0:00:00.880,0:00:02.880
So, this is a story

0:00:02.904,0:00:04.833
about how we know what we know.

0:00:05.690,0:00:07.825
It's a story about this woman,

0:00:08.611,0:00:10.547
Natalia Rybczynski.

0:00:10.912,0:00:12.960
She's a paleobiologist,

0:00:12.984,0:00:16.813
which means she specializes[br]in digging up really old dead stuff.

0:00:16.837,0:00:20.339
(Audio) Natalia Rybczynski: Yeah,[br]I had someone call me "Dr. Dead Things."

0:00:20.363,0:00:22.992
Latif Nasser: And I think[br]she's particularly interesting

0:00:23.016,0:00:24.930
because of where she digs that stuff up,

0:00:24.954,0:00:29.149
way above the Arctic Circle[br]in the remote Canadian tundra.

0:00:29.901,0:00:32.956
Now, one summer day in 2006,

0:00:32.980,0:00:36.171
she was at a dig site called[br]the Fyles Leaf Bed,

0:00:36.195,0:00:40.773
which is less than 10 degrees latitude[br]away from the magnetic north pole.

0:00:40.797,0:00:43.524
(Audio) NR: Really, it's not[br]going to sound very exciting,

0:00:43.548,0:00:47.578
because it was a day of walking[br]with your backpack and your GPS

0:00:47.602,0:00:51.680
and notebook and just picking up[br]anything that might be a fossil.

0:00:51.704,0:00:54.379
LN: And at some point,[br]she noticed something.

0:00:54.403,0:00:56.570
(Audio) NR: Rusty, kind of rust-colored,

0:00:56.594,0:00:58.529
about the size of the palm of my hand.

0:00:58.553,0:01:00.847
It was just lying on the surface.

0:01:00.871,0:01:04.323
LN: And at first she thought[br]it was just a splinter of wood,

0:01:04.347,0:01:06.640
because that's the sort of thing[br]people had found

0:01:06.664,0:01:10.083
at the Fyles Leaf Bed before --[br]prehistoric plant parts.

0:01:10.107,0:01:12.575
But that night, back at camp ...

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(Audio) NR: ... I get out the hand lens,

0:01:14.893,0:01:17.290
I'm looking a little bit[br]more closely and realizing

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it doesn't quite look[br]like this has tree rings.

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Maybe it's a preservation thing,

0:01:21.330,0:01:23.604
but it looks really like ...

0:01:23.628,0:01:24.829
bone.

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LN: Huh. So over the next four years,

0:01:27.766,0:01:30.700
she went to that spot over and over,

0:01:30.724,0:01:36.260
and eventually collected 30 fragments[br]of that exact same bone,

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most of them really tiny.

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(Audio) NR: It's not a whole lot.[br]It fits in a small Ziploc bag.

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LN: And she tried to piece them[br]together like a jigsaw puzzle.

0:01:46.941,0:01:48.386
But it was challenging.

0:01:48.410,0:01:51.230
(Audio) NR: It's broken up[br]into so many little tiny pieces,

0:01:51.254,0:01:55.512
I'm trying to use sand and putty,[br]and it's not looking good.

0:01:55.536,0:02:00.703
So finally, we used a 3D surface scanner.

0:02:00.727,0:02:02.316
LN: Ooh![br]NR: Yeah, right?

0:02:02.340,0:02:03.780
(Laughter)

0:02:03.804,0:02:06.547
LN: It turns out it was way easier[br]to do it virtually.

0:02:06.571,0:02:09.341
(Audio) NR: It's kind of magical[br]when it all fits together.

0:02:09.365,0:02:11.564
LN: How certain were you[br]that you had it right,

0:02:11.588,0:02:13.733
that you had put it together[br]in the right way?

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Was there a potential that you'd[br]put it together a different way

0:02:16.795,0:02:18.737
and have, like, a parakeet or something?

0:02:18.761,0:02:20.126
(Laughter)

0:02:20.150,0:02:23.790
(Audio) NR: (Laughs) Um, no.[br]No, we got this.

0:02:24.242,0:02:28.083
LN: What she had, she discovered,[br]was a tibia, a leg bone,

0:02:28.107,0:02:32.107
and specifically, one that belonged[br]to a cloven-hoofed mammal,

0:02:32.131,0:02:34.980
so something like a cow or a sheep.

0:02:35.004,0:02:37.464
But it couldn't have been either of those.

0:02:37.488,0:02:39.271
It was just too big.

0:02:39.822,0:02:43.886
(Audio) NR: The size of this thing,[br]it was huge. It's a really big animal.

