurs took over because of a similar traps event in the Permian extinction. The traps then caused a million year rain which selected them to survive in such conditions. So, I don't think the Deccan traps would have caused the Dinosaurs to go extinct.
Finally, we know the Dinosaurs did not survive the Cretacious impact. After the Cretacious impact, the Dinosaur age ended. So, it was the asteroid impact that caused the extinction of the Dinosaurs!
No, the question is not whether the traps caused dinosaurs to go extinct, it is just whether the traps contributed to their extinction (even if it was a 10% contribution compared to the impact's 90% contribution). I think many scientists agree that the traps caused some rapid global climate changes leading up to the KPg boundary and these changes may have caused declines in many species, which ultimately made them more vulnerable to the effects of the asteroid impact (thus, contributing to their ulimate extinction by making them more vulnerable). But of course, more research is required to determine the actual relative contribution of the traps compared to the impact before we can say any of that, that is just the idea. I hope that makes sense! :)
As you are surely well aware, Princeton’s Professor Gerta Keller has for some time been perhaps the most prominent and energetic proponent of the hypothesis that Deccan volcanism was the principal factor in the end-Cretaceous extinction, and skeptic of the model that a celestial-body impact was the main direct cause of that extinction event. Do you know if she, or colleagues allied with her on these questions, have weighed in on the research reported in the recent GSA Bulletin paper?
Great review. FYI. I think it is deh-kn with a short e not dee-kn with a long e.
Well, at least we know why it took the Vulcans so long to make first contact . . .
The fossil presents and composition of the rock layer supports a sudden cataclysmic event that covered the planet, whether or not that included volcanoes with the impact of an asteroid is debated.
Those quetzalcoatluses (quetzalcoatli?) from the palaeoart at like 1:05 lack wing membranes connecting to their ankles and it looks hilarious. I would seriously be so embarrassed if I were them rn, like looking down in a dream and seeing you’re not wearing any pants
Hi, I was wondering if you’ve heard of antipodal volcanism as applied to the Chicxulub impact? In this case, the shockwaves from the impact initiating a substantial acceleration of Deccan volcanism? Does the paper you link to discuss this relationship? Thank you. 🌎 ☄️
I study animal life in the Cenozoic, so the K-Pg extinctions is really just background noise for most of what I do. But someone once described this conundrum to me as "Every other mass extinction seems to have been caused by a large igneous province eruption, and no other asteroid impact seems to have caused a mass extinction... But this is the smallest igneous province eruption, so we're not sure it was enough, and the larges asteroid impact, so it likely had more of an effect." I'm curious how that sounds to someone more deeply embedded in the geology?
The Chicxulub impact was kind of a perfect storm of horrors. Not only was it very large, and MAYBE occurred at a very sensitive time, but it also hit at what might have been the worst possible location: A shallow carbonate bank comprised of limestone and evaporites such as gypsum, the perfect raw material to supercharge the atmosphere with CO2 and sulfur compounds. Had it struck farther from shore over deep oceanic crust, we'd have had big tsunamis and dust fallout, but probably not the long-term climate disaster that did occur.
They really got double whammied at the end of the Cretaceous.
interesting, i never knew volcanism was even considered over the asteroid bad day visit.
the anti podes of the chixulub impact is deccan plateau,which erupted at 65 million years ago,isn't that weird?
First came the impact which was localized. Then came the aftermath of same which spread all around the world and did most of the killing for the next year or so. Most dinosaurs died of starvation as plant life died out. If any volcanoes popped off, that wou;ld have added to the doomsday shroud that enveloped the planet.
Speaking of something completely different. What are the drivers for convergent evolution apart for striving to fill the same food- nishe?
Well I think that just the volcanism wouldn't have wiped out the dinos. I think they went through more environmental stresses throughout their over 165 million years of existence. I think it's likely that even if they wouldn't have suffered the stress of the Deccan traps, which was perfectly reversible, they would still have been doomed by the asteroid. Or at best very very few of them would have survived, very hard to bounce back....
Why would dinosaurs and similar species have gone extinct entirely, regardless of the impact’s specific nature?
How many other species faced extinction due to the same event, and is there evidence of a widespread extinction affecting various species?
Could nature have been preparing an environment for modern species, including humans, to survive and thrive?
Nature has no purpose. Preparation requires cognition, and nature has no cognition.
