[Script Info]
Title: 
[Events]
Format: Layer, Start, End, Style, Name, MarginL, MarginR, MarginV, Effect, Text
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: There is a theory that scientists once dismissed as absurd:
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,that long ago the earth became so cold, every inch of it was entombed in ice.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The whole planet became one vast snowball,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and it lasted for 10 million years.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Theme Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Earth has no more terrible force than an ice age.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Only 5 times in its 4 billion year existance
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,has our planet suffered this kind of catastrophe.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,No one is certain what started them, or why they happened,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but there is one thing about ice ages on which most scientists agree:
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the conventional view is that no matter how ferocious the advance of the cold in any ice age,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,there will always be parts of the world that are safe and warm.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The freeze spreads out slowly from the poles,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but never reaches the hottest part of the planet, the tropics.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It has long been assumed that this is a basic law of nature.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The tropics can never freeze.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But then, this basic law of nature can't explain what happened 600 million years ago in Namibia.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Jazz Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Paul Hoffman is one of those defiant geologists who disputes the conventional view.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,He has spent years trying to convince his colleagues about the snowball earth.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,As a scientist, I was completely convinced it was right.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But I knew I was going to have a struggle on my hands.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Because any idea as radical as this is going to be difficult to get across,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and there are going to be skeptics for sure.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: The place Hoffman and his colleague, Dan Schrag,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,come back to study again and again is Namibia.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It is not an obvious place in which to seek evidence of a catastrophic ice age,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it is a land of relentless heat.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,One of those locations that has been in the tropics for hundreds of millions of years.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The conventional laws of nature say an ice age could never have penetrated here.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But lurking among these sun-baked rocks is something that the conventional laws of nature
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,cannot explain away.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,600 million years ago, these hills were at the bottom of the ocean,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and lying on the old sea bed are mysterious boulders.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Eerie Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Geologists call them drop stones,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and drop stones could only have been brought here by one thing: a glacier.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,To recreate drop stones in the lab, first you need ice.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,This is going to take a while.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: The ice needs to float on shallow water above a sandy sea floor.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,This is to simulate a glacier as it flows off the land, onto the surface of the sea.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Because it is carved through the landscape, a glacier always collects a huge amount of rock debris.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The ice would then get filled up with all sorts of boulders and cobbles,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and in this case, we're just using some gravel,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,which we can pour on top of this layer of ice in our tank here.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: Having recreated a boulder-filled glacier, you need to melt the ice.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Crashing sound]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,As the ice melts, the boulders are released.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,While most of the ice has melted at this point,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,you can see that all the rocks that the glaciers carried out to the ocean
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,are now dropped to the sea floor.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,In addition to all of this--in the real world--boulders,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,there would also be a lot of sand, and a lot of much finer gained sediment.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And so these rocks would get filled in with very fine-grained sediment as well.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: In a few thousand years, the fine-grained sediment will cement itself together to form rock.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,With the boulders trapped inside.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And that's how drop stones are made.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,All you need is a glacier.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The message from the drop stones suggests just one thing:
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Namibia, in the tropics, a place that everyone says has been hot for hundreds of millions of years,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,must once have been covered in ice.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The most compelling evidence here is the juxtaposition of a large boulder like this
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,enclosed within very fine and delicately layered sediment.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And so it's difficult, if not impossible to imagine any way to account for this
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,other than a very extensive glaciation.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But for 50 years, since the idea that an ice age must have smothered the tropics was first proposed,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it has been deemed so radical that most scientists have dismissed it as absurd.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The theory has its roots in the 1940s, when a young geologist called Brian Harland,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,made a series of intrepid field trips deep into the arctic.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Conditions were very different then.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Man hauling in the old Scotch tradition.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It was cold, but, um, you get used to it.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,You can get used to anything, really.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: In the arctic, Harland had ample opportunity to learn all there was to learn
