MinuteEarth
How Many Mass Extinctions Have There Been?
Want to learn more about the topic in this week's video? Here are some keywords/phrases to get your googling started: - Mass Extinction Event: a significant, global decrease in the diversity of life - "Big 5": The five biggest mass...
PBS
The Rise and Fall of the Bone-Crushing Dogs
A huge and diverse subfamily of dogs, the bone-crushers patrolled North America for more than thirty million years, before they disappeared in the not-too-distant past. So what happened to the biggest dogs that ever lived?
TED Talks
Spencer Wells: A family tree for humanity
All humans share some common bits of DNA, passed down to us from our African ancestors. Geneticist Spencer Wells talks about how his Genographic Project will use this shared DNA to figure out how we are -- in all our diversity -- truly...
SciShow
SciShow Quiz Show: Weird Facts About Humans
Hank squares off against the host of SciShow Kids, Jessi Knudsen Castaneda, to match wits about chemistry, evolution, and how babies are weird!
PBS
Life, Sex & Death Among the Dire Wolves
This is not a Game of Thrones fan fiction episode. Dire wolves were real! And thousands of them died in the same spot in California. Their remains have taught us volumes about how they lived, hunted, died and way more about any animal's...
SciShow
4 Mysterious Extinctions from Earth’s History
Nowadays, we're pretty confident about how the dinosaurs died out, but there are still other extinctions throughout Earth's history, some big, some small, that remain unsolved.
PBS
The Trouble With Trilobites
Trilobites are famous not just because they were so beautifully functional, or because they happened to preserve so well. They're known the world over because they were everywhere!
SciShow
Slowly Solving the Mystery of Turtle Origins
The origin story of turtles is a mystery that has perplexed many for centuries, but thanks to more recent studies, we might be one step closer to figuring out their lineage.
SciShow
What We've Learned from Fossilized Farts
We tend to think of fossils as dinosaur bones or petrified wood, but what if we told you that there's a lot we can learn from fossilized waste?
SciShow
The Northern Hemisphere’s Very Own Giant Penguins (Sort Of)
Today, penguins are found mainly in the Southern Hemisphere. But fossils have revealed giant lookalikes to these swimming birds further up north, spurring questions of how they evolved and what happened to them.
PBS
When Insects First Flew
Insects were the first animals to ever develop the ability to fly, and, arguably, they did it the best. But this development was so unusual that scientists are still working on, and arguing about, how and when insect wings first came about.
PBS
When Camels Roamed North America
Camels are famous for adaptations that have allowed them to flourish where most other large mammals would perish. But their story begins over 40 million years ago in North America, and in an environment you'd never expect: a rainforest.
PBS
How Sloths Went From the Seas to the Trees
The story of sloths is one of astounding ecological variability, with some foraging in the seas, others living underground, and others still hiding from predators in towering cliffs. So why are their only living relatives in the trees?
SciShow
5 Dinosaur Dinners and What They Told Us
"When it comes to extinct creatures like dinosaurs, it can be tough to know for sure what they actually ate. And we’d like to know because what an animal eats tells you a lot about it. But every now and then, the fossil record gives us a...
PBS
Why Megalodon (Definitely) Went Extinct
For more than 10 million years, Megalodon was at the top of its game as the oceans' apex predator...until 2.6 million years ago, when it went extinct. So, what happened to the largest shark in history?
SciShow
The Past, Present, and Future of Human Evolution | Compilation
Humanity has changed a lot since the days of our ancestral species, and we have continued evolution to look forward to as well.
PBS
The Last Time the Globe Warmed
Imagine an enormous, lush rainforest teeming with life...in the Arctic. Well there was a time -- and not too long ago -- when the world warmed more than any human has ever seen. (So far)
TED Talks
Tara Djokic: This ancient rock is changing our theory on the origin of life
Exactly when and where did life on Earth begin? Scientists have long thought that it emerged three billion years ago in the ocean -- until astrobiologist Tara Djokic and her team made an unexpected discovery in the western Australian...
SciShow
The Most Stable Neighborhoods in the Universe
No planet’s trip around a star is exactly like the one before it, because solar systems aren't as static as they first appear. Even small nudges can add up to disaster, but some objects find safe orbits with the help of a partner or two.
TED Talks
Emma Schachner: The secret weapon that let dinosaurs take over the planet
We've all heard the theories on why the dinosaurs died -- but how did they come to dominate the earth for so long in the first place? (Hint: it has nothing to do with their size, speed, spikes or fantastic feathers.) Travel back in time...
MinuteEarth
The Freshwater Paradox
Even though less than 1% of Earth's water is freshwater, it's the home for 50% of fish species. This is the Freshwater Paradox.
SciShow
What Did the First Animal Look Like?
If you trace your way back along the tree of life, eventually you'd come face-to-face with the very first animal. But what exactly would that animal have looked like?
SciShow
10 Strange-Looking Prehistoric Animals
Take a close look at some of the strangest-looking animals evolution has created.
TED Talks
Mark Pagel: How language transformed humanity
Biologist Mark Pagel shares an intriguing theory about why humans evolved our complex system of language. He suggests that language is a piece of "social technology" that allowed early human tribes to access a powerful new tool:...