this post was submitted on 24 May 2026
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Science Memes

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submitted 9 hours ago by fossilesque@mander.xyz to c/science_memes@mander.xyz
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[–] echodot@feddit.uk 7 points 34 minutes ago* (last edited 34 minutes ago)

This isn't really a mystery. We know the fossil record is incomplete, something like 99% of species are almost certainly not represented in the fossil record and what is present will massively be biased towards marine life.

Plants don't fossilize particularly well anyways so it's not surprising that we don't have records for these organisms. The fact that we have records for the existence of ferns at all is probably evidence of them suddenly becoming massively prolific (I wonder if some major environmental change occurred around that time ☄️) rather than them springing out a thin air.

[–] Norn@lemmy.zip 48 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

Regardless of topic, I can relate to the need to look something up in the middle of the night for peace of mind.

[–] gandalf_der_12te@discuss.tchncs.de 12 points 7 hours ago (2 children)

i looked up the number of deaths during the napoleonic wars like yesterday

[–] SeductiveTortoise@piefed.social 1 points 28 minutes ago

The bare necessities of knowledge for sound sleep.

[–] Peppycito@sh.itjust.works 6 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

Was it more than 10?

[–] gandalf_der_12te@discuss.tchncs.de 8 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

eh idk, i had difficulty finding exact numbers. apparently the napoleonic wars did have wide consequences but not so much because of the number of people that died in them but because they basically pushed very severely the modernization of all states in europe, which then caused a whole lot of things to happen rather quickly.

[–] Peppycito@sh.itjust.works 5 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

Interesting! So ~10?

[–] homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world 20 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

[–] damnthefilibuster@lemmy.world 8 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Fuck this moron.

[–] BucketBong@p.hobo.social 3 points 2 hours ago

Like, I'll try.

[–] bert_brause@lemmy.world 16 points 9 hours ago (4 children)

what? Sorry, what does it mean? I cheated my way trough computer science - archeology / biology are not my expertise.

[–] RandomStickman@fedia.io 33 points 8 hours ago (3 children)

I think it means we don't know what the ancestors of those plants are/what they evolved from. They just kinda showed up in the fossil record.

[–] Nurse_Robot@lemmy.world 23 points 8 hours ago

Which, tbf, it's a miracle enough of the fossil record exists as is. I'm sure there was a LOT that was lost to the sands of time

[–] F_State@midwest.social 1 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Relatively few lifeforms end up fossilizing and then some of those fossils later get eroded. The percentage that make it to the present is low.

[–] dudinax@programming.dev 3 points 1 hour ago

I'm no paleontologist but it seems like our total knowledge of certain eras comes from a few river banks collapsing on whatever lived there. That's not going to be a great representation of all life at that time.

[–] gandalf_der_12te@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

ehh, modern biology doesn't construct evolutionary history from fossil records, but from genetic similarities.

[–] RandomStickman@fedia.io 7 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

It's impossible to compare genetics from fossils and we can't study ancient long dead species besides fossil records for the most part.

[–] gandalf_der_12te@discuss.tchncs.de -1 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

yeah that's not what i meant. phylogenetic trees are constructed by considering the genetics of recent (living) species, not from fossils.

[–] RandomStickman@fedia.io 10 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

And this post is about ancestors of ferns which are unknown so I'm not sure what are you suggesting

[–] spicehoarder@lemmy.zip 5 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

He's Fern's uncle.

[–] RandomStickman@fedia.io 2 points 5 hours ago

Ah, my bad

[–] TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world 2 points 4 hours ago

Imagine you are trying to infer the structure of a tree by only know the positions of its leaves. Now imagine doing the same, but only 1/100 of the leaves are above ground.

It's only a small fraction living organisms which remain alive today. Most species and families which have ever been are extinct. And most are so old we could never do DNA work on them. Among the living, we can do some good DNA work and that's made a huge difference. But then go back far enough and there are just massive nonconformities.

[–] lemonskate@lemmy.world 16 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

That the fossil record is incomplete

[–] TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world 2 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Your mom's record is incomplete

[–] GreyEyedGhost@piefed.ca 1 points 4 hours ago

But she's working on it...

[–] sharkfucker420@lemmy.ml 15 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

It means our knowledge of their ancestry cuts off at that point. Anything else is speculation without additional information.

[–] thanksforallthefish@literature.cafe 12 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

That is exactly what the comic says but its not true, fossil records for ferns go back to the devonian several 100 million years before the Cretaceous

https://www.ontariobeneathourfeet.com/dinosaur-salad-ancient-extant-ferns

https://www.amerfernsoc.org/about-ferns

[–] turtlesareneat@piefed.ca 10 points 7 hours ago

That's why he's so cranky in frame 4, he's realizing his piece of shit brain lied to him again.

[–] aeronmelon@lemmy.world 7 points 7 hours ago

“I can’t get… no… sleeeeep…”

techno music

[–] sharkfucker420@lemmy.ml 3 points 9 hours ago

Paleobotany my beloved