Although no one knows the exact year when we made our entry into the life cycle of Earth, let’s say we came on the scene around 300,000 years ago.

Now, Mr./Ms. Homo Sapien of 2026, close your eyes and visualise. Much of the Northern Hemisphere is covered with ice sheets. There are thick forests, grasslands, rivers, plains, valleys, mountains, all in their pristine form, all humming with life, in natural balance. Your ancestors are hunter-gatherers living beside mammoths, saber-toothed cats and other magnificent species. Their lives revolve around finding food, caring for their young, avoiding predators and surviving.

Life is fast, simple, rewarding and short.

Earth had already spent nearly 4.5 billion years. It had experienced the painful pangs of birth and evolution. It had died and then relived many times. 252 million years ago, it had gone through its biggest extinction, the Permian–Triassic extinction event, which is often called the "Great Dying". This event wiped out about 96 percent of marine species and 70 percent of land animals, making it the most severe loss of life in the history of our planet.

Then, about 66 million years ago, a giant asteroid or meteorite slammed into Earth at the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico, creating the Chicxulub crater. Today we call this event the Cretaceous–Paleogene (K–Pg) extinction. It wiped out not only the non-avian dinosaurs but also about three-quarters of all plant and animal species on Earth.

Earth recovered through a combination of rapid physical stabilisation of the climate and the oceans. New forms of life emerged and proliferated. Mammals diversified into niches left empty by the........

© The Nation