WEBVTT - Prototaxites: Shrooms Like Cedars in the Devonian Wilds 0:00:01.880 --> 0:00:04.840 The time traveler, for so it will be convenient to 0:00:04.880 --> 0:00:08.840 speak of him. Turned his attention at last the Devonian period. 0:00:09.360 --> 0:00:12.760 His pale gray eyes shone and twinkled, and his usually 0:00:12.800 --> 0:00:16.680 pale face became flushed and animated. The calm of mourning 0:00:16.760 --> 0:00:20.000 was upon. The world whirled in its greening, the spring 0:00:20.040 --> 0:00:23.360 time of the Earth. The environment was arid and warm, 0:00:23.400 --> 0:00:26.680 and everywhere I walked I observed forests of moss and 0:00:26.800 --> 0:00:30.640 clusters of shrub like ferns, and horse tails. Amid them 0:00:30.680 --> 0:00:35.239 crept primitive arthropods and something that looked remarkably like a 0:00:35.240 --> 0:00:37.199 winged insect, though I did not catch it in the 0:00:37.200 --> 0:00:40.479 act of flight. But there were no leaves, no true 0:00:40.520 --> 0:00:42.920 trees to lift a canopy above my head. For what 0:00:43.000 --> 0:00:45.800 I at first took for primitive conifers proved anything. But 0:00:46.400 --> 0:00:49.920 each of these cylindrical giants stood some twenty feet high 0:00:50.159 --> 0:00:53.440 and were a good yard wide. They towered above the 0:00:53.479 --> 0:00:57.160 Devonian world like stylight pillars, and I observed just a 0:00:57.240 --> 0:01:01.760 hint of spores carried away from their czaar. I wondered, then, 0:01:02.440 --> 0:01:06.679 might these organisms to be giant mushrooms? But that's when 0:01:06.720 --> 0:01:09.240 the more locks came at me. The more Locks, I said, 0:01:09.280 --> 0:01:12.039 surely the more locks existed far in the future. What 0:01:12.080 --> 0:01:14.200 were they doing in the Devonian? Well, they stole my 0:01:14.319 --> 0:01:16.920 time machine and they followed me. But you arrived there 0:01:16.959 --> 0:01:19.399 in your time. Well they stole it from the future. 0:01:19.680 --> 0:01:26.759 But the look time travel is very complicated. No further questions. 0:01:26.800 --> 0:01:28.679 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of 0:01:28.680 --> 0:01:37.280 I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, are you welcome 0:01:37.319 --> 0:01:39.080 to Stuff to Blow your Mind? My name is Robert 0:01:39.160 --> 0:01:41.800 Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. And in that cold open 0:01:41.840 --> 0:01:44.000 we had a little fun with H. G. Wells. The 0:01:44.040 --> 0:01:47.960 Time Machine, which of course is a is a wonderful novel, 0:01:48.680 --> 0:01:53.320 well worth seeking out even in today's technically advanced times. 0:01:53.520 --> 0:01:55.440 I remember liking it when I read it, but I 0:01:55.480 --> 0:01:58.760 don't recall does he actually go into the prehistoric past? Well, 0:01:58.800 --> 0:02:01.000 he certainly goes into the far far future, which is 0:02:01.080 --> 0:02:02.840 kind of my inspiration for that, because he goes he 0:02:02.920 --> 0:02:04.680 goes so far into the future that the world is 0:02:04.720 --> 0:02:08.239 just an alien landscape. But one of the fun things 0:02:08.320 --> 0:02:11.200 is that if you travel back far enough in time, 0:02:11.560 --> 0:02:14.680 you also encounter an alien landscape like that is what 0:02:15.280 --> 0:02:18.880 the surface world of the Devonian period four hundred million 0:02:18.960 --> 0:02:24.080 years ago basically was, and so it was irresistible to 0:02:24.160 --> 0:02:26.440 use the time traveler. Here is a is a way 0:02:26.440 --> 0:02:29.280 of sort of imagining what it might be like to 0:02:29.480 --> 0:02:34.320 