跟读练习: What If the Mosasaurus Never Went Extinct? - 通过视频学习英语口语
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There's a giant, vicious lizard monster lurking in the ocean.
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It's more massive than any creature that exists today.
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Say hello to the modern-day Mosasaurus.
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This creature went extinct 66 million years ago, but what if it evolved to live today?
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In this episode, we're going to look at the special traits the Mosasaurus would need in order to avoid extinction,
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and what kind of terrifying beast it would evolve into if it lived in the modern day.
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A world with modern-day Mosasaurus would change everything.
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Instead of just shark attacks, stories of random Mosasaurus attacks would be in the news.
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This ambush predator might attack unsuspecting swimmers who venture a little too far away from shore.
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And it wouldn't just be the loss of a limb.
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No, the Mosasaurus is a deadly opportunistic hunter that eats any prey that comes its way.
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It would hunt you down incredibly fast.
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Using a quick burst of energy, it would accelerate from 0 to 48 km per hour in just a second.
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Similar to a crocodile which can suddenly lurch into action.
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If you were less than 30 meters away from this beast, it would be on you before you could even blink.
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Propelling it is a super powerful tail fin, just like a shark's.
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But this tail fin could put the Mosasaurus in jeopardy.
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In today's world, just like shark fin soup, Mosasaurus tail fin soup would be a specialty dish,
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sought after by humans who believe in traditional medicine.
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It wouldn't have any particular properties to make humans superhuman-like, but the myth would persist.
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Now, given the might of the Mosasaurus, acquiring its tail fin would be a much more difficult feat.
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Humans could only get one if Mosasaurus washed up dead on shore.
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Hunting this creature would not be a viable option.
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If you were ambushed by the Mosasaurus, you'd find yourself caught in its massive double-hinged jaw.
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Rows of sharp teeth line every part of its mouth.
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These teeth aren't for chewing food.
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No, they're used for clamping down and holding prey in place.
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On that very first bite, the mosasaurus can go right through their prey and kill it.
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After that, all that's left is for our modern-day mosasaurus to swallow its victim whole.
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The double hinging of jaws means that they both work independently.
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Each time the jaw ratchets back, the prey gets pushed in several feet.
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A six-foot-long sunbather?
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They'd be swallowed in just a couple of bites.
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Think you've got a chance of slipping out once you're caught by these jaws?
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Yeah, that's unfortunately not the case.
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To prevent wriggling prey from escaping, the Mosasaurus has a third row of teeth that line the upper jaw.
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This is just a taste of the Mosasaurus' incredible power.
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much like starting a new game, the deadly Mosasaurus had humble beginnings.
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98 Million Years Ago The Mosasaurus' journey starts with the Agialosaurus.
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This was a family of monitor lizards who made their way from land and back to water.
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These lizards were the Mosasaurus' ancestors.
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They were much smaller, no more than one and a half meters long.
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Over the next few million years, during the Cretaceous Period, these little guys underwent a rapid evolution,
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an evolution that spawned about 40 different species of mosasaur.
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And one in particular emerged much bigger and badder.
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The Mosasaurus hofmanni, commonly referred to as the Mosasaurus, was the biggest and most ferocious of these species.
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This creature was 9 to 15 meters in length.
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That's even longer than the T-Rex.
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It lived in oceans everywhere around Earth.
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It would slither around with its long, streamlined body, and its legs were extremely powerful.
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They transformed into whale-like flippers that would help with swimming and provide stability.
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As the Mosasaurus evolved and became bigger, older apex predators called Ichthyosaurs went extinct,
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allowing the Mosasaurus to become even more dominant.
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Over the 25 million years that the Mosasaurus lived on Earth, they evolved into truly terrifying creatures.
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They ate sharks, dolphins, sea turtles, and any other creature they could sink their teeth into.
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They'd even eat their own species.
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Yeah, the Mosasaurus was a ruthless cannibal when the opportunity was presented.
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In fact, one mosasaur fossil was discovered with three mosasaur skulls inside of it.
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Today, we puny humans would just be a light snack for the mosasaurus.
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To satisfy its voracious appetite, it would go after today's biggest marine animals.
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Whales would be a favorite, and of course it would have no problem devouring one of its own kind.
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To do this, it would smash its opponent with its snout.
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This was a trait of one species of Mosasaur, the Tylosaurus.