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,about that tell-tale sign of glaciation, drop stones.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Glacier deposits were a very dramatic occurrence, very distinctive, easy to identify.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And when I saw them, I knew from my own experience that this is glacial.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I didn't have to think very hard about it.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: But it was when he returned from the arctic, armed with his new-found knowledge,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,that Harland made his scientific breakthrough.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,With his now expert eye, he analyzed rocks from all over the world.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,What he discovered amazed him.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Almost everywhere he looked, in rocks formed about 600 million years ago, he found drop stones.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Classic evidence that there had once been thick ice, even on the hottest continents.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The drop stones were so wide-spread that Harland began to contemplate the unthinkable.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The fact is that we've got evidence of a global glaciation.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: He knew it made no sense.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,He knew that at the peak of the last ice age, which ended just 10,000 years ago,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,ice spread down to where New York is today, but no further.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But the evidence was staring Harland in the face.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Evidence which seemed to flout the laws of nature.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,600 million years ago, the drop stones said, ice had spread over every continent.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Right across the tropics, to the equator itself.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It meant there must have been an ice age of unimaginable ferocity.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,In fact, too unimaginable.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,When Harland presented his theory of global glaciation, colleagues dismissed it as laughable.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The skeptics had a whole host of reasons why Harland had to be wrong.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Reasons that were utterly convincing,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,as they were based on the most basic rules about how the world works.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,For a start, it's a given that the tropics, that wide belt around the earth,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,has always received the full glare of the sun.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,As they have always basked in sunlight, so they must always have remained warm.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Even during the last ice age, geological evidence suggests the tropics were pleasantly hot.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And they had another reason why the snowball theory must be wrong.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There was a far simpler explanation for drop stones in the tropics,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,one that was absolutely consistent with scientific knowledge,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and which didn't involve a ludicrous idea like the tropics freezing over.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Continents drift.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,They scrape across the surface of the earth at about the same pace that your fingernails grow.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,This means that in about 400 million years, continents can shift from one end of the globe to the other.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Obviously, the doubters said, 600 million years ago all the continents had drifted into icy polar regions.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Once there, glaciers would have formed, and drop stones would be common in all rocks of this area.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And after those drop stones had been formed at the poles,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the land and the drop stones would have been carried back down to the tropics by continental drift.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,For years, this remained the accepted explanation for why drop stones appeared everywhere.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The only way to make the theory of a global glaciation credible
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,was for someone to make the impossible possible.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,They would need to find a way for the tropics to freeze over.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And this is just what happened next.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Counting in German]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Explosion]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It was the 1960s, the height of the cold war.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The world was obsessed with calculating the odds of surviving a nuclear holocaust.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It was known that a series of massive nuclear explosions
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,would create clouds of dust, smoke and soot.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Sunlight would be blocked out.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Hypothetically, the earth would enter a nuclear winter.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,A man-made ice age.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,In the Soviet Union, finding out how severe this man-made ice age could be
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,became the task for one climatologist.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Mikhail Budyko was that man.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Long ago, probably 25 or 30 years,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I compiled a number of studies which could be used to describe origin of ice ages.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: What Budyko was to uncover would fly in the face of conventional wisdom.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,He would show how those predictions, that the tropics couldn't freeze over,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,were complacent and unfounded.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Budyko knew that because the land and oceans are dark,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,they absorb most of the heat coming from our sun's rays,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and that is how our planet is warmed up.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But sheets of ice are white.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,They reflect sunlight like a mirror.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,So an ice-covered earth absorbs far less solar heat.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,During an ice age, as the freeze spreads, the earth grows whiter.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,More heat is reflected away, so less and less heat is absorbed.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And so the earth grows ever colder.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It means that potentially, the Earth could be
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,caught in an vicious circle of unstoppable freezing.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Budyko converted this hypothetical scenario into a mathematical formula,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and that formula produced a terrifying prediction.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The Earth's climate has a theoretical breaking point.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Dramatic Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: As long as the ice sheets remain close to the poles,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the Earth is safe but if the freeze continues,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,such as might happen in an nuclear winter,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,they could advance down to about where Texas is today.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Once the freeze had reached that point,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,so much of the Earth would be covered in white ice
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but over half the solar heat that normally warms the planet
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,would be reflected back into space.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,At that point, there wouldn't be enough heat left to warm up the Earth.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Once this happens, there could in theory, be a runaway freeze.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,A freeze that nothing could stop.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Temperatures plummet, ice sheets spread across all the continents,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the oceans and eventually, even the tropics.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,If this was ever to happen, the entire planet would be trapped in ice.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There would be a snowball Earth.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,What was most disturbing about Budyko's calculations
