Other Intelligent Species Prior to Man

[SLD]

Man has dominated this planet for a mere 10,000 years at most. And really only truly developed a globe spanning civilization in the last few hundred years at the most and a technological one for only 100 years.

This is a mere blink of an eye in geological terms. If we were wiped off the earth by an asteroid tomorrow how long would it take for all traces of our civilization to be destroyed? Wouldn’t evidence of our larger structures be showing up in the fossil record for tens of millions of years? 63 million to be more exact? Or even 250 million?

Is it possible that an extremely intelligent species of dinosaurs began to develop language and civilization before the KT extinction event? If so shouldn’t we have found it somewhere in the fossil record by now if it developed to our level? Or to that of say the Roman Empire?

Maybe it formed on the Yucatán peninsula.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I think if the KT event took out a civilization at our level we could detect it. Specifically, Iodine-129. The KT impactor was only a little over 4 half-lives ago. Widespread nuclear power would have left an excess of it in the environment.

 

[BH]

This is an interesting subject. The Christian creationists talk a lot about iron pots being found in coal and hammers found in rocks. I dont believe their claims or at least what they interpret of the findings but it doesnt help them if it is true. A ten million year old pot found in a coal bed could be from a prehiman civilization and not an artifact from some flood.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

I think if the KT event took out a civilization at our level we could detect it. Specifically, Iodine-129. The KT impactor was only a little over 4 half-lives ago. Widespread nuclear power would have left an excess of it in the environment.

But also, what are the odds a rock like that hits just before a civilization gets advanced enough to divert it? If our civilization does not get hit by a planet killer within 200 years (much less I say, but to be conservative), it will never get hit by a planet killer (of course, if our civilization gets otherwise destroyed first the planet killers might hit, though that too is extremely improbable). That's nothing in evolutionary time.

That's apart from other reasons.

 

[Jokodo]

I think if the KT event took out a civilization at our level we could detect it. Specifically, Iodine-129. The KT impactor was only a little over 4 half-lives ago. Widespread nuclear power would have left an excess of it in the environment.

That assumes they were using fission for energy generation at scale . What if, as per the OP, they only ever advanced to a level comparable to ancient Rome? What if they were luckier than is in their search for fusion technology and more or less jumped straight to it?

 

[hyzer]

This is an interesting subject. The Christian creationists talk a lot about iron pots being found in coal and hammers found in rocks. I don't believe their claims or at least what they interpret of the findings but it doesn't help them if it is true. A ten million year old pot found in a coal bed could be from a prehuman civilization and not an artifact from some flood.

It is fascinating to me that there is a whole study of these OOPArts - or out-of-place artifacts.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Out-of-place_artifact

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I think if the KT event took out a civilization at our level we could detect it. Specifically, Iodine-129. The KT impactor was only a little over 4 half-lives ago. Widespread nuclear power would have left an excess of it in the environment.

But also, what are the odds a rock like that hits just before a civilization gets advanced enough to divert it? If our civilization does not get hit by a planet killer within 200 years (much less I say, but to be conservative), it will never get hit by a planet killer (of course, if our civilization gets otherwise destroyed first the planet killers might hit, though that too is extremely improbable). That's nothing in evolutionary time.

That's apart from other reasons.

Yeah, it would have to be an extreme coincidence. If L is short it's because intelligence is self-destructive, not because of anything nature throws at us.

I think if the KT event took out a civilization at our level we could detect it. Specifically, Iodine-129. The KT impactor was only a little over 4 half-lives ago. Widespread nuclear power would have left an excess of it in the environment.

That assumes they were using fission for energy generation at scale . What if, as per the OP, they only ever advanced to a level comparable to ancient Rome? What if they were luckier than is in their search for fusion technology and more or less jumped straight to it?

I was addressing the our level part of it. I don't think we could detect Roman level civilization that far back.

 

[BH]

Theoretically speaking if bones can form fossils couldn't weaved baskets, cooking utensils, and other items?

 

[lpetrich]

I think that such a species would make itself evident with the artifacts of its technology. So let us consider what kind of longevity our artifacts would have.

Many of our artifacts are built from various kinds of artificial stone: brick, cinderblock, ceramic, glass, ... Cut stone was common in past centuries, but it is not very common today. Mainly as decoration, like granite and marble.

Some metals, like iron and copper, will corrode, leaving behind deposits of their oxides, but some other metals will survive by not being very reactive, like gold, and some, by their corrosion being self-limiting, by their being sealed off by thin layers of their oxides, like aluminum.

Organic materials may not survive the Earth's interior very well, but we do get fossils of plant leaves and wood and the like. So wood and fiber and plastic and rubber artifacts may survive in carbonized form.

