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New (5 Million Year Old) Invetertebrates found in cave in Israel

All Acting Regiment

14:16 / 01.06.06

Here's the BBC story.

Basically, they found a cave that's been sealed off from the outside world for 5 mil years (to get some perspective, dinosaurs died out roughly 65 mya). Lots of bizarre, unique invertebrates- nearly all of them colourless and blind . The biggest is 5cm long. Quatermass, anyone?

grant

15:46 / 01.06.06

You know, reading your title and abstract, I assumed the things were fossils.

They're freakin' crawling around down there! Blind things inside the mountain!

Forget Quatermass, that's Gollum!

Quantum

15:57 / 01.06.06

Elder Things Alert! *WHOOP WHOOP!* Science has finally doomed us all!

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

17:03 / 01.06.06

Science needs to stop uncovering 5cm long lobsters that MAN WAS NOT MEANT TO KNOW.

or something.

17:07 / 01.06.06

Poor dears, they're probably all confused about all this 21st century.

All Acting Regiment

19:43 / 01.06.06

Yeah, things have changed quite a bit. 5 million years ago, it was the Pliocene epoch- the second epoch of the Neogene period of the Cenozoic era.

Camels were dying out in North America. Gomptotheres were doing pretty well for themselves, however.

[External image]

A Gomptothere.

lekvar

23:12 / 01.06.06

Wow, that chin... you supose that's what Bruce Campbell evolved from?

All Acting Regiment

00:14 / 02.06.06

Hmm. Was Bruce Campbell a shovelfeeder? And how many tusks did he have?

lekvar

01:36 / 02.06.06

I never kiss and tell.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

13:40 / 02.06.06

I'm always frightened by archaeology in the Holy Land. I've seen the movies.

We're doomed, aren't we?

All Acting Regiment

17:10 / 02.06.06

[External image]

[External image]

The bests themselves.

17:40 / 02.06.06

I wonder if they're tasty.

nameinuse

13:07 / 03.06.06

I'm not sure the "5 Million Year Old Seafood Restaurant" would sound very appetising.

Is that thing in the picture a scorpion with stingers instead of claws? Or is it just a really mean looking prawn?

All Acting Regiment

14:01 / 03.06.06

It's a scorpion with thin claws, but seen from above.

17:48 / 03.06.06

It doesn't have a stinger. It looks to me like a tiny cave lobster.

How about "White Lobster"? I think we have a branding concept...

All Acting Regiment

18:46 / 03.06.06

It's a scorpion. The article said. The other one is a lobster.

lekvar

20:09 / 05.06.06

Legba, I'm pretty sure you're looking at the same beast from two different angles. The article said that the research team found no live specimens of the scorpion.

All Acting Regiment

20:19 / 05.06.06

Yes, you're right.

*drops spade*

*tries to climb out of hole*

petunia

23:09 / 06.06.06

Scientists say it is a unique ecosystem that has been sealed off from the rest of the world for five million years[...]

So um..

To make a parallel to instances of rabbits being brought to Australia, and rats in New Zealand, etc...

If this cave has been sealed off from the rest of the world for 5 million years, and has formed a special ecosystem that is highly distinct from those that the rock previously seperated it from...

Well.. you can see where this is going...

Isn't the once-sealed ecosystem now open to influence from the rest of the world. Does this not mean there's going to be some sort of ecsystem culture-shock?

Doesn't this mean that all the cute blind critters in this cave are.. well... fucked?

All Acting Regiment

15:27 / 07.06.06

I think they were going to seal the cave back up again.

petunia

15:53 / 07.06.06

Oh. Good.

Sorry for the rampant pessimism.

Go newold invertebrates!