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,was that an Earth encased in ice would reflect so much solar heat,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it could never warm up enough to thaw, ever.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It was one billion and twenty years ago that the system
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,will be stable for a very long time and possibly,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,all life will disappear.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: This was Budyko's paradox.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,He had shown that a runaway freeze could ice over the tropics in theory,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but he had also shown that it could never have happened in practice
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,because if it had, the world would still be a snowball today
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and that would mean we would never have existed.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,For 15 years, nobody could solve the paradox of the runaway freeze.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The snowball Earth theory remained a logical impossibility.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,To resurrect the theory, believers would have to do two things.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,First, they had to prove that ice really had reached
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the hottest parts of the planet, the tropics and that the
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,dropstones hadn't arrived there merely through continental drift.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Second, they had to come up with a theory that offered
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,an escape from the runaway freeze.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,That was when a new scientist had entered the picture.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,In the late 70s, Joe Kirschvink was one of geology's rising stars
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and back then, he thought the idea of a snowball Earth was mad.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The willingness to accept a nutty idea like freezing the whole planet
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,really needs to be supported by incredibly strong evidence
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and overall, if you had asked me to place a wager in the late 70s,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I would've been on the conservative side on that one.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: Kirschvink's conservatism came about because he believed
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the simple conventionalist explanation of why there were dropstones at the equator today.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,600 million years ago, he thought, all the continents must've been
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,up near the icy poles when the dropstones were formed.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There was however only one technique to test this theory,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and it just so happened that Kirschvink had dedicated
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,his entire professional career to that technique.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It involved magnets and Kirschvink is a man in love with magnets.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I have wiped out my credit cards so many times by playing with strong magnets,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I don't like to remember it.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: Few people realize it but every rock is a weak magnet.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Each one contain magnetic minerals and the direction
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,these minerals pull in is fixed forever the moment the rock is first formed and
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,what gives these minerals their magnetic direction is the magnetic field around the Earth's core.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,This means that rocks formed at the poles will always have a
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,magnetic direction that points up and down.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Rocks formed at the equator will always have a
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,magnetic direction that points from side to side.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The rocks have the ability to preserve magnetic direction
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,because of magnetic minerals in them.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,They act like little compass needles and will line themselves up.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: By finding a rock's magnetic direction, Kirschvink is able to
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,identify where in the world it was originally formed,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,no matter where continental drift might've taken it in the millions of years that followed.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,In the 1980s, Kirschvink heard of a team of Australians who had run
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,tests which they claimed showed evidence of glaciers in the tropics.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Ever the skeptic, Kirschvink decided to duplicate their tests on his own, more sophisticated equipment.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It meant examining dropstones from some of the hottest parts of Earth.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The question was were they already at the equator when they were
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,formed by the ice or had they been created at the poles
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and then carried to the tropics by continental drift?
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,To answer the question, Kirschvink turned to his pride and joy:
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,a custom built, hyper-sensitive magnetometer.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It's an incredible instrument.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,You lower the sample into the actual magnetometer chamber.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The weak magnetic field of the sample generates an electric current
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and so it allows us to measure the magnetic moment of an extraordinarily weak magnet.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,One billionth say the level of a ordinary hand magnet type thing.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: Attached to the magnetometer was a computer which plotted
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,each rock's origin on an electronic outline of Earth as seen from above.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The center of the circle represented the poles, the circumference, the equator.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,If the dropstones had been formed at the poles, as Kirschvink and everyone else thought,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,they would show up at the center of the circle on the computer.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,If they had been formed at the equator, they would show up at the circle's edge.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The machine gave its answer.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The dropstones had been formed in the tropics.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,600 million years ago, there must have been a snowball Earth.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Here's a fundamental theorem in science.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,If a theory is in conflict with data, modify the theory.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There's so many wonderful, beautiful theories that have been slaughtered by a nasty little fact.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: But Kirschvink was racked by the insurmountable paradox of the runaway freeze.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,That if a snowball Earth had ever happened,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,then science said that we should still be entombed in ice today.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,How do you get out of it?
