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The fossils are 2.1 billion years old, the scientists say, fully three times older than previous estimates of when complex life evolved. The fossils were reported in the British journal Nature.
Quote:
The team found more than 250 specimens, which are shaped somewhat like cookies with a lumpy interior. The organism looks nothing like any forms of life we know today, but they have a couple familiar traits: their cells appear to have a membrane-bound nucleus housing and protecting its chromosomes, the genetic blueprints for life.
It's certainly a strange looking thing, as well as fascinating. Some of the largest of the fossils found are about 4.7 inches in size (12 centimeters). It's hard to guess if it's an early plant or animal.
Here's another link with some more info about it. Includes a larger image of the reproduction, as well as a photo of someone olding one of the larger fossils. Cosmic Log - Earliest traces of complex life?
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That's why I love science. Just when you think you have a good working theory something new comes along and throws a wrench in the gears. Man I love discovery.
It's certainly a strange looking thing, as well as fascinating. Some of the largest of the fossils found are about 4.7 inches in size (12 centimeters). It's hard to guess if it's an early plant or animal.
Here's another link with some more info about it. Includes a larger image of the reproduction, as well as a photo of someone olding one of the larger fossils. Cosmic Log - Earliest traces of complex life?
Makes me think of a precursor to a shell in sea water.
Keep in mind that this is still all speculation. Fossils form under unique, and for the most part -lucky- conditions. For every one fossil found, millions, perhaps billions, of organisms did not fossilize. There are also huge gaps of time with no fossil record to the tune of millions of years, so who knows what else is out there that we may find?
Anyways, this thing looks more advanced than the sponge-which is said to have been the first.
Possibly, there was new life which was completely extinguished, but other critters took their places...maybe with the exception of types of life that can live in extremely harsh conditions, such as those found in very hot environments or places that have no oxygen -- that kind of thing. Others could maybe live in hot, sulfuric places, or in other places where it is extremely cold.
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