History of how humans first began to identify bizarre-looking fossilsĪnd finally came around to the idea that extinction was a thing. Much further back in time to the mastodon and reviews the Over the world due to a fungus I had no idea this was going on! One small village in central Panama went from having so many golden frogs in its region that you could barely walk without stepping on them to within a few short years, the only ones now left are in a small laboratory in the village made specifically for their preservation. She opens the book with a chapter about huge numbers and entire species of amphibians disappearing all Many scientists also agree that we are now in the midst of a sixth, and Kolbert shared the evidence of that-and what it means-in this book. One of those, of course, was the most recent one that killed all the dinosaurs-and three-quarters of mammals-that is now known to have been caused by the impact of a large meteorite, but there are four other, lesser-known but no less devastating extinctions. We also had a great discussion about it.Īs Kolbert explains in the book, scientists agree there haveīeen five mass extinctions since life began on Earth, based on the fossil

One of my books groups chose the nonfiction best-seller and Pulitzer Prize-winning The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert for our February selection, and everyone in the group loved this fascinating and eye-opening book.

Book review the sixth extinction