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Obviously, the climate modelers had assumed that that was
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,a irreversible step and that you would never get out of it
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and yet, we're out of it now and if we'd been in it before,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,at some point, we must've gotten out of it.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: To get out of the deep freeze, what Kirschvink needed was
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,a power that would stay hot, even when the whole planet had frozen over.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Something that Budyko hadn't thought of, something that could burn forever, something like hell.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Looking at an active volcano, realize that magma tens or hundreds of kilometers
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,below the surface couldn't care less whether there was a thin layer of ice over the oceans.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It would still emerge.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: Volcanos survive ice ages because they have a direct channel
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,to the molten rock deep within the Earth,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,rock that reaches temperatures of over a thousand degrees but that would
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,only melt ice in their immediate area.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Kirschvink has spotted something else about volcanos.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,They also produce gas 10 billion times a year.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,One gas volcanos emit in huge quantities is carbon dioxide,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,a gas that causes the greenhouse effect and global warming.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Today, carbon dioxide is being pumped into the atmosphere by both volcanos and industrial activities,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but what stops the Earth from overheating is that we have a natural way
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,of removing the excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Rain is the Earth's natural cleaning agent.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,As it falls through the atmosphere, each droplet of rain
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,absorbs carbon dioxide and cleans the air but Kirschvink realized
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,that on a snowball Earth, there could've been no rain.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The snowball was so cold, all the water on the planet's surface was frozen solid.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Without liquid water, nothing could've evaporated into the air
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,so there would've been no clouds and without clouds,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,there can be no rain.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There would've been nothing to stop the carbon dioxide from the volcanos
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,from building up over millions of years.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It would've caused global warming on an inconceivable scale.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Kirschvink came across calculations showing that after 10 million years without rain,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the atmosphere would've been 10% carbon dioxide.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Today, it's far less than 1%.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,This extra carbon dioxide would've created a greenhouse effect
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,that raised the temperature to an average of 50 degrees Centigrade,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,hotter than the Earth has ever been.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Hot enough to melt the ice.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Kirschvink: And that seemed to be a natural and plausible escape.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Certainly enough to break the snowball or the ice condition.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: Joe Kirschvink had cracked it.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,He had found the way out of the runaway freeze,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,a way that made perfect scientific sense.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,A way that was consistent with the laws of nature.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Kirschvink: The realization that we may have found
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the way out of the snowball, it was wonderful.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: By 1990, Kirschvink had evidence that the tropics
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,had frozen over for 10 million years and he had
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,come up with a theoretical escape route from the runaway freeze,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but the problem was it was just a theory.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,He had no physical evidence to prove the ice had melted
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,because of an extreme greenhouse effect and without that evidence,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the snowball Earth theory continued to be ignored.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,In 1992, Paul Hoffman entered the story.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,One of geology's most respected but open-minded figures.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,He was to turn into one of the snowball Earth
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,theory's most fervent disciples.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I loved the snowball Earth theory.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I mean it's almost a religious ferocity with which
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I want to get across this saga of Earth history with
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,so many twists and turns and events that are
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,so far outside our own experience.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: Hoffman's mission was to find that
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,hard evidence that had eluded Kirschvink.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The final piece of the puzzle that would
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,prove the snowball had ended because of the greenhouse effect
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and he knew just where to start looking.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Namibia.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Hoffman was drawn to Namibia first by the dropstones
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but even more by what sat immediately on top of them.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Towering directly above were huge formations called cap carbonates.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Calcium carbonate crystalized into rock.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,These bizarre structures seemed to appear right out of the blue.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Above this line right here, ??, no more stones whatsoever
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,so the glaciation must've come to an abrupt end
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and sitting directly on top is a thick pile of carbonate
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and it's puzzled geologists for generations.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Dramatic Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: What really puzzled geologists was that caps made
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,from calcium carbonate are usually formed in warm water,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but in Namibia, they had suddenly appeared on top
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,of an ice cold glacier.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,What this indicates is that you go from glacial conditions
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,to an ocean that is warm in a flash.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: To most geologists, this instant change from
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,cold to hot defied their understanding
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but Hoffman suspected it might be a huge clue.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,That the sudden appearance of mountains of
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,calcium carbonate must somehow be connected to
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the death of the snowball in a colossal greenhouse effect.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But how?