walk amid this strange, these strange h specimens, this all 0:02:34.320 --> 0:02:37.919 this weird Devonian flora and a glimpse in the wild, 0:02:38.639 --> 0:02:42.040 a living specimen of an organism that continues to mystify 0:02:42.160 --> 0:02:45.120 us in the past. It's been called a mystery fossil even, 0:02:45.360 --> 0:02:48.639 and that is proto tax I t s. Yes, today 0:02:48.680 --> 0:02:51.080 we are going to be talking about the world of 0:02:51.240 --> 0:02:54.079 prehistoric fungus. This is something that I wanted to talk 0:02:54.120 --> 0:02:57.919 about for a long time because fungus in the fossil record. 0:02:58.000 --> 0:03:00.520 I think there's actually a lot of interesting stuff we explore. 0:03:00.800 --> 0:03:03.200 But the keystone of today's episode is going to be, Yeah, 0:03:03.360 --> 0:03:08.960 the fossil remains of these giant stylite organisms from hundreds 0:03:08.960 --> 0:03:12.760 of millions of years ago that were the tallest standing 0:03:12.919 --> 0:03:16.520 things of their time, and we don't know for sure 0:03:16.600 --> 0:03:18.760 what they were. We have we have better ideas than 0:03:18.800 --> 0:03:20.920 we used to, and we'll get into that as the 0:03:20.960 --> 0:03:23.920 episode goes on. But yeah, try to imagine yourself as 0:03:23.960 --> 0:03:27.920 a paleontologist digging into the strata from a period hundreds 0:03:27.919 --> 0:03:29.960 of millions of years ago where there were no trees, 0:03:30.480 --> 0:03:32.919 there's no there are no forests on the earth, but 0:03:33.080 --> 0:03:38.360 you find these six meter high giant pillars of something 0:03:38.440 --> 0:03:41.520 that was alive. Yeah. And you can see if you 0:03:41.520 --> 0:03:44.400 look up the images of prototyps I t s, you'll 0:03:44.600 --> 0:03:48.640 you'll see people posing with the fossil remnants. Uh. And 0:03:48.720 --> 0:03:51.480 it looks like like a massive pillar or even in 0:03:51.480 --> 0:03:54.040 the way it's broken in some of these uh, these fossils, 0:03:54.080 --> 0:03:55.920 it looks like it could be the you know, the 0:03:56.000 --> 0:04:00.440 neckbone of some of some enormous creature. Like there's an 0:04:00.560 --> 0:04:04.880 enormity to the fossil uh that that makes it so irresistible. 0:04:04.920 --> 0:04:07.880 It is a giant of the past, but it is not. 0:04:08.400 --> 0:04:11.680 It is not an animal. It is it is something else. 0:04:12.080 --> 0:04:16.240 We don't know exactly what prototax it t S looked 0:04:16.279 --> 0:04:19.840 like when it was alive. They are different interpretations of it, 0:04:20.200 --> 0:04:25.480 but some of the interpretations uh and and resulting illustrations 0:04:25.520 --> 0:04:29.159 really give it a kind of almost like a gigaresque 0:04:29.279 --> 0:04:32.279 or love crafty and appearance of something that looks truly 0:04:32.440 --> 0:04:36.160 like a um like like pillars, like towers, like little 0:04:36.240 --> 0:04:40.200 mom like not little you know, towering monoliths, um and 0:04:40.200 --> 0:04:43.560 and certainly they were the largest and tallest feature of 0:04:43.920 --> 0:04:49.400 the Devonian terrestrial environment. It dominated the early and early 0:04:49.440 --> 0:04:52.440 Middle Devonian period, though it eventually gives way to the 0:04:52.560 --> 0:04:55.400 rise of shrubs and early and other early plants in 0:04:55.400 --> 0:04:58.760 the Late Devonian. But it is to say the least 0:04:58.800 --> 0:05:02.800 a very tantalized fossil then continues to be something of 0:05:02.839 --> 0:05:06.440 a mystery fossil. So to to get to the origin 0:05:06.560 --> 0:05:08.719 of the fossil find itself, we have to go back 0:05:09.400 --> 0:05:12.760 roughly a hundred and seventy six years, and that is 0:05:12.839 --> 0:05:17.000 when in eighteen forty three, Canadian born geologist William Edmund 0:05:17.040 --> 0:05:22.160 Logan unearthed fossil remnants of Devonian flora. And the classification 0:05:22.360 --> 0:05:25.279 of the Devonian period, by the way, only dates back 0:05:25.400 --> 0:05:28.240 to the eighteen thirties, so it was, you know, kind 0:05:28.240 --> 0:05:31.720 of a revolutionary time and just geologic discovery in general. 