Dinosaurs

David Wilkinson and colleagues from U of London and U of Glasgow published results of studies in the journal Current Biology suggesting that dinosaurs like Brontosaurus, emitted enough flatulence to influence global warming in the Mesozoic Era. Studies show the Earth’s temperatures to be 18^{o F} warmer as a result of methane during the time of the dinosaurs.  Cows today produce 50 - 100 million metric tons of methane per year. By extrapolation, the dinosaurs’ Mesozoic output of 520 million metric tons of flatus produced enough methane and thus heat to account for the warmer temperatures.  We currently produce around 500 million metric tons of methane from all sources, so methane may be nearly as much a threat for global warming as carbon dioxide.

I must say that politicians represent an even greater risk. Extrapolating the odoriferous gas produced in the presidential primaries, it surely pushes us over the line, and we are just getting started. Did the dinosaurs contribute to their own extinction with flatus or was it an asteroid? If by flatus, one might say, the dinosaurs farted themselves to death. Could we hope that politicians will do the same? Unfortunately, the politicians, today’s dinosaurs, would take us all along with them into extinction --- and so they are.