INDOZONE.ID – Could a comet impact that destroyed Earth’s distant past have changed human civilization forever? Scientists think that a cluster of comet fragments may have hit Earth’s surface 13,000 years ago, in the most catastrophic impact since Chicxulub killed Earth’s massive dinosaurs about 66 million years ago.
In a new study, a team led by Martin Sweatman, a scientist at the University of Edinburgh investigated the impact and how it could shape the origins of society on Earth.
Meanwhile, Homo sapiens itself first appeared between 200,000 and 300,000 years ago, much further in the past than this impact. The researchers found that this comet collision actually coincided with a significant change in how human society organizes itself.
Researchers are investigating the theory that a comet hit Earth 13,000 years ago, analyzing geological data from areas they think may have hit, namely North America and Greenland. They found that high grade platinum, evidence of extremely high temperatures that could melt materials at the site and nanodiamonds, which scientists know can be made from explosions and can exist inside comets.
This work builds on previous research suggesting that significant impacts may have preceded the beginning of the Neolithic period, the first part of the Stone Age during which a number of major developments in human civilization took place, including with important advances in agriculture, architecture and stone tools.
“This great cosmic catastrophe seems to have been perpetuated on the giant stone pillar of Göbekli Tepe [di Turki], possibly ‘the world’s first temple,’ linked to the origins of civilization in the Fertile Crescent of southwest Asia. Did civilization, therefore, begin with an explosion?” Sweatman said in a statement.
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