The Sixth Extinction Chapter 2 - Elyonni Tordesillas

     Extinction is one of the first scientific concepts that children learn about. When small children play with toy dinosaurs they learn that the dinosaurs died a long time ago. In a way, a small child living in the 21st century has a better understanding of the history of life on Earth than scientists did thousands of years ago. In the second chapter, Kolbert states "Aristotle wrote a ten-book History of Animals without ever considering the possibility that animals actually had a history." Even today, there are some people who believe that no animals have ever gone extinct—or that the animals that went “extinct” drowned in the great flood described in the biblical book of Genesis. Scientist first proposed the concept of extinction in the late 18th century. A naturalist named Georges Cuvier studied the fossils of an animal now known as the American mastodon, or Mammut americanum, and concluded that all such creatures must have died out in the distant past. At the time, many people refused to believe his ideas, but now in the 21st century, it is proven that he was correct. Cuvier traveled around Europe, exhibiting his fossils while giving extraordinary lectures. One of Cuvier’s most famous discoveries was the pterodactyl, which he correctly identified as an extinct flying reptile. Kolbert meets with Pascal Tassy, the current director of the Paris Museum of Natural History. Tassy shows Kolbert the museum’s vast collection of elephant, mammoth, and mastodon remains, including the mastodon teeth that Longueuil found in Ohio. After going around the museum exploring the different fossils and artifacts, Kolbert states " With his lecture on the species of elephants, both living and fossil, Cuvier had succeeded in establishing extinction as a fact." Cuvier’s ideas paved the way for further ideas. For instance, the discovery of different fossils started by Cuvier led scientists to realize that older fossils were buried deeper, an insight that allowed them to estimate the fossils’ ages. This shows how science is a process that grows and evolves over time.