Sex Drugs Disasters And The Extinction Of Dinosaurs Summary

This researcher proposes that the dinosaurs did not die of heat, in fact she thinks the opposite, that they froze to death instead. Both articles have the same idea about a meteorite hitting the earth yet there is no concrete evidence as to what caused the meteorite to strike and what it did when it got here.

The author states that there is a considerable evidence that dinosaurs were endotherms and provides three resons. In contrast, the professor states that many scientists have problem with the author arguments and she oppses each of the author's reasons.

“Sex, Drugs, Disasters, and the Extinction of Dinosaurs” is written by Stephen Jay Gould, professor of geology and zoology at Harvard. This essay is one of more than a hundred articles on evolution, zoology, and paleontology published by Gould in national magazines and journals. It tells about scientific proposals for the extinction of dinosaurs – a confusing but an exciting problem that humanity tries to solve. By analyzing and describing each of the claims for the reptiles’ demise – sex, drugs, and disasters – Gould differentiates bad science from good science and explains what makes some theories silly speculations, while the other, a testable hypothesis.

Gould praises Alvarez for his theory and the fact that it is flexible and sparks debate. Consider this: a man proclaims to the world that the sky is gray. This is not based off of any factual evidence, and it sparks no debate because people will either believe the theory against factual evidence or disagree with it because it is not factual. Now if a man were to say the sky is blue and openly inquire about why it is that color, new doors are opened, and discussion is created. Most people would believe this man, because his theory is based off of factual evidence, and it would generate a discussion because his theory raises a new question that can be spoke on limitlessly. This is the same point that Gould is trying to make; baseless thoughts shun discussion while factual ideas tend to open a forum for debate and new ideas.

The asteroid impact extinction theory began in 1980 with Luis and Walter Alvarez, a father and son team. They theorized that an asteroid struck the Earth at the close of the Cretaceous period, causing devastating effects and mass

It is difficult to envision that one of the greatest impact craters on Earth that measures up to 180km wide and 900m deep could just vanish just from sight. There have been many different dinosaur extinction theories offered in the recent decades. These range from poisonous plants to mass suicide by dinosaur herds. Although one concept as to how the dinosaurs became extinct has gained a wide acceptance since the 1980’s, involving a major earth impact by a meteor or comet (Icr.org, 2014). This horrific catastrophic event is thought to have extinguished up to two thirds of all animal and plant species, leaving behind a large crater found in Chicxulub, Mexico (LiveScience.com, 2014).

He narrowed his hunt down to a location in Denmark, where he had sent a colleague to perform an iridium analysis test at ("Asteroids and Dinosaurs: Unexpected Twists and an Unfinished Story," n.d.). When the results came back, Alvarez knew that whatever happened had not been a small-scale disaster. Once again, Alvarez was back to asking questions. What caused the increased iridium levels at the KT boundary? Except this time, he realized that his observations supported the ten year old hypothesis that had been proposed by paleontologist Dale Russell and physicist Wallace Tucker ("Asteroids and Dinosaurs: Unexpected Twists and an Unfinished Story," n.d.). They brought up the possibility of a supernova being the cause of dinosaur extinction. Supernovas are known to release high amounts of iridium, so such a hypothesis fit perfectly with Alvarez’s team’s discovery. However, the hope of having found a conclusion was short-lived. Luis Alvarez had mentioned that if said supernova had occurred that it would have released amounts of plutonium which would have been found alongside the iridium; no plutonium was found at either site. After more digging, the team came up with a new hypothesis ("Asteroids and Dinosaurs: Unexpected Twists and an Unfinished Story," n.d.). Perhaps an asteroid had struck Earth towards the end of the Cretaceous period, blowing enough dust into the atmosphere to

