In July 2023, the world experienced three consecutive days which were the hottest day on record. In fact, an interview with the Washington Post cited that it was the hottest day for 125,000 years. What does that mean? Well, today's episode will put that number into prehistorical and historical context, as well as compare our current global warming to an example of change from the Cretaceous.
1) Blum, M. G. B., and Jakobsson, M. (2010), Deep Divergence of Human Gene Trees and Models of Human Origins. Molecular Biology and Evolution 28(2): 889- 898. 2) Cavalheiro, L., Wagner, T., Steinig, S., Bottini, C., Dummann, W., Esegbue, O., Gambacorta, G., Giraldo-Gómez, V., Farnsworth, A., Flögel, S., Hofmann, P., Lunt, D. J., Rethemeyer, J., Torricelli, S. and Erba, E. (2021), Impact of global cooling on Early Cretaceous high pCO2 world during the Weissert event. Nature Communications 12: 5411. 3) Dee, M., Wengrow, D., Shortland, A., Stevenson, A., Brock, F., Flink, L. G. and Ramsey, C. B. (2013), An absolute chronology for early Egypt using radiocarbon dating and Bayesian statistical modelling. Proceedings of the Royal Society A 469: 20130395. 4) Gómez-Robles, A. (2019), Dental evolutionary rates and its implications for the Neanderthal–modern human divergence. Science Advances 5(5): eaaw1268. 5) Haber, M., Jones, A. L., Connell, B. A., Asan, E. A., Yang, H., Thomas, M. G., Xue Y. and Tyler-Smith, C. (2019), A Rare Deep-Rooting D0 African Y-Chromosomal Haplogroup and Its Implications for the Expansion of Modern Humans Out of Africa. Genetics 212(4): 1421-1428. 6) Hublin, J.-J. (2017), The last Neanderthal. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 114(40): 10520- 10522. 7) Jones, D. (2007), The Neanderthal within. New Scientist 193(2593): 28-32. 8) Osborne, M., Smithsonian Magazine (2023), Earth Faces Hottest Day Ever Recorded- Three Days In A Row (online) [Accessed 07/07/2023]. 9) Pettitt, P. B. (1999) Disappearing from the World: An Archaeological Perspective on Neanderthal Extinction. Oxford Journal of Archaeology 18: 217-240. 10) Plant, V., Exeposé (2019), Things are Heating Up (online) [Accessed 07/07/2023]. 11) Sands, L., Washington Post (2023), This July 4 was hot. Earth’s hottest day on record, in fact (online) [Accessed 07/07/2023]. 12) Stringer, C. (2012), The Status of Homo heidelbergensis (Shoetenstack 1908). Evolutionary Anthropology: Issues, News and Reviews 21(3): 87- 125. 13) Su, D., The Conversation (2022), How many ice ages has the Earth had, and could humans live through one? (online) [Accessed 07/07/2023]. 14) Zhang, S., truthout (2023), July 3 Was the Hottest Day on Record. Then July 4 Came Along. (online) [Accessed 07/07/2023]. 15) Author unknown, CNN (2023), Global temperatures break heat record (online) [Accessed 07/07/2023]. 16) Author unknown, Smithsonian Museum of Natural History (date unknown), Homo neanderthalensis (online) [Accessed 07/07/2023]. 17) Author unknown, Wikipedia (date unknown), Mesozoic (online) [Accessed 09/07/2023]. 18) Author unknown, Wikipedia (date unknown), Palaeogene (online) [Accessed 09/07/2023].