Documentary Reports 1 Flashcards
Big History Horsepower
Romans wore tunics, but they were awkward for riding a horse to battle. Romans noticed some of their enemies wore something form fitting; pants. Pants were perfect for fighting and riding a horse in battle. This was the start of people wearing pants, because of riding horses.
Evolution of land animals
There are an estimated 6.6 million land animals (counting insects) [MN: Do we believe these all fit in Noah’s ark?]
[If you deny evolution, then God had to make every creature in the beginning for them to be around today!]
Gold
4.6 billion years ago, the heavy metals sank to the Earth’s core. In the core, 1,800 miles down, there is an estimated amount of Gold to cover the Earth 12 feet thick. But we cannot get to it. The enormous depth plus volcanic heat and pressure prohibit it.
Big History Salt
All life began in the ocean. Laying eggs brought ocean with animals so they could live on dry land.
We need salt to live! Salt in our blood makes it work. Salt in brain gives us ability to think thoughts and the sensation of being a conscious, sensient being. The ions in salt permit us to think and auto control our body, for example organs, like heart, lungs, pancreas, our immune system.
Our sweat, our tears, our blood, womb embryo fluid have same percentage of salt content as the ancient oceans.
The majority of early American roads are paved over animal trails made by herds looking for salt. Buffalo, NY named from herds looking for salt.
Salt was valuable as gold in ancient times. It was taxed to finance the Great Wall of China! Workers were paid in salt. Expressions like “worth his salt” evolved from this fact.
Latin word for salt is “Sal”. It is prefix for many words in use today. Salary, Sauce, Sausage. The Egyptians cut out the entrails of dead pharoahs and filled the body cavity with salt. The Egyptians feared the pharoah’s body would rot before he was accepted into his after life. So they removed entrails and filled body cavity with salt to “Save the body until the pharoah made it to his next life. This action started a new word. Sal Plus Vation or “Salvation” . This started the idea of Salvation.
All the world religions jumped on this bandwagon and ran with it, inventing the many new religions.
Because of Subduction, all the salt mines deep underground are remains of ancient oceans that evaporated. We know when we need to eat because of hunger. We know when we need to drink because of thirst. How do we know when we need salt? We crave it in our food!
Mountains
Without mountains there would be no wind breaks. Tornados and Gale force winds would continue to accelerate to the point nothing could live here.
Many mountain ranges are created from tectonic plate movement thousands of miles away. Mountains give us most rain and snow. Tall mountains have their own weather system.
**A perfect planet
**
S1E1 Volcanos
A Grizzly bear can eat 100,000 calories per day!
Wildebeest, a thousand born every hour. Only 1 in 10 survives to adulthood. Can walk minutes of being born.
The Sun is a nuclear reactor. Sun is younger than the Earth. Sun/3 billion years old. Earth/4.5 BYA.
All life on Earth gets its energy from the Sun.
Fig trees Part 1: Fig trees in the tropics create hundreds of figs that look like green apples. Inside the fig there are hundreds of flower seeds. The Fig Wasp burrows deep inside the fig, losing its wings because of the tight fit.
The wasp then fertilizes the flowers with pollen and lays eggs in the flowers. then the wasp dies!**
Part 2: After 5 weeks the male wasp are born and mate with their sisters with their telescopic penis which is twice their body length!
Then the males crawl outside the fig as decoys and are eaten by forest ants. While the female wasps escape and have only 48 hours to find another fig tree ripe for penetration of the fruit and repeat the pollen procedure just like their mother did;
Thousands of animals rely on fig trees for food, especially our ancestor, the Gibbon!