At the beginning of the passage, he tells the readers that two of these theories are speculation and the other is pure science but each one is hard to dismiss. Testicular malfunction, the first example, cannot provide enough evidence to support this theory, solely because a paleontologist cannot extract samples and information from a fossil and simply because testicles do not fossilize. The scientists proving this theory, E. H. Colbert for an example, admitted that testicular malfunction is just a hypothesis. Therefore, Gould believes that this theory is merely unusable, but not as disadvantageous as psychoactive overdosing. Drug overdosing, like sex, can not be tested because again, like testicles, livers do not fossilize. In addition, there is also not enough evidence to prove this theory explicable, thus becoming another speculation proposal. Consequently, the theory of asteroidal zapping is the exponential scientific reasoning for dinosaur extinction. This theory can be proven by Luis and Walter Alvarez, a father-son geologist team, who became the first to propose the idea of asteroidal collision. The father and son duo collected sediment samples from deep in the Earth’s core in which they found extremely high amounts of iridium. Iridium is a highly testable chemical, therefore allowing the theory of asteroid and earth collision to be plausible. Gould’s final analysis proposes that asteroidal collision is the most scientific theory among the three. The author believes the asteroid colliding with earth and changing its temperatures allowed for evolution to happen. In summary, Gould distinctly and carefully analyzes the three theories, showing his reasoning for his scientific

A handgun’s sole purpose is to kill a human being. Manipulating that power would lead to immense consequences, if the gun were to fall into the hands of an individual who is not in their right mind. Today, Nevada stands as the eighth state that enforces background checks on gun sales or transfers, through the work of Michael Bloomberg. Bloomberg’s Question 1 hypostatized Stephen Jay Gould’s article, “Sex, Drugs, Disasters, and the Extinction of Dinosaur” by illustrating the pseudoscience behind establishing universal background checks to limit gun control. David Montero’s “When it Comes to Gun Laws, Nevada Could be Edging Closer to California,” and John Lott’s “The Gun Question,” discuss the topic of gun control and Nevada’s proposal to limit the amount of people able to obtain such guns by instigating background checks. Nevada’s new law of gun transactions requiring comprehensive background checks is flawed and vaguely written, the government must first improve the accuracy of the background checks and resolve the ongoing issues of crime in poverty before progressing.

who theorize that volcanic eruptions could have been the cause for the extinction of dinosaurs

In “Sex, Drugs, Disasters and Extinction of Dinosaurs”, Stephen Jay Gould believes that the ridicule assertion inspired by current events can often lead to well idealized, experimental, and promising discoveries. Stephen Jay Gould is employed at Harvard University in the faculty of science portraying his knowledge as a professor. Evidently, He publishes various writings and further demonstrate his research and studies on the basis of science. Gould uses three different theories such as of how scientists assumed the dinosaurs became extinct. Firstly, he states Cowles’ idea of testes dying amongst male dinosaurs, due to the high temperature fluctuations. The highly heated body must have killed off the testes making them unable to reproduce will

Considering that Bill’s interpretation of scientific observation rests on human assumptions, for Bill, assumptions are necessary for understanding origins history. Accordingly, Bill uses assumptions as a starting point for thinking.

The impact hypothesis which is the asteroid discovered by the physicist luiz Alvarez played a role in causing the cretaceous mass extinction It was supported through evidence these facts are:

It seems like something out of a low-budget, alien sci-fi movie, but there is actually some scientific data to back this theory up. Astrophysicist Daniel Whitmire suggests that the mysterious alien planet not only may have killed the dinosaurs but is causing extinction at regular intervals on Earth. These intervals are said to be every 27 million years, so it's

According to the research made by Alvarez (1980), it was due to an asteroid impact that single-handedly destroyed dinosaurs to extinction. Advocacy of this mechanism has been aided by the availability and tangibility of supporting evidence in the form of impact craters- the Chicxulub crater in the Yucatan Peninsula's date and timing of impact (dating produced an almost exact date of 65 million years ago), location, enormous size-170 km (Hildebrand et al.1991) and its high iridium content ( a metal not commonly found at the Earth's surface) make it seem that with a theoretical asteroid 10 km big caused the crater great damage at the end of the Cretaceous (Alvarez et al. 1980).