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Hoffman needed someone to explain why
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,calcium carbonate would be formed not just because
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,of warm conditions in general but specifically in the
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,conditions created by a melting snowball Earth.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,So he turned to a geochemist, Dan Schrag.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Painstakingly, they analyze the snowball's theoretical
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,final moments, stage by stage,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,working out what chemical and climatic processes were at work.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,First, they realized that as the ice melted,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it would produce liquid water.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The water would then evaporate, and create clouds
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and those clouds would cause a change in the weather,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the likes of which has never been seen by human eyes.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Daniel Schrag: When the ice is retreating,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,this is probably the most spectacular climate change
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,in Earth's history.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,In some ways, we're going from the coldest climate
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the Earth's ever experienced to the warmest climate
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the Earth's ever experienced.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,We immediately say that this was the mother of all climate changes.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: The most elemental powers of nature
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,would be unleashed upon the Earth.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,One would predict hurricanes of such intensity that are unimaginable
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,so it's quite possible you could've had waves of
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,100 meters in amplitude coming in and crashing
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,in on the shore.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It would be unbelievably violent.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: And above all, there would be rain.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The first rainstorms for millions of years.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Rainstorms that would last at least a century
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and it wouldn't be just any rain.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The rainwater would react with the vast quantites
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and form carbonic acid.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,This acid rain would then deluge the Earth.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The acid rain would pound the exposed rocks,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,producing a violent chemical reaction.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It would break the rocks down into their constituent parts,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,one of which was calcium.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,This would then fuse with the carbon in the acid rain.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The result, mountains of calcium carbonate,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,exactly as they could see right above the dropstones in Namibia.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Suddenly, it became clear that the natural expectation
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,of a prolonged global glaciation ending in extremely
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,high levels of carbon dioxide was that you would expect
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,these very unusual thick carbonate rocks should
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,immediately follow the glacial deposits.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: Hoffman and Schrag had found the final evidence.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Schrag: The beauty of the snowball Earth theory is exactly that
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it links the chemistry, the geology, the planetary science
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and bam, bam, bam, all of the facts
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,are consistent with the predictions of the theory.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Jazz Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: In 1998, Hoffman and Schrag made an
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,triumphal tour of the world's universities,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,promoting the snowball theory,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and then someone threw a spanner in the works.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,An entire scientific discipline, the biologists took one look
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,at the 10 million year long snowball Earth and said
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it was quite simply impossible.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,One scientist who had problems with the snowball was Guy Narbonne.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,He like many other biologists could see there was a
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,fundamental problem reconciling the snowball Earth theory
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,with what he knew.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The geological evidence speaks very strongly
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,of ice sheets marching on the equator.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The biological evidence speaks very strongly of open water
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,being available at this whole time.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: Narbonne's problem was another set of nature's law.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Nothing less than the laws that governed life itself.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,600 million years ago, when the snowball was set to have struck,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,there was nothing living on the land.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It all existed in the sea and it was not life as we know it.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The most common organism on the planet was this.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Cyanobacteria.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,This mass of cyanobacteria is so ancient,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it predates even the snowball.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The oldest fossils that we have in the world
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,are stromatolites and these are colonies like you see here.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,They're made out of literally billions of cyanobacteria.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: What made cyanobacteria and more sophistocated
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,ancient organisms like green algae essential to the snowball
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,debate was that they photosynthesize.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Just like plants today under the water, these lifeforms
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,absorb sunlight and convert it into energy.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,So these species' chances of surviving the snowball
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,would've depended on whether there was enough
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,sunlight for photosynthesis in the snowball seas
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,at a time when every inch of the planet was
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,allegedly covered in thick ice.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Light penetration through ice is not great if the ice
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,is more than a couple tens of meters thick.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: And that was the problem biologists pointed
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,to in Hoffman and Schrag's work.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Their calculations had reckoned on the snowball
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,producing ice sheets up to a kilometer thick,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and even in the warmest places around the equator,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,they would've been tens of meters thick.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,More than enough, biologists believe, to block out
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,any sunlight from the oceans and that meant death
