Moontanman

Gee whiz guys is this paper really that uninteresting? I am have been obsessing over it for days an what it would mean for the prospects of extraterrestrial life not to mention the wild stories that could be written about such a weird place! Thank you for your replies Raider5678

Golly gee, thanks for the heads up, writing is so beyond me...

Mass and gravity would have an effect on the size of organisms but higher gravity would result in smaller creatures. lower gravity would result in larger creatures... that pesky cube square law would apply....

I was thinking more of the amount of mass necessary to increase the earths mass significantly enough from being smaller and have gravity weak enough to allow larger animals. Of course there are other reasons why this is a non starter, less mass means less gravity and a loss of atmosphere. I admit that I was using the standard talking points of this very old argument that says the earth was about the size of mars, I apologize for that assumption...

The same amount of energy is released when 200 tons of sand grains hit the earth as a 200 ton rock. Google terror birds, all birds were not small. Using your logic since bats are so small elephants cannot exist and the atmosphere does not add significant buoyancy to anything that is denser than air.... Even birds drop like rocks if they stop flying... I criticize you because you are so far off the mark there is precious little to show you. You think you saw a problem, your incredulity does not a problem make. The dinosaurs were large, so far you have offered no explanation as to why you don't think they could be large other than pseudo science of the worst kind...

Well then why worry about where it came from or where it went... ?

The multi giga tons of matter necessary to significantly affect the mass of the earth would render the surface uninhabitable due to the energy released. Even dust adds energy, much like the idea that comets struck the earth and froze mammoths in place it is a total non starter. A comet impact would have incinerated mammoths not freeze them. The same would be true for the millions of giga tons of mass the earth would have to pick up over 200 million years. I would like to see a citation about the oxygen content being higher and the atmosphere being denser and more buoyant? You think sauropods were slender? You need to support these notions...

Was this animal an aborted attempt by echinoderms to evolve into active animals in competition with animals like arthropods? http://paleobiology.si.edu/burgess/hallucigenia.html

What has got to do with the premise of the earth being completely covered by water?

200 million years of dust would only be a drop in the bucket if you are postulating that lower gravity helped dinosaurs exist. I'm not sure what the moon being slightly closer or the day being slightly shorter has to do with it. Please elaborate...

There are bacteria that photosynthesize and live in anoxic conditions, can you imagine how bad oxygen would smell to creatures that evolved to breath hydrogen?

I like a little bit of coffee with my cream...

I think you need to show your evidence that the earth was smaller, the rest of what you assert about the earth and moon is only marginally true. The Earth and life existed for hundreds of millions of years before there were dinosaurs an the continents have clumped together and spread about more than once... . When you think of dinosaurs don't think large lizards, think birds, birds are to dinosaurs what bats are to mammals. If you really think bees can't fly I would suggest stirring up a bumble bee nest and watch them crawl after you...

Does anyone on the list have expertise in freshwater crustaceans? I am looking for an online source of information.

Yeah my wife makes me drink non fat milk...

That is an interesting question and could be a good experiment... I'm betting that some cyanobacteria could do it, not so sure about higher plants..

The modern consensus on dinosaurs is that even the large sauropods were strictly land dwellers. They had hollow bones and air sacs and a respiratory system analogous to modern birds. To some extent their large size was fundamental to eating plants. Thier huge stomachs were fermentation vats and they probably ate constantly. I would like to know how the earth got to it's size we see today if it was significantly smaller during the reign of the dinosaurs. The large insects that were mentioned did not live during the time of the dinosaurs but lived in the carboniferous period when the air contained more than 30% oxygen. When the oxygen levels fell the large insects died out. Mammals and dinosaurs developed at about the same time but dinosaurs out competed the mammals and rule the earth for something like 170 million years. Mammals were suppressed by the superior dinosaurs..

I am not sure it is or is not good for you but I love it! If my wife would let me I'd drink heavy cream

You are predisposing a particular god, one that is trivially falsified or an immoral sadist or possibly just doesn't give a flying flip about humans... The concept of god isn't limited to the Islamic Judeo Christian god, while I am not even sure what a god is, it is reasonable to say the idea of god is pretty much a personal thing with all believers varying their belief to suit their personal needs. To answer the question "what is god" you would first have to define the term god then we can possibly get a handle on the answer to the op's question...

The Bible is not evidence of anything, the bible is the claim that requires evidence.... Current christianity which was gelded during the enlightenment is completely different from the christian religion we see today. Yes christianity was spread at the point of a sword, various denominations persecuted each other often to the death over points of dogma. the christianity you see not is one that the power of life an death has been stripped from. Before that millions of people were killed, often in horrible ways over points of dogma, others were killed because they either didn't believe or believed in other gods...

This article is a bit goofy but the fish and the pictures are awesome! Do we have any native fish enthusiasts on Texas? Ever encounter these fishes? I think they are related to Flathead Catfish but their underground environment has changed them considerably. They are occasionally brought up out of wells, such fish cannot be sent back due to the way the wells are constructed. Breeding them would be quite a feather in the cap of the breeder! https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jun/19/blind-catfish-discovered-texas-cave-mexico Do we have members from Texas who are familiar with this fish?

Hey guys, we have discussed worlds with hydrogen breathing life forms and the main stumbling block has been how do you develop technology with out fire! Now it looks like fire might be possible after all, this may very well suggest that we oxygen breathers may be a minority so this is just one more way we are not special!

This paper suggests some very interesting possibilities about life on other planets. Dense hydrogen atmospheres might support life on super Earth type planets! http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4284464/ Does this suggest that fire could take place? Would this indicate that hydrogen breathing life forms on super earths dominated by hydrogen might be more common than oxygen dominated terrestrial planets? If so what could this indicate for exo life and our search for such life?