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Tylosauruses had bony growths protecting their front teeth and forming a key part of their reinforced snout.
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This bony snout would be a valuable trait that our modern-day Mosasaurus would likely have incorporated over multiple waves of evolution.
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Once it dealt a blow with its snout, the Mosasaurus would begin to devour any massive creature.
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But how did the Mosasaurus find its prey in the first place?
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It would smell them out.
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The Mosasaurus was equipped with a third nifty feature, a forked tongue that it used to smell its prey underwater.
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This is called chemoreception.
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The tongue flicks out, gathers odor molecules, and then delivers them to an organ in the mouth that detects prey.
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This same smelling organ was used to smell out a potential mate.
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Good luck to that potential mate if it has the wrong smell.
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It might become dinner instead.
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If the Mosasaurus were alive today, humans would be in some pretty big trouble.
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Imagine swimming in the ocean and you let it cut, seeping a tiny bit of blood into the water.
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The Mosasaurus would smell it and snatch you up in an instant.
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Deep sea diving might just stop being a thing.
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How could you predict when the Mosasaurus would come and get you from the depths of the ocean?
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Now, the Mosasaurus that lived and died 66 million years ago didn't venture into deep ocean waters.
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But a Mosasaurus that evolves to survive extinction?
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Well, that one would.
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To understand why, we have to go back to the catastrophe that wiped out both the dinosaurs and the Mosasaurus
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and see how the Mosasaurus could have evolved with different traits in order to survive.
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Traits that would make it particularly deadly in our modern world, 66 million years ago.
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Alright, let's go back to a time where something completely unexpected happened.
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Something that would change the course of history.
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An asteroid came hurtling out of the sky and crashed into the Yucatan Peninsula.
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An enormous crater was carved into Earth and tsunamis rose into the air.
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With the heat of the crash, rocks melted, throwing tiny molten particles into the air.
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This came back down to Earth in the form of hot, deadly shards.
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Any Mosasaurus poking its head out of the shallow water would have been shredded instantly.
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A cloud of ash enveloping Earth caused a decade-long impact winter, killing off the majority of plants and animals.
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Sulfuric acid rained down on the oceans, and 90% of phytoplankton went extinct.
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In the oceans, the marine ecosystem collapsed.
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75% of marine animals died out.
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This was a major problem for Mosasaurus, as their food source was disappearing.
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But there still was some food out there, mostly in the form of new types of algae popping up.
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These became a food source for krill and shrimp.
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So could the Mosasaurus use these as a food source?
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Well, unfortunately, no. Large predators need large prey, not krill.
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So the mighty Mosasaurus, which had ruled the oceans for the past 25 million years, went extinct.
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Could there have been another way for the Mosasaurus to survive?
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Well, let's look at what features the sea animals who did survive had.
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Sharks are particularly interesting, because they've lived through many different extinctions.
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One of the reasons sharks were able to survive this extinction is that they don't just hunt in shallow water.
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Sharks have the ability to navigate to different parts of the water to find food, from warm waters to the depths of the ocean.
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Now, being partially warm-blooded helps sharks maintain a higher internal body temperature, allowing them to survive in really cold waters.
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They also have the ability to move through varying depths of water, increasing their options for food.
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The Mosasaurus was limited to hunting mostly shallow waters.
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It was a pretty good swimmer, but it didn't wander too far from the shoreline.
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Its strength was to make quick bursts of power to make a kill, rather than taking long swims.
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A Mosasaurus that evolved into a more tapered body and with paddles that were more fin-like would have fared better.
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This Mosasaurus would have been better able to migrate to different parts of the ocean, covering the waters at a steady pace.
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Scientists have evidence that the Mosasaurus was already warm-blooded.
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This will come in handy as its new swimming prowess takes it to different parts of the ocean.
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Because it's warm-blooded, it can maintain its internal body temperature, even in cold water.
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Finally, this mosasaurus will need a swim bladder, an adaptation that we'll borrow from deep-sea sharks.
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This bladder is a gas-filled sac that it can inflate or deflate whenever it likes, allowing it to roam different depths of the ocean.
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Okay, are we done?
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Oh, no, we might need one more modification.
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We need to move the sinuses of the Mosasaurus to be external, you know, like what whales and dolphins have.
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This is what enables them to dive deep.
