Imagine waking up tomorrow to find out an unstoppable natural disaster is about to wipe out the entire population of the human race.

Or, to be more specific, 96.7% of it. Sounds pretty scary, right?

Thankfully, it doesn't look like that's going to happen to us anytime soon, but that isn't to say it hasn't happened before.

These near-extinction circumstances were a reality for our ancestors at one point in history.

You're listening. You're listening. You're listening.

You're listening.

You're listening.

There are close to 8 billion human beings alive today. With such an enormous population, it's

hard to imagine that we were once an endangered species. But it's true. At one point, we were a turn

of bad luck away from being wiped out completely. But thanks to a little sprinkling of good

fortune and the impressive intelligence of our ancestors, we're still here today.

Want to know how we managed it?

Well, strap in folks, because we're going on a journey back in time.

A hundred and ninety-five thousand years ago, the world was almost unrecognizable compared to what it's like today.

There were no cities or cars,

no cell phones or fast food restaurants, and there was certainly no Wi-Fi. But the most significant

differences between Earth in 2020s and Earth 195 millennia ago were in the temperature and climate. Back then,

planet Earth was starting to get very, very cold.

Because of something called the Big Chill. Or if you want to get all scientific, marine isotope stage

six. What is a marine isotope stage, I hear you ask? Well, marine isotope stages are

alternating warm and cool periods in the history of Earth's climate. These varying stages are assigned higher numbers the further back in Earth's history they occurred,

and are measured by scientists studying data from deep sea core samples.

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