0:02:43.910,0:02:46.768
LN: So what animal could it be?

0:02:47.291,0:02:49.871
Having hit a wall, she showed[br]one of the fragments

0:02:49.895,0:02:52.467
to some colleagues of hers in Colorado,

0:02:52.491,0:02:53.751
and they had an idea.

0:02:54.244,0:02:59.291
(Audio) NR: We took a saw,[br]and we nicked just the edge of it,

0:02:59.315,0:03:05.706
and there was this really interesting[br]smell that comes from it.

0:03:06.521,0:03:09.284
LN: It smelled kind of like singed flesh.

0:03:09.308,0:03:11.941
It was a smell that Natalia recognized

0:03:11.965,0:03:15.908
from cutting up skulls[br]in her gross anatomy lab:

0:03:15.932,0:03:17.096
collagen.

0:03:17.120,0:03:19.777
Collagen is what gives[br]structure to our bones.

0:03:19.801,0:03:21.959
And usually, after so many years,

0:03:21.983,0:03:23.134
it breaks down.

0:03:23.158,0:03:27.506
But in this case, the Arctic had acted[br]like a natural freezer and preserved it.

0:03:28.190,0:03:31.813
Then a year or two later,[br]Natalia was at a conference in Bristol,

0:03:31.837,0:03:35.031
and she saw that a colleague[br]of hers named Mike Buckley

0:03:35.055,0:03:40.895
was demoing this new process[br]that he called "collagen fingerprinting."

0:03:41.284,0:03:44.927
It turns out that different species[br]have slightly different structures

0:03:44.951,0:03:46.103
of collagen,

0:03:46.127,0:03:48.943
so if you get a collagen profile[br]of an unknown bone,

0:03:48.967,0:03:51.161
you can compare it[br]to those of known species,

0:03:51.185,0:03:53.723
and, who knows, maybe you get a match.

0:03:54.546,0:03:57.825
So she shipped him one of the fragments,

0:03:57.849,0:03:59.143
FedEx.

0:03:59.167,0:04:02.977
(Audio) NR: Yeah, you want to track it.[br]It's kind of important.

0:04:03.001,0:04:04.254
(Laughter)

0:04:04.278,0:04:05.469
LN: And he processed it,

0:04:05.493,0:04:09.855
and compared it to 37 known[br]and modern-day mammal species.

0:04:10.674,0:04:11.951
And he found a match.

0:04:12.824,0:04:17.436
It turns out that[br]the 3.5 million-year-old bone

0:04:17.460,0:04:21.090
that Natalia had dug[br]out of the High Arctic

0:04:21.729,0:04:22.923
belonged to ...

0:04:24.031,0:04:25.348
a camel.

0:04:25.372,0:04:27.103
(Laughter)

0:04:27.127,0:04:31.425
(Audio) NR: And I'm thinking, what?[br]That's amazing -- if it's true.

0:04:31.449,0:04:33.501
LN: So they tested[br]a bunch of the fragments,

0:04:33.525,0:04:35.769
and they got the same result for each one.

0:04:36.197,0:04:41.617
However, based on the size[br]of the bone that they found,

0:04:41.641,0:04:48.004
it meant that this camel was 30 percent[br]larger than modern-day camels.

0:04:48.028,0:04:51.218
So this camel would have been[br]about nine feet tall,

0:04:51.242,0:04:52.440
weighed around a ton.

0:04:52.464,0:04:53.515
(Audience reacts)

0:04:53.539,0:04:54.588
Yeah.

0:04:54.612,0:04:58.105
Natalia had found a Giant Arctic Camel.

0:04:58.129,0:05:00.271
(Laughter)

0:05:02.396,0:05:04.714
Now, when you hear the word "camel,"

0:05:04.738,0:05:08.663
what may come to mind is one of these,

0:05:09.507,0:05:12.871
the Bactrian camel[br]of East and Central Asia.

0:05:12.895,0:05:16.380
But chances are the postcard image[br]you have in your brain

0:05:16.404,0:05:19.959
is one of these, the dromedary,

0:05:19.983,0:05:22.411
quintessential desert creature --

0:05:22.435,0:05:26.754
hangs out in sandy, hot places[br]like the Middle East and the Sahara,

0:05:26.778,0:05:28.258
has a big old hump on its back

0:05:28.282,0:05:30.799
for storing water[br]for those long desert treks,

0:05:30.823,0:05:34.204
has big, broad feet to help it[br]tromp over sand dunes.

0:05:34.918,0:05:40.930
So how on earth would one of these guys[br]end up in the High Arctic?