Many of our mineral resources are obtained by mining, and we ought to find evidence of mines, especially subsurface mines.

But we don't find any of those sorts of things.

 

[Potoooooooo]

In the sci-fi novel Evolution by Stephen Baxter, there is a species of predatory dinosaur that is as intelligent as humanity (more or less).However, they eat their meat raw and never had any need to master fire. Most of their tools are made from bone and leather, so they never advance much technologically and thus leave no trace of their culture behind.

 

[bilby]

Theoretically speaking if bones can form fossils couldn't weaved baskets, cooking utensils, and other items?

Bones almost never form fossils.

We find fossilised bones because there were a LOT of bones, deposited over a LOT of years, in a LOT of places.

The palaeontological record is an utterly minuscule fraction of the animal and plant life of the distant past.

And tens of millions of years will erase a massive amount of evidence of pretty much anything. It's enough time for entire mountain ranges to erode to nothing; Whole continents to shift and erase (or create) entire oceans.

If humans went extinct today, and a new civilisation with our technologies arose in seventy million years, they would need to be pretty fortunate to find any traces of our industry or technology. Some stuff would probably survive; But surviving in an accessible location where it has a good chance of being found and identified for what it is, that's pretty unlikely. Fossil humans would be fairly easy to find in a handful of 'lucky' locations where the anthropocene strata happen to be either exposed or cut by mining operations. But evidence of technology? Not likely. Not impossible, but definitely not a certainty.

 

[SLD]

Theoretically speaking if bones can form fossils couldn't weaved baskets, cooking utensils, and other items?

Bones almost never form fossils.

We find fossilised bones because there were a LOT of bones, deposited over a LOT of years, in a LOT of places.

The palaeontological record is an utterly minuscule fraction of the animal and plant life of the distant past.

And tens of millions of years will erase a massive amount of evidence of pretty much anything. It's enough time for entire mountain ranges to erode to nothing; Whole continents to shift and erase (or create) entire oceans.

If humans went extinct today, and a new civilisation with our technologies arose in seventy million years, they would need to be pretty fortunate to find any traces of our industry or technology. Some stuff would probably survive; But surviving in an accessible location where it has a good chance of being found and identified for what it is, that's pretty unlikely. Fossil humans would be fairly easy to find in a handful of 'lucky' locations where the anthropocene strata happen to be either exposed or cut by mining operations. But evidence of technology? Not likely. Not impossible, but definitely not a certainty.

Wouldn’t our burial practices be discovered then? We leave lots of bones buried around the world in ways that indicate intelligence. We leave our dead organized, and in sarcophagi of stone and metal. They are protected from scavenging and being scattered by being buried. Thus they would more likely be found than simple dinosaurs or other animals who died and were left to rot on the open plains. Or were the victims of predators as they got old and thus their bones are eaten essentially. Note the study of a dead whale off California.

 

[bilby]

Theoretically speaking if bones can form fossils couldn't weaved baskets, cooking utensils, and other items?

Bones almost never form fossils.

We find fossilised bones because there were a LOT of bones, deposited over a LOT of years, in a LOT of places.

The palaeontological record is an utterly minuscule fraction of the animal and plant life of the distant past.

And tens of millions of years will erase a massive amount of evidence of pretty much anything. It's enough time for entire mountain ranges to erode to nothing; Whole continents to shift and erase (or create) entire oceans.

If humans went extinct today, and a new civilisation with our technologies arose in seventy million years, they would need to be pretty fortunate to find any traces of our industry or technology. Some stuff would probably survive; But surviving in an accessible location where it has a good chance of being found and identified for what it is, that's pretty unlikely. Fossil humans would be fairly easy to find in a handful of 'lucky' locations where the anthropocene strata happen to be either exposed or cut by mining operations. But evidence of technology? Not likely. Not impossible, but definitely not a certainty.

Wouldn’t our burial practices be discovered then? We leave lots of bones buried around the world in ways that indicate intelligence. We leave our dead organized, and in sarcophagi of stone and metal. They are protected from scavenging and being scattered by being buried. Thus they would more likely be found than simple dinosaurs or other animals who died and were left to rot on the open plains. Or were the victims of predators as they got old and thus their bones are eaten essentially. Note the study of a dead whale off California.

After thousands of years? Certainly.

After tens of millions? Possibly.

