If life never emerged on Earth, would the continents still be more or less the same today? In other words, does life affect the formation and movement of continents significantly?

Sheridan · edit-2 6 months ago

If life never emerged on Earth, would the continents still be more or less the same today? In other words, does life affect the formation and movement of continents significantly?

Skua · 6 months ago

I’m not sure how much of a difference that would make. That’s less than the total cumulative CO2 emissions of China and the US, and it’s 1% of 1% of the total mass of the atmosphere

@ch00f · 6 months ago

That’s a good point. My number is all of the current biomass (according to Wikipedia), but all the CO2 we’ve produced since the Industrial Revolution was also originally captured by living things. So add all the gas and coal that ever existed on earth to that number.