Episode 218 - Lungs

The Common Descent Podcast

Common Descent

Science, Education, Earth Sciences, Natural Sciences, Science:natural Sciences

4.8 • 764 Ratings

🗓️ 25 May 2025

⏱️ 135 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Take a deep breath and appreciate for a moment the organs that let you do it so efficiently. Lungs are an invaluable tool for life out of the water, and are therefore a favorite topic for paleontologists interested in early animals on land. This episode, we explore the diversity of modern lungs and the few but fascinating insights we have into the lungs of ancient animals, from dinosaurs to the first terrestrial vertebrates. In the news: trilobite sizes, polar forests, early footprints, and cicadas. Time markers:Intro & Announcements: 00:00:00News: 00:05:50Main discussion, Part 1: 00:31:30Main discussion, Part 2: 01:21:35Patron question: 02:05:35 Check out our website for this episode’s blog post and more: http://commondescentpodcast.com/ Listen to our new podcast, Leaf it to Us!https://linktr.ee/leafittouspod Join us on Patreon to support the podcast and enjoy bonus content: https://www.patreon.com/commondescentpodcast Got a topic you want to hear about? Submit your episode request here: https://commondescentpodcast.com/request-a-topic/ Lots more ways to connect with us: https://linktr.ee/common_descent The Intro and Outro music is “On the Origin of Species” by Protodome. More music like this at http://ocremix.org Musical Interludes are "Professor Umlaut" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com). Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to the Common Descent Podcast.
0:18.8	Hello, David. Hello, Will.
0:21.7	And hello listeners.
0:23.0	Welcome to episode 218 of the Common Descent podcast.
0:28.7	This episode, we're talking about lungs.
0:32.7	That was it.
0:33.8	Just a gasp.
0:34.6	Gasp's all around.
0:36.9	This is going to be a fun one.
0:38.5	I'm always excited when we get to do an anatomy topic.
0:41.9	We're going to get to talk about what lungs are, the jobs it does for us, how it differs across, how they differ across different groups of animals.
0:52.2	And then, of course course the evolution and what little
0:55.2	fossil record we have of them.
0:57.4	There's some.
0:58.7	This is an awesome topic, and as always, it was requested.
1:03.8	That's where we're talking about it.
1:05.1	This was requested by Serpentine, Layla, George, Jackie, Kyla, Science Skink, Richard, Z, and Dustin.
1:14.6	Thank you, everybody.
1:15.9	This will be a lot of fun.
1:17.7	Yes.
1:18.7	Before we jump into it or our news section, some quick announcements.
1:23.8	First and foremost, we have a Patreon.
	...

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