It's a statistical thing; The half life of evidence of such things as ritualistic burial depends to some extent on the method, but in all cases is likely in the order of no more than tens of thousands of years. Tens of millions of years is a thousand such half-lives, and 1/2¹⁰⁰⁰ is a very small number indeed, even if multiplied by a population past future and present of (say) 10¹¹ ritually buried humans.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

I'm on the 'didn't happen' camp, mostly because it seems extremely improbable to me that such an intelligent species would not produce, in one way or another, an advanced civilization. Human level of intelligence very probably requires siginificant trade-offs. A chimp would easily beat a human in an fight - and the chimp is already very smart. And in most of the world, we would freeze to death in winter if we don't get killed by predators first. Something as smart as humans would likely develop tech to fend off predators, as well as fighting each other. In fact, I think it's very improbable they would even become as intelligent as humans without previously developed a number of basic technologies. And from there on, technological development would continue.

Now if humans were to become extinct now, I do not know for how long our tech would be detectable; probably a long time, especially space. But I think the odds that our civilization would not develop far most advanced tech are very slim. Even extinction by AI is very improbable I think, but then, in that case the AI would remain and very probably keep going indefinitely.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

I'm on the 'didn't happen' camp, mostly because it seems extremely improbable to me that such an intelligent species would not produce, in one way or another, an advanced civilization. Human level of intelligence very probably requires siginificant trade-offs. A chimp would easily beat a human in an fight - and the chimp is already very smart. And in most of the world, we would freeze to death in winter if we don't get killed by predators first. Something as smart as humans would likely develop tech to fend off predators, as well as fighting each other. In fact, I think it's very improbable they would even become as intelligent as humans without previously developed a number of basic technologies. And from there on, technological development would continue.

Now if humans were to become extinct now, I do not know for how long our tech would be detectable; probably a long time, especially space. But I think the odds that our civilization would not develop far most advanced tech are very slim. Even extinction by AI is very improbable I think, but then, in that case the AI would remain and very probably keep going indefinitely.

Though I'm not entirely sure it couldn't have happened in water, where the conditions are different, Fire is not an issue, and tech is much more difficult to develop. I wonder whether the trade-offs are lighter.

 

[Potoooooooo]

Fossil humans would be fairly easy to find in a handful of 'lucky' locations where the anthropocene strata happen to be either exposed or cut by mining operations. But evidence of technology? Not likely. Not impossible, but definitely not a certainty.

Let me ask a related question, Would these hypothetical future sapients be able to deduce that were were a sapient species based on our fossils alone?

 

[Angra Mainyu]

Fossil humans would be fairly easy to find in a handful of 'lucky' locations where the anthropocene strata happen to be either exposed or cut by mining operations. But evidence of technology? Not likely. Not impossible, but definitely not a certainty.

Let me ask a related question, Would these hypothetical future sapients be able to deduce that were were a sapient species based on our fossils alone?

I'd say there is a good chance, for at least two reasons:

1. Brain size and body size.
2. How on Earth did we get to survive?

Regarding point 2., we have no claws, small teeth and jaws, generally very weak bone and muscle structure compared to chimps and other animals that also have no claws or long canines or other similar weapons, and so on. Other than intelligence, we would have had no chance (and our ancestors evolved in an environment with basic technologies already, for a very long time).

On the other hand, our extinction leaving no intelligence behind would truly be puzzling to them, and would speak against the hypothesis that we are sapient. Then again, we do exist.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Fossil humans would be fairly easy to find in a handful of 'lucky' locations where the anthropocene strata happen to be either exposed or cut by mining operations. But evidence of technology? Not likely. Not impossible, but definitely not a certainty.

Let me ask a related question, Would these hypothetical future sapients be able to deduce that were were a sapient species based on our fossils alone?

With enough fossils, yes--some bones will show surgical intervention. If a bone has been cut and the injury healed that shows it was done by someone who knew what they were doing and that shows sapience.

 

[DBT]

We have not been a technological species for very long, so it may be that it was the serendipitous circumstance in one region of the world in recent times allowed us to progress technologically. Circumstances that were not likely to come around again.


An intelligent dinosaur species could have remained in the stone or bronze age stage for hundreds of thousands of years until environmental conditions ended all possibility of advancement.

 

[skepticalbip]

We have not been a technological species for very long, so it may be that it was the serendipitous circumstance in one region of the world in recent times allowed us to progress technologically. Circumstances that were not likely to come around again.


An intelligent dinosaur species could have remained in the stone or bronze age stage for hundreds of thousands of years until environmental conditions ended all possibility of advancement.

But 'stone or bronze age' is technological advancement and assuming they would follow the same developmental path as humans. A different species could have found no need for tools, weapons, shelter, or monuments so developed philosophical advancement, working the 'big questions' while living in the open and allowing those who die to decay or be eaten by scavengers with no rituals.

That would make them an intelligent, but not technological, species. Sorta like if dolphins would routinely gather together to argue over the nature of reality, each proposing and defending their philosophical position.