Welcome to Nobody Told Me. I'm Laura Owens and I'm Jan Black. There are a few topics that are more

fascinating and mysterious than the history of life on Earth. We all learn about it in school

and then we forget a lot

of what we've learned. We also discover that what we've learned becomes outdated as scientists make

new discoveries. Our guest on this episode is paleontologist and evolutionary biologist Henry G,

who is the senior editor at the Science Journal, Nature. And Henry is also the author of several books,

the latest of which is called A Very Short History of Life on Earth,

4.6 billion years in 12 pithy chapters.

Henry, we thank you so much for joining us.

Well, thanks for letting me in.

Why did you decide to write the book and

how can you condense 4.6 billion years in 12 chapters? I was really intrigued by that. I thought,

okay, I can handle this. Well, the first answer is I'd always have this idea in the back of my

mind to do a kind of quick,

easy history of life on earth. I'm not the first person to do it, but it was at the back of my mind,

you know, in the shed behind the barbecue and the rusty bike and everything and just got

stuck there with all the lumber until a colleague suggested to be at work.

Henry, he said, that's my name.

That's why I called me Henry, and we know each other quite well.

He said, why don't you, he said, write a book celebrating all the wonderful fossil creatures that I've overseen to publication in my many,

many years at nature. And I've just written a book and said, I'm not going to write another book,

which is what I always say after I've written a book. My wife nods indultently and said, yes, that's nice, dear. Would you like a cup of tea?

...