The extinction was not limited to dinosaurs. Lots of reptiles, most birds, and many mammal species also went extinct, as well as many specie of marine life. The patterns of extinction and survivorship indicate that the species most likely to survive the event were those that could burrow and/or hibernate, and could survive on scavenging and insects. Dinosaurs were largely too big and too specialized to get through the extreme impact and post-impact conditions. A few crocodilians, lizards, burrowing mammals, and a very few species of birds, possibly living in remote island refugia, were able to weather the disaster. It's possible there may have been a few non-avian dinosaur survivors in the immediate aftermath, but as their ecosystem was destroyed, they were basically re-starting from scratch, as were all other life forms. They were no longer in a dominant competitive position, and their survival or extinction may have been a matter of chance, as it was for many other short-term surviving species.
To your last question, nature wasn't "preparing" anything, the species that survived evolved and diversified because that's what species do when introduced to new and relatively empty niches. They are "modern" species only because they happen to exist in the present, and calling them modern is strictly a bias coming from our own limited point of view. Lots of "modern" species: alligators, turtles, lizards, garfish, sturgeon, ants, pine trees, magnolias, etc.etc., still look and live very similarly to their Cretaceous ancestors.
Well explained. Thank you
9:00 re weathering and drawing CO2 sounds much like the plant life cycle, almost like this natural, chemical effect led to higher forms of carbon-based ... anyway, interesting stuff
Q: Volcanism or impact? A: yes
i'm sure it was a combination of the two.
'Maastrichian' goes reasonably well, but I'm fairly certain that Deccan is pronounced more like 'dekkan' than 'deacon' ;)
Vulcans could have altered the trajectory of that asteroid.
OKAY ASK THIS ONE QUESTION
WHAT AR MOST COMMON ON EARTH VOLCANOES OR ASTEROIDS
UM ?? =VOLCANOES
CHoosing one or the other is a pointless argument. Having been responsible for troubleshooting on production lines you soon learn that it is never one variable that causes the problem but the interaction of several variables
Dr Phillips: You may want to check authoritative sources for the pronunciation of the word, “Deccan”. I was surprised to hear you pronouncing it, throughout this video, as “DEEK-uhn” - like the word, “deacon”. I’ve always heard it pronounced, “DECK-uhn”, although I grant I can’t state with absolute certitude that that is •the• correct pronunciation.
Thanks for the feedback! I'll look into it :)
Why is there a debate. Clearly it was both. Hell, perhaps either on their own would have been survivable, but together, it's good bye, thanks for all the fish.
Subduction causes volcanisim ...🏝️🌎☄️🍽️🌍🌋 It would make sense after the earth consuming a large section of sea crust into the mantle that shortly thereafter the boiling water would turn to steam and erupt somewhere else depending on spin and impact velocity through the mantle
I thought it was smoking.
The debate between asteroid caused extinction vs volcanism caused extinction vs some combination caused extinction is not new and is not unknown to anyone who pays attention to science. What would be new is if physical evidence which helps to resolve the debate.
Both......Double Wammy.
Why are you saying Deekan? The E here is clearly short, as it is followed by a double C. It comes from the Sanskrit word dakkan. There is absolutely no reason to change the short E to a long one.
Was dinosaurs stressed and decline because of the Deccan volcanos? I think we need evidence of this before making any conclusions about the volcanos impact on the extinction.
Did you watch the video? This new study was trying to help answer that question, although it's focused on how much or how little the eruptions affected the climate, which is easier to quantify than how they affected the dinosaurs.
This has been a matter of debate for decades now. Study is ongoing to clarify the sequence of events leading up to the Chicxulub impact and what happened afterwards. Some studies say the non-avian dinosaurs were doing fine up to that point, while others say they were in decline at the time. It'll take a few more decades, at least, to figure it out.
Studying the fossil record and reconstructing environments and events from the distant past is like trying to figure out the plot of a movie when all you have to work with is scattered tiny fragments of individual frames. Perhaps one fragment only shows a piece of what seems to be a glass or a door, while another shows only a finger, and you only have a few dozen of these fragments out of the thousands of whole frames that compose the movie. From these, you have to deduce the movie's title, plot, the cast, director, etc. That's paleoarcheology in a nutshell, and it's why there's so much debate over what happened to the dinosaurs and other ancient animals.
I've always thought it was pronounced deck-in rather than deacon.
Depends on if you went to a US Ivy-league or British Oxford/Cambridge
This is like asking did the patient die due to a sudden traumatic event, or, was it the decades long diet of Macdonalds and pop?
Or, was it a micronova of the Sun which produces volcanic activity, massive floods and earthquakes and a rain of solar debris?