Programme Index

Discover 11,128,835 listings and 281,491 playable programmes from the BBC

A Geochemical History of Life on Earth

4. The great chemistry experiment

Duration: 23 minutes

First broadcast: on BBC World Service East and Southern AfricaLatest broadcast: on BBC World Service East Asia

Available for over a year

Justin looks at the period since the meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs, which had seen a steadily cooling climate - until we humans turned up. What can the last 66 million years teach us about the likely consequences of climate change? And can our species make the next big evolutionary leap needed to tackle it?

Adrian Lister of the Natural History Museum gives Justin a fossilised tour of how the Earth's fauna adapted to this changing climate. Cardiff University's Carrie Lear explains how human carbon emissions have already turned the clock back some three million years to a time when sea levels were 20 metres higher. But that's not the only way our carbon emissions are meddling with the oceans, as Daniela Schmidt of Bristol University warns. Plus evolutionary theorist Eors Szathmary explains how climate change could be the ultimate test of whether humans can complete the next great leap in evolution of life on Earth.

Producer: Laurence Knight

Image: Car exhaust (Credit: Thorsten Nilson / EyeEm via Getty Images) Show less

About this data

This data is drawn from the data stream that informs BBC's iPlayer and Sounds. The information shows what was scheduled to be broadcast, meaning it was/is subject to change and may not be accurate. More