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With external sinuses, there's less of a chance
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that the Mosasaurus will suffer skull damage from too much compression at the lower depths.
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Alright, this iteration of the Mosasaurus would have easily survived this mass extinction event.
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It would have swum deep out into the ocean to hunt prey like sharks.
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These survival mechanisms would make the Mosasaurus a terror in all parts of the oceans today, and at the same time, a nearly invincible survivor.
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Our modern-day Mosasaurus would be an incredibly vicious predator.
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But there's a second, more gentle version that could have evolved as well.
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To see how a second version of the Mosasaurus might have evolved, we have to go back again, this time to the Paleogene epic,
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spanning 66 million to 23 million years ago.
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The extinction event 66 million years ago would have kicked off the first tiny change.
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Mosasauruses were struggling to find sufficiently large prey.
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Some might have been less skilled at hunting sharks, some of the largest prey available.
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Well, these Mosasauruses may have started to suck up smaller fish, swallowing them whole.
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As they evolved with this diet, there would have been less use for the three rows of sharp teeth
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that they used to catch and kill larger marine animals.
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Maybe a subset of these mosasaurus began to evolve into filter feeders.
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The first transition?
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Well, possibly a gradual change in skull shape to be more adapted to sucking in rather than chomping on prey.
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This type of evolutionary change has been seen in whales.
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Ancient whales had teeth, but a subset of them underwent evolutionary changes, lost their teeth, and became filter feeders.
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Okay, let's fast forward to 56 million years ago.
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Temperatures rose in what's called the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum.
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Massive volcanic eruptions shot tons of carbon dioxide up into the air, causing temperatures to increase by about 8 degrees Celsius.
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That's 14 degrees Fahrenheit.
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The North and South Poles felt like the tropics.
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What would happen with our two different Mosasaurus species during this time?
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Well, first, let's look at the ferocious Mosasaur.
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Two different scenarios could play out.
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One possibility is that the Mosasaurus, a giant reptile that thrived in warm temperatures, would have gotten a massive boost in size.
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Other reptiles, like crocodiles and turtles, would have thrived as well.
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This Mosasaurus would have fed on whatever prey was available.
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Sharks, crocs, turtles.
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They would have gotten larger and larger, reaching 25 to 30 meters in length.
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In a second scenario, our Mosasaurus might have found the temperature spike challenging.
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Ocean waters absorbing more carbon dioxide might have become increasingly acidic.
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We know a lot of marine life died off during this period.
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Lucky for our Mosasaurus, it was already adapted to roam in different parts of the ocean.
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It would have been able to swim in open waters looking for large prey, or it could swim into warmer areas to eat alligators.
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Okay, let's have a look at our second Mosasaurus, the gentle giant that's also evolving at this time.
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Its food sources would have been changing.
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During the temperature spike, algae blooms appeared on the coastal waters, food for marine microorganisms like krill.
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The gentle giant's signature sharp teeth would have first become narrow and spiky, acting like a type of mesh.
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And then over time, they would have transformed into a sieve-like structure, enabling the mosasaurus to feed on tiny sea creatures like plankton and krill,
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filtering them out from the seawater.
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Now, after this heating event 56 million years ago, temperatures began to cool down, but then rose to their previous levels during the Eocene Optimum.
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But both our mosasauruses with newly evolved traits would be experts in getting through this hot period.
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This would be a repeat of what each species had done before.
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The vicious mosasaurus would swim the oceans and the gentle giant would feed on the krill.
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34 million years ago.
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Temperatures on Earth gradually declined until about 34 million years ago.
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Both species of Mosasaurus would have thrived using their different survival strategies.
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One would have become a more ruthless killing machine, and the other would have mirrored the evolution of whales, getting large eating plankton and krill.
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In today's world, the victims of the ruthless Mosasaurus wouldn't just be the casual swimmers and deep sea divers.
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Smaller fishing boats would get attacked by groups of Mosasaurus.
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More about why that would be the case in a second.
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Because of that behavior, the safest commercial operations in the 21st century would be large fishing boats, the ones built like tanks.
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But even these bruisers would stay clear of the hunting grounds of these gigantic sea monsters.
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So what would have made the vicious Mosasaurus evolve as pack hunters?
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This behavior would have been created by a real evolutionary need.
