Tracking the First Animals on Earth

Discovery

BBC

Science, Technology

4.3 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 29 October 2018

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What were the earliest animals on Earth? The origin of the animal kingdom is one of the most mysterious chapters in the evolution of life on Earth. Our animal ancestors appeared and began to diversify about half a billion years ago. What might they have looked like, and which creatures alive today can be traced to these primordial times? Answers are beginning to come with new techniques for both studying ancient fossils and for reading evolutionary history from the DNA of animals alive today. Zoologist Professor Matthew Cobb explores the latest discoveries and controversies with the researchers on the trail of the Earth’s first animals. Producer: Andrew Luck-Baker Picture: Artists impression of Dickinsonia, Credit: Nasa

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, it's Doleepa, and I'm at your service.
0:04.7	Join me as I serve up personal conversations
0:07.1	with my sensational guests.
0:08.9	Do a leap, interviews, Tim Cook.
0:11.2	Technology doesn't want to be good or bad.
0:15.0	It's in the hands of the Creator.
0:16.7	It's not every day that I have the CEO of the world's biggest company in my living room.
0:20.6	If you're looking at your phone more than you're looking in someone's eyes, you're doing the wrong thing.
0:26.0	Julie, at your service.
0:28.0	Listen to all episodes on BBC Sales.
0:31.0	You're listening to Discovery from the BBC World Service.
0:35.0	I'm Matthew Cobb, professor of zoology at the University of Manchester,
0:42.0	and in this program I'm going in search
0:44.8	of the first animals on earth.
0:46.6	We humans are really obsessed by our line of descents and I think the transition from a world
0:55.0	that's merely bacterial and microscopic to one with large creatures is one of the most important
1:01.4	steps, most fascinating steps.
1:06.0	What did the earliest animals look like?
1:08.0	What was the series of events that led eventually to more complex animals?
1:12.0	There are a really interesting phenomena of evolution.
1:15.0	In the next half hour, we'll explore how our understanding of the early evolution of the animal kingdom has been transformed
1:25.6	by two very different ways of studying the deep history of life on earth.
	...

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