0:05:41.719,0:05:44.506
Well, scientists have known[br]for a long time, turns out,

0:05:44.530,0:05:47.092
even before Natalia's discovery,

0:05:47.116,0:05:52.734
that camels are actually[br]originally American.

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(Music: The Star-Spangled Banner)

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(Laughter)

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They started here.

0:06:01.520,0:06:06.354
For nearly 40 of the 45 million years[br]that camels have been around,

0:06:06.378,0:06:09.537
you could only find them in North America,

0:06:09.561,0:06:12.814
around 20 different species, maybe more.

0:06:12.838,0:06:16.083
(Audio) LN: If I put them all in a lineup,[br]would they look different?

0:06:16.107,0:06:18.542
NR: Yeah, you're going to have[br]different body sizes.

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You'll have some with really long necks,

0:06:20.502,0:06:22.747
so they're actually[br]functionally like giraffes.

0:06:23.345,0:06:26.417
LN: Some had snouts, like crocodiles.

0:06:26.441,0:06:30.025
(Audio) NR: The really primitive,[br]early ones would have been really small,

0:06:30.049,0:06:32.552
almost like rabbits.

0:06:32.576,0:06:35.423
LN: What? Rabbit-sized camels?

0:06:35.447,0:06:36.884
(Audio) NR: The earliest ones.

0:06:36.908,0:06:39.143
So those ones you probably[br]would not recognize.

0:06:39.167,0:06:41.357
LN: Oh my God, I want a pet rabbit-camel.

0:06:41.381,0:06:43.425
(Audio) NR: I know,[br]wouldn't that be great?

0:06:43.449,0:06:44.621
(Laughter)

0:06:44.645,0:06:47.304
LN: And then about three[br]to seven million years ago,

0:06:47.328,0:06:50.136
one branch of camels[br]went down to South America,

0:06:50.160,0:06:53.114
where they became llamas and alpacas,

0:06:53.138,0:06:56.060
and another branch crossed over[br]the Bering Land Bridge

0:06:56.084,0:06:57.520
into Asia and Africa.

0:06:57.544,0:06:59.965
And then around the end[br]of the last ice age,

0:06:59.989,0:07:03.088
North American camels went extinct.

0:07:03.893,0:07:06.313
So, scientists knew all of that already,

0:07:06.337,0:07:12.413
but it still doesn't fully explain[br]how Natalia found one so far north.

0:07:12.437,0:07:17.111
Like, this is, temperature-wise,[br]the polar opposite of the Sahara.

0:07:17.135,0:07:19.636
Now to be fair,

0:07:19.660,0:07:21.343
three and a half million years ago,

0:07:21.367,0:07:25.466
it was on average 22 degrees Celsius[br]warmer than it is now.

0:07:25.490,0:07:28.425
So it would have been boreal forest,

0:07:28.449,0:07:32.363
so more like the Yukon or Siberia today.

0:07:32.853,0:07:36.559
But still, like, they would have[br]six-month-long winters

0:07:36.583,0:07:38.806
where the ponds would freeze over.

0:07:38.830,0:07:40.298
You'd have blizzards.

0:07:40.322,0:07:43.933
You'd have 24 hours a day[br]of straight darkness.

0:07:43.957,0:07:46.938
Like, how ... How?

0:07:46.962,0:07:51.120
How is it that one of these[br]Saharan superstars

0:07:51.144,0:07:54.375
could ever have survived[br]those arctic conditions?

0:07:54.399,0:07:57.375
(Laughter)

0:07:57.399,0:08:01.087
Natalia and her colleagues[br]think they have an answer.

0:08:01.632,0:08:03.642
And it's kind of brilliant.

0:08:04.700,0:08:11.233
What if the very features that we imagine[br]make the camel so well-suited

0:08:11.257,0:08:13.225
to places like the Sahara,

0:08:13.249,0:08:16.661
actually evolved to help it[br]get through the winter?

0:08:17.448,0:08:22.145
What if those broad feet were meant[br]to tromp not over sand,

0:08:22.169,0:08:25.189
but over snow, like a pair of snowshoes?

0:08:25.792,0:08:28.593
What if that hump --[br]which, huge news to me,

0:08:28.617,0:08:30.991
does not contain water, it contains fat --

0:08:31.015,0:08:32.594
(Laughter)

0:08:32.618,0:08:36.219
was there to help the camel[br]get through that six-month-long winter,

0:08:36.243,0:08:37.920
when food was scarce?

0:08:37.944,0:08:41.657
And then, only later, long after[br]it crossed over the land bridge

0:08:41.681,0:08:46.099
did it retrofit those winter features[br]for a hot desert environment?

