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133 points kristianp | 6 comments | | HN request time: 1.232s | source | bottom
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EGreg[dead post] ◴[] No.42161012[source]
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1. dan353hehe ◴[] No.42161033[source]
> Drabon and her colleagues went in search of evidence of ancient major impacts in a remote area south of Kruger National Park in South Africa. There they sought out rocky outcrops containing a layer of spherules – molten droplets formed following a major meteorite impact that rained down over huge swathes of the planet. There are eight such spherule bands in this area, each preserving an ancient impact event.

> While the impact crater itself is long gone, analysis of rocks from 3.26 billion years ago tells a tale of planetary devastation. The layer of spherules from this huge impact was 15 to 20cm thick in places, compared with less than a centimetre for the famed dinosaur-killing meteorite, says Drabon.

replies(1): >>42161463 #
2. mmooss ◴[] No.42161561[source]
> it's just a theory that tries to fit this data

What do you feel is missing? You might find that if you read the paper, it goes through the evidence, prior evidence, and their hypothesis.

3. andrewflnr ◴[] No.42161660[source]
> Yeah, but it's just a theory that tries to fit this data. Doesn't mean it is correct.

Yes. What else do you expect from science, or really from any human attempt to find truth? Are you just upset they don't include the caveat "subject to potential future evidence or better theories" on literally every single piece of science journalism? Are you upset that people do their best to make sense of weird situations and then tell people about their work, even if it's not absolute truth? What do you want to happen here?

4. drdaeman ◴[] No.42161666[source]
I hope that your reaction is because the headline is way more sensational (to the extent of probably being incorrect) than the actual paper's abstract (https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2408721121)

Here's what the actual paper says:

> [...] Thus, the S2 impact likely had regional, if not global, positive and negative effects on life. The tsunami, atmospheric heating, and darkness would likely have decimated phototrophic microbes in the shallow water column. However, the biosphere likely recovered rapidly, and, in the medium term, the increase in nutrients and iron likely facilitated microbial blooms, especially of iron-cycling microbes.

Which sounds and - if I understand it correctly - means something kinda different than how "reset early life" is ordinarily understood, huh.

replies(1): >>42161913 #
5. _moof ◴[] No.42161679[source]
Have you got a better theory that fits all available data and has predictive power?
6. dang ◴[] No.42162003{4}[source]
Please don't take the bait. It's fine to let us know when a headline is sensational/distorted so we can change it. It's not fine to take to the comments about it, because that is likely to produce a shallow and less interesting discussion, which is what happened here.

Edit: I've changed the title to that of the paper.