The Evolution of Crocodiles
In Our Time16 Syys 2021

The Evolution of Crocodiles

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the remarkable diversity of the animals that dominated life on land in the Triassic, before the rise of the dinosaurs in the Jurassic, and whose descendants are often described wrongly as 'living fossils'. For tens of millions of years, the ancestors of alligators and Nile crocodiles included some as large as a bus, some running on two legs like a T Rex and some that lived like whales. They survived and rebounded from a series of extinction events but, while the range of habitats of the dinosaur descendants such as birds covers much of the globe, those of the crocodiles have contracted, even if the animals themselves continue to evolve today as quickly as they ever have.

With

Anjali Goswami Research Leader in Life Sciences and Dean of Postgraduate Education at the Natural History Museum

Philip Mannion Lecturer in the Department of Earth Sciences at University College London

And

Steve Brusatte Professor of Palaeontology and Evolution at the University of Edinburgh

Producer Simon Tillotson

Jaksot(1077)

The Lindisfarne Gospels

The Lindisfarne Gospels

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Lindisfarne Gospels. In 597 Pope Gregory the Great ordered that a mission of monks be sent from Rome to convert Britain to its own brand of Christianity - lest it b...

20 Helmi 200328min

Chance and Design

Chance and Design

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the theories of a grand design in the universe. The late evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould argued that if you re-ran the tape of evolutionary history, an entirel...

13 Helmi 200328min

The Epic

The Epic

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the history of the epic. In his essay 'Why the novel matters', DH Lawrence argued that the novel contained all aspects of life. Perhaps better placed to make that claim...

6 Helmi 200328min

The Calendar

The Calendar

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the calendar, which shapes the lives of millions of people. It is an invention that gives meaning to the passing of time and orders our daily existence. It links us to ...

19 Joulu 200241min

Man and Disease

Man and Disease

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss man and disease. The Book of Exodus makes clear that when God wants to strike humankind, he does so with plague and disease. For millennia epidemics were understood exa...

12 Joulu 200228min

The Enlightenment in Scotland

The Enlightenment in Scotland

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Scottish Enlightenment of the 18th century. In 1696 the Edinburgh student, Thomas Aitkenhead, claimed theology was "a rhapsody of feigned and ill invented nonsense"...

5 Joulu 200227min

Imagination

Imagination

Melvyn Bragg investigates the creatives forces of the imagination. Immanuel Kant said, "Imagination is a blind but indispensable function of the soul without which we should have no knowledge whatever...

28 Marras 200228min

Muslim Spain

Muslim Spain

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Muslim Spain. In 711 a small army of North African Berbers invaded Spain and established an Iberian Islamic culture that would last for over 700 years. Despite periods ...

21 Marras 200228min

Suosittua kategoriassa Historia

olipa-kerran-otsikko
gogin-ja-janin-maailmanhistoria
mayday-fi
huijarit
mystista
totuus-vai-salaliitto
tsunami
rss-ikiuni
konginkangas
rouva-diktaattori
rss-subjektiivinen-todistaja
rss-i-dont-like-mondays-2
sotaa-ja-historiaa-podi
rss-peter-peter
tiedetta-ja-sirkushuveja-vanhojen-aikojen-podcast
rss-kirkon-ihmeellisimmat-tarinat
rss-kalmakabinetti
rss-sattuu-sita-suomessakin
maailmanpuu