Oxygen!
Woahh!
It’s everywhere.
It’s doubled--and holy moly, will you look at the size of that centipede.
What’s going on?
Well, for those of you that don’t know, in the parameters of this particular Life’s
Biggest Question--the oxygen on Earth has suddenly doubled, and we’ve been reaping
the many oxygenated benefits that come with it--as well as the myriad of detriments that
would mean our planet is either completely on fire, or under threat from giant bugs--a
few thousand years down the line, of course.
But, we all know this is hypothetical--so we have to throw our heads together--and like
many of you have already done in the comment section of our initial video--there’s a
few things left behind for debate, so let’s take a look.
Hello Internet--what’s going on, and once again, welcome back to the most inquisitive
channel on YouTube--Life’s Biggest Questions.
As per usual, I’ll be your disembodied floating voice Jack Finch--as once again, we revisit
this particular Life’s Biggest Question--and take a look at what you guys had to say of
the question, What If The Oxygen On Earth Doubled?
Roll the clip.
For the curious amongst you, that clip was from 1995’s Apollo 13--because, you know,
just breathe normal, fellas--this is a video about Oxygen, and as many of you pointed out
in the initial response to this Life’s Biggest Question--for some strange reason, watching
a video about Oxygen suddenly makes you frighteningly aware about your own breathing pattern.
And now you’re doing it again, right?
Yeah.
Sorry.
Anyway, back to the video--because as many of you may have noticed, this is a new thing
that we’re trying out on Life’s Biggest Questions, where some of the more dynamic
videos get a more precise look, to shake things up a little bit and see if there are any points
that we missed.
Thankfully for us, there’s a boatload of intriguing insights to sift through--but if
you’d like some context as to what the hell we’re talking about, then please--now would
probably be high time to check out our What If The Oxygen On Earth Doubled video, because,
yeah--this won’t really make any sense if you don’t.
Hey, we’re just being diligent.
In our first video, we spoke about the massive plethora of things that would go really, really
wrong if the Oxygen on Earth Doubled--which was mainly harkened back to the Paleozoic
Earth of Earth’s ancient history--where the Oxygen on Earth was indeed doubled, and
giant lizards and insects roamed the planet in their overwhelming O2 rich environment.
Which leads us neatly to our first comment, which comes from Cianni 31--who says
*If you really think about it though, everyone is freaking out about gigantic bugs.
But in reality, they could only live outside.
Most bugs are just small enough to fit in tiny holes in our houses, so if they were
all large we would really have no issues in our house.
Until you step outside…*
Yeah.
Exactly.
Until you step outside--duhn duhn duhnnn.
I mean, okay, this is a pretty interesting outlook on things, one of which has been disseminated
in the many classic sci-fi creature feature horror movies of old.
The Deadly Mantis.
The Black Scorpion.
Tarantula--all of which are actual classic staples of horror cinema, but all of which
paint a much more dramatic landscape than what would happen under the parameters of
the Oxygen on Earth Doubling.
You see, as we laid out in our initial video, during the Paleozoic Era--where six-foot centipedes
and dragonflies the size of hawks roamed the oxygen rich wilds, those massive creatures
had already had hundreds of thousands of years to grow to their staggering size, from the
tiny amoeba’s that spawned their evolutionary cycle--as did every other insect, lizard and
mammal that followed them.
You see, unfortunately in this hypothetical scenario, evolution takes time--and under
the parameters of our new simulated Earth, it would take a staggering amount of time
for the planet’s ecosystem to become fully engorged on the oxygen rich environment and
grow to their gigantic size.
Which, in one way--you’re right about, they wouldn’t have to worry about pestering us
in our homes--because in all likelihood, we wouldn’t have homes.
Given the fact that the human population would have more than likely succumbed to the many
negatives of an oxygen rich environment, and we’d all be… well, long gone.
If we did somehow survive though, yeah, you’re bang on the money.
Sharpen me some spears, we’ve got giant centipedes to hunt.
Next up, Jenny Bean06 says--So if we keep destroying the forest so there’s half of
the oxygen we would live longer?
Uhhh.
Phew.
Okay.
Where do we even begin with this one?
In short.
No.
Not at all.
That’s not how it works.
In fact, with less oxygen on the planet--we’d all die pretty quickly.
Now, not immediately--because if our 21% oxygen atmosphere depleted in half to 10.5% oxygen--there’d
still be breathing room, but we’d struggle to survive.
Now, thankfully for us--that isn’t how our atmosphere works anyway, and atoms can’t
just vanish willy-nilly--but if we destroyed our Planet’s forest to the point where the
*oxygen* on Earth slashed in half--holy moly.
We’re in too deep and it’s time to build a rocket to Mars, because we’d probably
have a better chance of breathing on their.
Our forests, and every single tree on this planet is integral to maintaining our delicate
atmosphere, and keeping it in the sweet spot that means all life on Planet Earth can survive
and thrive.
Deforestation is one of many key factors in the climate emergency that our civilization
now faces, and even more worryingly--one of the most important rainforests on the planet,
the Amazon--is increasingly under threat of being removed.
Which leads us to our next comment.
Allie busz says--Think of the amazon rainforest where the oxygen is almost 10x more.
All of the wildlife there is so diverse and evolved to a point where we can’t even keep
up anymore.
Crazy.
And that’s an incredibly important point Allie, although--you’re slightly mistaken
in the fact that the Amazon Rainforest doesn’t exactly produce 10 times more the amount of
Oxygen, which would be insane, and anyone that strolled into the Amazon would suddenly
become a superhuman before collapsing from oxygen poisoning--but the fact remains the
same.
The Amazon Rainforest is staggeringly important to the Oxygen production on Earth--given the
fact that it produces around 20% of the planet’s oxygen, and even the slightest of disruption
to that process, as in--the Brazilian Government tearing it down to make way for economic growth--will
have dire consequences.
However, the health of the Rainforest isn’t just down to the oxygen it produces--but more
importantly, it’s vital role is it’s responsibility as a carbon sink.
You see, any forest--especially tropical rainforests, act as carbon sinks--absorbing the abundance
of carbon dioxide that our planet produces.
Getting rid of that, in any capacity--yeah, that’s really bad.
More importantly than that though, although the Amazon produces 20% worth of the worlds
oxygen--the most important facet to that is our oceans, which face a similar threat to
the rainforest.
About 70% of our planet’s Oxygen is produced by tiny, microscopic, photosynthetic organisms
that float in the oceans--called Diatoms--a sort of phytoplankton.
Essentially, these guys are algae--and they’re so important to the delicate balance of our
oxygen supply--that if they go, we all go--and currently, the acidification of the oceans
are making it pretty difficult for these guys to stay alive.
So yeah.
Uhh.
Let’s not worry about giant centipedes for the moment.
Let’s worry about this stuff.
Well, there we have it guys--our second glance at the question, What If The Oxygen On Earth
Doubled?
There are a few more things to worry about before we face that hypothetical notion.
What did you guys think?
Do you agree?
Have any more to add to this point?
Please, let us know your thoughts down in the comment section below, and we’ll be
seeing you in the next one.
Before we depart from today’s video, if you’d like to continue on with your questioning
binge, then please, feel free to hit that playlist floating conveniently to the side,
and we’ll be seeing you in the next one.