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The fossil records of Mosasauruses from 66 million years ago don't reveal them to be social creatures.
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They would regularly engage in big snout fights, battling for dominance.
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But this nasty behavior may have led to their cooperation over time.
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To understand why, let's go to the Neogene period, 23 to 2.6 million years ago.
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During this time, the Megalodon evolved, the biggest shark ever, scarfing down 1,200 kilograms of food a day.
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The Meg would have been a key rival of our Mosasaurus.
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Both the Meg and the Mosasaurus would have been competing for baleen whales, the big marine mammals of that time.
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Maybe in order to compete with the Meg, the Mosasaurus would have opted to be a little more friendly.
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Maybe instead of fighting with their own species, they would start to team up for the hunt.
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This need for cooperative behavior would have become solidified even more during the first part of the Quaternary Period, 2.6 million years ago.
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around 20 periods of glaciation came and went, greatly stressing the environment and its inhabitants.
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Now, during this time, the baleen whale, the bread and butter of the apex predator diet, was fighting to survive itself.
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Competition for food would have intensified even more.
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Now, both the mag and the mosasaurus were fundamentally solitary creatures in adulthood.
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large, powerful predators usually are.
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But it's possible that the Mosasauruses that had begun cooperating with each other would have survived better,
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so this trait would have been favored in new generations.
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Maybe it would have just been a small pod with two to three members, but enough to cover the center, front and rear during the kill.
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In this formation, the Mosasaurus can take on any mighty mags, as well as any great white sharks.
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Hunting in a coordinated way and being part of a social group all require a high degree of intelligence.
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Mosasauruses would have grown a bigger brain during this period.
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And the result of this behavioral change?
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The Mosasaurus would have out-competed the Megalodon for food.
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The Meg would have gone extinct 2.6 million years ago,
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maybe earlier, as it would have been fighting both the great white sharks and the newly evolved Mosasaurus for food.
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the Mosasaurus would have continued to reign supreme, fighting with the sharks to eat the whales.
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Plus, Mosasaurus pods would have targeted enormous whale sharks and blue whales, especially if they found one swimming by itself.
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And remember, these Mosasaurus are still cannibals, so they might even go after the gentle giant Mosasaurus that evolved.
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So how would the gentle giant Mosasaurus have fared during the Ice Ages?
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well, they would have become even bigger.
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The gentle giants would have grown exceptionally big during this time, swimming thousands of kilometers to feast on the massive amounts of krill and other nutrients.
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Today, after the last ice age around 11,000 years ago, the modern-day Mosasaurus would grow massive.
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The oceans would be teeming with large prey for food.
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Whales, sharks, dolphins.
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Its body is adapted to roam far and wide to kill prey, so it becomes larger and larger, a huge predator of the 21st century.
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OK, this is the Mosasaurus you saw at the start of this episode.
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40 meters long, 200 tons, the menace of the sea.
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In contrast, the gentle giant Mosasaurus would be found mostly in the coldest waters of the the Antarctic,
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far, far away from its evil twin.
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Governments would debate whether to use systematic methods to kill off these modern-day Moes, but ethicists would weigh in against it,
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saying that it's our duty to coexist with other species.
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A consensus would emerge allowing the Mosasaurus its hunting grounds separate from us humans.
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And the two giant Mosasaurus species would be essential to keeping our modern ocean environment in balance.
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The vicious Mosasaurus would weed out the weak and sick large marine animals, keeping ocean populations healthy.
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Similar to sharks, the Mosasaurus would hunt large predators like the grouper, which in turn hunts herbivorous fish.
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With these populations maintained at the right levels, algae growth is kept in check and coral reefs flourish.
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And for our safety, as our technology improves, humans would find ways of using sonar to spot these beasts ahead of time,
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map out where they fish, and plot out other areas for us to hang out.
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Meanwhile, the fashion industry's never-ending need for lizard skin bags and clothes would result in the targeting of the gentle giant Mosasaurus.
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They would be hunted to near extinction.
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Now, as their population dwindled, whales would grow larger and take over their ecological niche.
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And the day of reckoning is coming because at its size, the vicious Mosasaurus would be consuming so many large marine animals.
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And the bigger it gets, the more it hunts.
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Maybe the only way to combat this creature is to pit it against a titanoboa that never went extinct.
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But that sounds like a story for another WHAT IF.
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