So we have microbial fossils from 3.5 billion years ago, fossilised 300 million year old skin, bones from almost 200 my ago, even actually soft tissue inside a fossilised bone from 70 my ago. Ah, footprints too, the most unsubstantial matter of all: pure shape. That's in addition to all the million other fossils that are so common we hardly care: shells, small bones, etc.

And someone is saying there could have been an entire advanced civilization 400 million years ago, large and powerful enough to cause climate change, and that no traces of it would possibly be left? Like, billions of individuals, cities, factories, metals, concrete, mines, wells, roads and bridges and tunnels, stone sculptures!, plastic, waste dumps, farms, agricultural land, billions and billions of artifacts of all materials, most of them entirely artificial. All gone because "nothing resists 400 my" and, "oh btw, check this dinosaur footprint and this fossilised piece of skin, how cool"?

> or it could’ve been the eruption of a monster volcano, the sort that presently smolders beneath the Atlantic.

I know about Yellowstone, Campi Flegrei, etc, but I haven't heard about a supervolcano below the Atlantic. What's that referring to?

The timelines don't really add up for me.

So there could have been this hypothetical civilization 55 million years ago already. And they've only just disappeared (if they did) 10'000 or so years ago? Without a trace?

Also, no, a conspiracy cannot be the answer to a question we've not yet asked. The word has a clear meaning, it requires people to conspire to hide something from you.

Reminds me of this comic: https://badspacecomics.com/scour-copy-copy

This is a good thought experiment to show how time is as vast as space.

400 million years ago is as distant as the stars. The Earth was a different planet then, in a sense.

It’s also yet another Fermi paradox answer. Even if our civilization lasts for millions of years, that’s a blip. We are searching both space and time and both are incomprehensibly vast.

>The oldest place on the earth’s surface—a stretch of Israel’s Negev Desert

I do not understand this statement, I thought an area in Quebec was around 3 - 4 billion years old. I looked, seems Australia may have the oldest area:

https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20220126-is-the-pilbara-t...

But I say the article could be true, but the only issue I have is the large dinos. I would think they could be an impediment to any organized settlements.

One other thing, didn't most of our fossil fuels come from the Carboniferous era ?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carboniferous

Joe Rogan tier pseudoscience.