Life is Random

"Life is random. Postpone the climate change and await the asteroid."

Or the next eruption of a super volcano like Yellow Stone Park.

That doesn't mean the human race is doomed. We're by far the most intelligent species to have dominated the planet, and when average Earth temperatures exceed 120° F (sometime before the year 2300) hopefully we'll have the technology straightened out to thrive in such conditions, along with all of the remaining animal inhabitants.
The current world temperature average is about 57 degrees F. I find it hard to believe 120 F average in less than 300 years from now.

Just try to be scared! At least a little bit!

Will ya?

"In the space of one hundred and seventy-six years the Lower Mississippi has shortened itself two hundred and forty-two miles. That is an average of a trifle over one mile and a third per year. Therefore, any calm person, who is not blind or idiotic, can see that in the Old Oölitic Silurian Period, just a million years ago next November, the Lower Mississippi River was upwards of one million three hundred thousand miles long, and stuck out over the Gulf of Mexico like a fishing rod." - Mark Twain

It's really hard to look convincingly sacred when your trying to keep from laughing!

In fact, had the asteroid impacted at a different time, give or take a few million years, then dinosaurs likely would have survived, and mammals--and therefore humans--would have never thrived.

Actually, you have given the people who say our path is guided by a greater being a very sound basis for argument. Pretty darn co-incidental timing don't you think?

How would you define a 'dinosaur' ?. No, not a literal definition.

I'd venture we are all descended from some odd critter that lived in a hole in the ground.

Current day 'birds as being descended from dinosaurs' is old hat. It seems more likely that burrowing critters survived whatever happened. Squirrels could have done this .

"... then dinosaurs likely would have survived ..."

Having worked for several I can attest that the timing of the asteroid impact had little to do with it.

You're replying to the wrong person- that is a direct quote from the original post - not my thoughts. The original post was trying to present a train of thought saying everything is random, and instead presented a darn good case for someone who believes in guided destiny.

The best part of Jurassic park 1 (for me anyway) was when the T Rex ate the lawyer, everyone in the theater started clapping.

Of COURSE everyone applauded that.

Just like in the Godzilla movies (the REAL ones, made in Japan, not the American 're-imaginings'), look closely, there is one building Godzilla topples in EVERY movie when he rampages through Tokyo, that building's destruction is even rather prominently featured. That building's destruction gets a roar of cheers from the normally disciplined and reserved Japanese audiences. Why you ask? That building houses Japan's equivalent of the IRS.

Looking at the climatic conditions of past pre-extinction periods and the current one, it would seem a general warming trend, as we are predicting we are causing, may well spawn increased life forms, not decreased. The Cambrian and Carboniferous period were very hot and damp and even flooded with volcanic gasses, yet life was the most abundant and diverse then. Animal life flourished as did plant life. Earth was one big rain forest. Remember, we are living in a rather cool period.

The real issue is what the warming is doing to human developments near coast lines and in deserts, not the animal species. Human extinction is far more likely than animal extinction. Get it good and warm and damp again, and certain animal species, and plant species will thrive. Maybe not the ones we prefer, and we may lose some cold weather mammals, but definitely some species will do better in those conditions and new forms will evolve. Reptiles and amphibians will flourish. Tropical plants will take over the earth.

Ten thousand years from now - restaurants will have alligator and iguana steak nights.