0:08:46.123,0:08:50.197
Like, for instance, the hump[br]may be helpful to camels in hotter climes

0:08:50.221,0:08:52.693
because having all your fat in one place,

0:08:52.717,0:08:55.458
like a, you know, fat backpack,

0:08:55.482,0:08:58.010
means that you don't have[br]to have that insulation

0:08:58.034,0:08:59.793
all over the rest of your body.

0:08:59.817,0:09:02.067
So it helps heat dissipate easier.

0:09:02.555,0:09:05.396
It's this crazy idea,

0:09:05.420,0:09:10.967
that what seems like proof of the camel's[br]quintessential desert nature

0:09:10.991,0:09:14.691
could actually be proof[br]of its High Arctic past.

0:09:15.832,0:09:19.542
Now, I'm not the first person[br]to tell this story.

0:09:19.566,0:09:24.516
Others have told it as a way[br]to marvel at evolutionary biology

0:09:24.540,0:09:27.893
or as a keyhole into the future[br]of climate change.

0:09:28.855,0:09:31.092
But I love it for a totally[br]different reason.

0:09:31.751,0:09:34.513
For me, it's a story about us,

0:09:34.537,0:09:36.505
about how we see the world

0:09:36.529,0:09:38.833
and about how that changes.

0:09:39.658,0:09:43.030
So I was trained as a historian.

0:09:43.054,0:09:47.307
And I've learned that, actually,[br]a lot of scientists are historians, too.

0:09:47.331,0:09:48.880
They make sense of the past.

0:09:48.904,0:09:54.229
They tell the history of our universe,[br]of our planet, of life on this planet.

0:09:54.741,0:09:56.218
And as a historian,

0:09:56.242,0:10:00.613
you start with an idea in your mind[br]of how the story goes.

0:10:01.196,0:10:03.681
(Audio) NR: We make up stories[br]and we stick with it,

0:10:03.705,0:10:05.427
like the camel in the desert, right?

0:10:05.451,0:10:07.897
That's a great story![br]It's totally adapted for that.

0:10:07.921,0:10:10.150
Clearly, it always lived there.

0:10:10.174,0:10:14.476
LN: But at any moment, you could[br]uncover some tiny bit of evidence.

0:10:14.500,0:10:16.699
You could learn some tiny thing

0:10:16.723,0:10:20.682
that forces you to reframe[br]everything you thought you knew.

0:10:20.706,0:10:24.484
Like, in this case, this one scientist[br]finds this one shard

0:10:24.508,0:10:26.255
of what she thought was wood,

0:10:26.279,0:10:31.317
and because of that, science has a totally[br]new and totally counterintuitive theory

0:10:31.341,0:10:34.956
about why this absurd[br]Dr. Seuss-looking creature

0:10:34.980,0:10:36.512
looks the way it does.

0:10:36.536,0:10:41.940
And for me, it completely upended[br]the way I think of the camel.

0:10:41.964,0:10:46.346
It went from being[br]this ridiculously niche creature

0:10:46.370,0:10:48.719
suited only to this[br]one specific environment,

0:10:48.743,0:10:54.031
to being this world traveler[br]that just happens to be in the Sahara,

0:10:54.055,0:10:57.180
and could end up virtually anywhere.

0:10:57.880,0:11:03.855
(Applause)

0:11:14.396,0:11:15.854
This is Azuri.

0:11:16.589,0:11:19.469
Azuri, hi, how are you doing?

0:11:19.493,0:11:22.041
OK, here, I've got[br]one of these for you here.

0:11:22.065,0:11:24.111
(Laughter)

0:11:24.135,0:11:28.318
So Azuri is on a break[br]from her regular gig

0:11:28.342,0:11:30.565
at the Radio City Music Hall.

0:11:30.589,0:11:32.738
(Laughter)

0:11:32.762,0:11:34.344
That's not even a joke.

0:11:34.717,0:11:36.454
Anyway --

0:11:36.478,0:11:40.835
But really, Azuri is here[br]as a living reminder

0:11:40.859,0:11:45.106
that the story of our world[br]is a dynamic one.

0:11:45.130,0:11:49.837
It requires our willingness[br]to readjust, to reimagine.

0:11:49.861,0:11:54.138
(Laughter)

0:11:54.162,0:11:55.613
Right, Azuri?

0:11:55.637,0:12:02.053
And, really, that we're all[br]just one shard of bone away

0:12:02.077,0:12:04.307
from seeing the world anew.

0:12:04.926,0:12:06.086
Thank you very much.

0:12:06.110,0:12:12.531
(Applause)