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,to most things that depended on photosynthesis for life.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narbonne: You cut off photosynthesis and within a few years,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,let alone a few million years, mass extinction.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: It meant that many of the photosynthesizing
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,species should've become extinct 600 million years ago
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and the trouble was they hadn't.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Cyanobacteria grow in rock-like colonies all over the tropics today
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,as do other photosynthetic plants, dating from before
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the snowball like green algae.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,For many biologists, there seemed to be only one possible conclusion:
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,there may have been a severe ice age but not a fully
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,fledged snowball that covered all the oceans
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,because lifeforms that should've died out are still with us.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Unless someone could find a way for marine life
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,to survive under a thick sheet of ice,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the whole theory would be back in the bin.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Then along came the man from NASA, Chris McKay.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Chris McKay: I'm planetary scientist with an interest
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,in life in extreme environments.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,In particular, environments that are cold and dry.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Several years ago, I saw the papers about the snowball Earth,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,indicating the geological evidence that the Earth was ice covered
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and had been ice covered for millions of years.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Plus the evidence that there are organisms (bacteria and green algae)
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,that survived this ice covered state and that's the puzzle.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,How could these photosynthetic organisms survive?
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: McKay was intrigued because it just so happened
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,he had visited a place on Earth today that was so cold,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it could actually be compared with the snowball of 600 million years ago.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Antarctica, the coldest place on Earth.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Here, temperatures can fall to -30.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Almost as severe as the snowball at its warmest point, the equator
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and deep in Antarctica are the dry valleys where there are lakes
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,smothered by an ice sheet many meters thick.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,McKay: We think these little lakes represent a good
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,model for looking at the snowball Earth.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Could there be life underneath the ice cover on a snowball Earth?
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: Scientists were eager to discover if there was
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,enough light for life to survive in the water below the thick ice.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,They were about to be astonished.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There was light, lots of it
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,even though over head,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the ice was five meters thick.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There was so much light,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the water was filled with plant life and bacteria,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,including two organisms dating from the time
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,of the snowball that would've needed sunlight to live.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,McKay: When we're diving in the lakes
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and swimming around, there's life in the water.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There's bacteria, cyanobacteria
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but there's also green algae.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: And McKay had a hunch as to why this
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,photosynthetic life could survive.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It was something about the nature
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,of the ice itself.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,McKay: The transparency of this ice is very high
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and it's due to the fact that it's freezing very slowly
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,underneath this thick ice cover.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Now let's imagine this snowball Earth where
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,there's also a thick ice cover,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the ice on the bottom is freezing very slowly as well,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it should have the same optimal properties
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,as this clear, clean ice.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Narrator: By freezing slowly, water rejects impurities
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,such as salt or dirt which make it cloudy.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,So the ice becomes clean and transparent.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Because of this transparency,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,life giving sunlight would've been reaching down
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,into the snowball seas.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,McKay realized that even at its height,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,there would've been havens around the snowball's
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,equator where the ice was thin enough
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,for photosynthetic life to cling on below but there was more.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Although disciples of the theory accept
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the snowball would've been death to most things,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,they argue whatever life did survive
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,would've emerged into a new world almost
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,devoid of competition.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The perfect conditions for an explosion of evolutionary change.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,These fossils show the new species which appeared
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,soon after the time of the snowball.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,All display a massive increase in size and complexity
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,from the simple organisms that lived before.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,These are the first multi-cellular lifeforms.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Even those with some questions about the snowball theory
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,recognize a new climate after a mass extinction
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,could be a spur for evolution.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Music]
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But if the snowball can change the course of life on the planet,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,there remains one final question.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,No one knows why the snowball happened
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,or if it could happen again.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The sun is hotter than it was 600 million years ago
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and is getting hotter all the time.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Climate trends would have to change dramatically.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,If it ever did happen again,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it almost certainly wouldn't be for millions of years
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but if it ever did, that would mean death to almost everything
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,including us.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Music]