Fun Time Facts
(Author’s Notes. A conversation with my sister Emily inspired this idea. If I get good feedback I might do something like this again. I might do it anyway, because I had fun.)
(Author’s second note. Initially there were going to be a lot more time facts, but the drawings took a long time. —almost irony. So I hope that these are mind blowingly cool enough to entertain despite scarcity.)
Ok so. An explainer as we begin. I was talking with one of my sister’s about the fact that wooly mammoths and humans roamed the earth at the same time, and more incredibly, while the pyramids were being built. And that lead me on a tangent about other interesting time facts that I just kind of have spinning around in my head, (it’s a pun, you’ll see why later) Which lead me realize that there are a lot of mind-blowingly cool time facts which I take for granted, but more people should know.,
So let’s start with the first one. (one you should already know if you nobly keep up with my blog.)
#1 Wooly Mammoths roamed the earth while the Pyramids of Egypt were being built.
The Egyptians built most of their pyramids between 2700 B.C. and 1500 B.C. (or 4700 and 3500 years ago) and Mammoths living on Wrangle Island died out around 2000 to 1600 B.C. (4000 to 3600 years ago) However Egyptians and Mammoths probably never met. Wrangle island is in the Pacific ocean between Siberia and Alaska, and the Egyptians never made it that far.
This fractured relief found in an Egyptian Tomb clearly shows how the pyramids were built.
(Image shows a man consulting Medjed about how to tame his wooly mammoth sidekick, while an alien abducts a pyramid in the background.)
#2. Megalodon, the giant shark we often associate with dinosaurs only went extinct 3 million years ago!
That’s when their teeth disappear from the fossil record. And we can be pretty certain that they are gone, because scientist speculate that they would have needed to shelter in shallow water nurseries until they reached their massive size. (and we haven’t found any Megalodon pups hanging out in any shallow waters.) Don’t worry, there are other cool giant predators like Orca’s. And Giant Sharks like Whale Sharks.)
Image not to (time) scale.
But the relative sizes are relatively accurate.
#3. Megalodons and Dinosaurs (of the non-bird variety) never shared the planet.
Despite their common association with Dinosaurs, (probably because their fossil teeth are popular, and because they are extinct like dinosaurs,) Megalodon only appeared in the seas somewhere between 20 million and 17 million years ago. Meaning that Megalodon missed any chance to snack on (or hang out with) non-avian dinosaurs by at least 46 million years.
Nathan’s own theory: The Giant Ocean Predator niche was already taken in the Mesozoic by overly clingy Elasmosaurs and Plesiousaurs. (also, there are some theories that shallow water marine reptiles would have out hunted shark pups who needed shallow water nurseries to grow big)
A star-crossed love. (it’s a pun, see facts #5 on)
(note the fossils in the rock layers. There were fossils of dinosaurs in dinosaur times. Poof! extra mind-blowing fact!)
#4. We are closer in time to T-Rex, than T-rex was to Stegosaurus.
Dinosaurs ruled for a long time. Long enough that entire groups appeared and went extinct. T-Rex, Triceratops, and other Late Cretaceous Dinosaurs lived about 66 million years ago. Stegosaurus lived 145 million years ago. A full 79 Million Years before T-Rex. (There’s a few million years of wiggle room.) This means that T-Rex Archeologists* would probably have been digging up Stegosaur fossils and trying to figure out what happened to those weird plated animals. *( I say archeologists, because I’m assuming one continuous Dinosaur history. If records were lost at the end of the Jurassic, then it would be T-Rex Paleontologists. Also, I like the name Indiana Bones better than AlanRex Grant) (This would have been a fun Drawing…. Oops….)
<Insert Drawing Here>
#5. It takes ~250 Million years for our Solar System to orbit the center of the Galaxy!
This leads to a lot of fun facts. Some will follow this impressive visualization.
1 Trip around the Galaxy for our sun. Featured Earth Era’s are: #1. Now: with a man, a mammoth, and Medjed. #2. The End of the Cretaceous with a T-Rex, a Triceratops, and a Chicxulub. #3. The middle of the Jurassic featuring a stegosaur and a sauropod named Steve. 4. The Triassic Era, featuring a Herrerasaur and a pitiful synapsid, (not exactly time accurate, but representative of the entire Triassic.)
The time goes. 250 MYA The solar system would have been 1 revolution back, just near the start of the Triassic. Approximately 106 million years later, or 5/12ths of a trip around the Galaxy it was the middle Jurassic. 80 million years later, and some dinosaurs were about to have a very bad day. And here we are 66 million years after that wondering what Medjed is hiding beneath that bed sheet. (look up Medjed to understant.) All that travel just to end up right back where we started (Galactically speaking. Universally speaking the Galaxy has moved to, and much more locally, a lot of things have changed.)
#6. The last time that the solar system was in the same, relative, Galactic Neighborhood. (1 full turn around the galaxy,) Was around the beginning of the Triassic. (I wonder those herrarosaurs, synapsids, dimetrodons, and etc. saw the same constellations we do.*
*(Probably yes and no, some of the stars hang out with us or are so far away it doesn’t matter. Others are new and different and move at different speeds around the Galaxy.)
#7. The Cambrian Explosion, when animals we know and love began to fill the sea was more than 2 revolutions around the galaxy ago.)
(Fossils show us that life on earth already began way before that. Stromatolites have been riding Earth, around the sun and Galaxy for at least 3.5 Billion years. (that’s 3.5 revolutions around the sun, duh, and 14 spins around the Milky Way)
<Just picture the same drawing from above with 2 spirals instead of 1>
#8. Considering the Earth is roughly 4.6 billion years old, the sun has carried our planet around the galaxy more than 18 times.
Isn’t it crazy to think that complex animal life has only been around for 12% of that time?
<Drawing 18 whirls would have been ridiculous so instead here is a picture I made of our galaxy. It is not accurate at all.>
No Satellites were harmed in the making of this 1000000000000000000% accurate self-portrait of the Author of this post.
Well, I think that’s all for today. I hope that you enjoyed the facts and the illustrations. Feel free to share them with others!
Also, check out the Junior Rangers Investigative Club Novels, which go into a lot more relevant, and National Park related, facts, histories and mysteries. The Treasure of Biscayne Bay is on the way soon!!!!! (The illustrations are way cooler and more professional!)