T. Rex and the Crater of Doom

Posted on 10 December 2018 by Walter Álvarez

The story of one of the greatest adventures of twentieth century science, told by the central figure It is a great read for both scientist and layperson Richard Muller, author of Nemesis The Death Star Sixty five million years ago, a comet or asteroid larger than Mt Everest slammed into the Earth, causing an explosion equivalent to the detonation of a hundred million hydrogen bombs Vaporized impactor and debris from the impact site were blasted out through the atmosphere, falling back to Earth all around the globe Terrible environmental disasters ensued, including a giant tsunami, continent scale wildfires, darkness, and cold, followed by sweltering greenhouse heat When conditions returned to normal, half the genera of plants and animals on Earth had perished This horrific story is now widely accepted as the solution to a great scientific murder mystery what caused the extinction of the dinosaurs In T rex and the Crater of Doom, the story of the scientific detective work that went into solving the mystery is told by geologist Walter Alvarez, one of the four Berkeley scientists who discovered the first evidence for the giant impact It is a saga of high adventure in remote parts of the world, of patient data collection, of lonely intellectual struggle, of long periods of frustration ended by sudden breakthroughs, of intense public debate, of friendships made or lost, of the exhilaration of discovery, and of delight as a fascinating story unfolded Controversial and widely attacked during the 1980s, the impact theory received confirmation from the discovery of the giant impact crater it predicted, buried deep beneath younger strata at the north coast of the YucatanPeninsula The Chicxulub Crater was found by Mexican geologists in 1950 but remained almost unknown to scientists elsewhere until 1991, when it was recognized as the largest impact crater on this planet, dating precisely from the time of the great extinction sixty five million years ago Geology and paleontology, sciences that long held that all changes in Earth history have been calm and gradual, have now been forced to recognize the critical role played by rare but devastating catastrophes like the impact that killed the dinosaurs. 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Rex and the Crater of Doom by Walter Álvarez – kino-fada.fr I love the cover to this book I didn t love the material inside the book nearly as much, but it was still pretty interesting A bunch of years ago the dinosaurs had a really bad day when a meteor or comet the size of Los Angeles crashed into Mexico and killed them all off, except for the ones that were on Noah s Ark, and the still existing dinosaurs that live in Loch Ness and Lake Champlain, called Nessy and Champy respectively Those facts aren t in this book But you learn a lot about rocks a I love the cover to this book I didn t love the material inside the book nearly as much, but it was still pretty interesting A bunch of years ago the dinosaurs had a really bad day when a meteor or comet the size of Los Angeles crashed into Mexico and killed them all off, except for the ones that were on Noah s Ark, and the still existing dinosaurs that live in Loch Ness and Lake Champlain, called Nessy and Champy respectively Those facts aren t in this book But you learn a lot about rocks and things about geology and dating material, which would be cool, if it wasn t all just the devil manipulating us with his illusions to make us all believe in things like dinosaurs living on the Earth as a dominant life form for about 150 million years, which is millions of times longer than the bible says we have been here, and who are you going to believe, scientists with their numbers, and their research and besides look at...I was promised dinosaurs and I got only scientists searching for a buried crater A word repeated thrice in a book does not its title make.The initial 50 pages or so are worth reading For the rest, go watch some NatGeo doc.Walter is such a great storyteller He does an incredible job of making a complex scientific discovery very accessible to the general public, yet never talks down to the audience A fine job of combining scientific detail with an interesting story.Ok, ok, so I understand that if you bought this book based on this cover art e.g the giant Tyrannosaurus rex you might be a little pissed off Whoever was in charge of marketing this volume at Princeton University Press clearly knew that a whole book about the science of geology and specifically the proving of the impact theory to explain the unusually high amounts of iridium in the banded layer of rock known as the K T boundary that separates older Cretaceous period stone from newer Tertia Ok, ok, so I understand that if you bought this book based on this cover art e.g the giant Tyrannosaurus rex you might be a little pissed off Whoever was in charge of marketing this volume at Princeton University Press clearly knew that a whole book about the science of geology and specifically the proving of the impact theory to explain the unusually high amo...This doesn t focus in on the dinosaurs around the time of the extinction event so don t go in wanting that This focuses almost entirely in on the geology used to determine how the extinction event occurred and where This was absolutely fascinating, and Mr Alvarez s writing made it approachable and easy to understand fo...It was a great little book I listened to the audio version which was pretty short for the page length I think I must have missed some great illustrations, so I ll be picking up the text version at some point to get the whole picture What I enjoyed most about this book is that it was written by one of the individuals that actually figured the cause, location, and beginning of the story that caused the K T extinction I ve read, watched documentaries, and sat through many lectures about mass It was a great little book I listened to the audio version which was pretty short for the page length I think I must have missed some great illustrations, so I ll be picking up the text version at some point to get the whole picture What I enjoyed most about this book is that it was written by one of the individuals that actually figured the cause, location, and beginning of the story that caused the K T extinction I ve read, watched documentaries, and sat through ...Who could resist a title like this It s an adventure story, perhaps even a bit of a detective tale well, investigative, anyway , with plenty of scientific detail but not enough to make my eyes glaze over Excellent for readers like me absolutely not scientifically oriented but fascinated nonetheless.like lucy by johansen, this book gives a clear and engaging account of what scientists know of a popular field of study in this case the meteor that smacked into the yucatan triggering the kt species extinction a good read.Audiobook on 4 cd sNo one becomes bored by the Yucatan catastrophe do they, and this is a good rendition that is narrated well.A nice little book about what we think happened to the dinosaurs and how we came to figure it out Alvarez does a good job explaining the science without getting too technical.

English
10 December 2018

Walter Álvarez