Scientists are getting very close to bringing a few iconic species, like woolly mammoths and dodos, back from extinction. That may not be a good thing.
It’s not that long gone. There were still mammoths around when the pyramids were built. Plus there’s still huge swaths of tundra and taiga that they could live on, with a lot of the same plants, even if it’s quite a bit warmer.
A good measurement for human timescales is the age difference between a child and their grandfather (~50 years, basically one generation of oral tradition).
The mammoths died out 80 grandfathers ago.
It’s not that long gone. There were still mammoths around when the pyramids were built. Plus there’s still huge swaths of tundra and taiga that they could live on, with a lot of the same plants, even if it’s quite a bit warmer.
In the grand scheme of things the pyramids were built relatively recently, but I’d still consider it quite long ago
Measured in human life it’s long ago. measured at universal scales, it was nothing.
A good measurement for human timescales is the age difference between a child and their grandfather (~50 years, basically one generation of oral tradition).
The mammoths died out 80 grandfathers ago.
That’s an interesting unit of measure for sure. I do get what you’re saying–that’s sort of the limit to where some knowledge can reach.