0:05:32.440 --> 0:05:34.400 The name of the Devonian, of course, comes from the 0:05:34.720 --> 0:05:38.080 Devon area in England where some of these UH fossil 0:05:38.120 --> 0:05:42.479 finds come from. So Logan found UH these specimens in 0:05:42.520 --> 0:05:46.680 the exposed sections of Devonian rock on the shores of 0:05:47.080 --> 0:05:49.960 the I believe it's gossip a Bay in Quebec, in 0:05:50.000 --> 0:05:52.919 particularly an area that is called seal Cove, which he 0:05:53.000 --> 0:05:56.679 was mapping for coal and other minerals. Well, this fits 0:05:56.680 --> 0:06:00.360 in with a great Canadian tradition of of awesome fossil 0:06:00.480 --> 0:06:04.680 sites being discovered in you know, not originally by paleontologists, 0:06:04.760 --> 0:06:08.919 but by people developing industry and heavy heavy transport and 0:06:08.920 --> 0:06:12.560 stuff like. I think about how the the shale beds 0:06:12.600 --> 0:06:16.039 like the Burgess Shale in the Canadian Rockies were originally 0:06:16.400 --> 0:06:20.320 found because railroad workers who were building railroads through the area. 0:06:20.600 --> 0:06:25.120 We're finding the stone bugs everywhere, and that eventually attracted 0:06:25.160 --> 0:06:28.679 the attention of paleontologists to come and investigate. Oh yeah, 0:06:29.680 --> 0:06:33.520 the world of trilobytes, right, and other creatures of course, 0:06:33.640 --> 0:06:36.520 which we'll get back to later. So I want to 0:06:36.560 --> 0:06:39.039 note that one of one of my key sources on 0:06:39.120 --> 0:06:41.840 the the the early history of this fossil find uh 0:06:41.920 --> 0:06:45.680 comes to us from paleo biologist Francis Huber of the 0:06:45.800 --> 0:06:48.880 National Museum of Natural History and Washington, d C. Who 0:06:48.880 --> 0:06:53.560 wrote a two thousand and one piece titled Rotted Wood 0:06:53.640 --> 0:06:58.599 Alga Fungus The History and Life of prototax I T. S. Dawson, 0:06:58.720 --> 0:07:01.640 eight fifty nine. And it's just a tremendous source on 0:07:01.680 --> 0:07:05.360 all of this. But it's also very concerned with naming, renaming, 0:07:05.440 --> 0:07:09.360 and misnaming things, even getting into the various names used 0:07:09.360 --> 0:07:13.280 by Logan and others to designate the cove in which 0:07:13.280 --> 0:07:17.080 they found this. But at times it may seem a 0:07:17.120 --> 0:07:19.640 little tedious if if you read it in in full, but uh, 0:07:19.800 --> 0:07:25.200 fair enough citation and uh in miscitation and the illegitimate 0:07:25.200 --> 0:07:28.360 renaming of things is a vital part of this fossil's 0:07:28.440 --> 0:07:30.960 human history. Yeah, well, you know, you've got to get 0:07:31.000 --> 0:07:33.280 people to agree on what they call things, or it's 0:07:33.280 --> 0:07:36.600 gonna be a lot harder to talk about them, and 0:07:35.800 --> 0:07:39.240 it can come become quite a dramatic issue as well. 0:07:39.600 --> 0:07:43.600 Unravel here. So, in eighteen fifty five, Logan's Devonian Flora 0:07:43.680 --> 0:07:47.680 fossils passed into the hands of noted Canadian geologist John 0:07:47.800 --> 0:07:51.720 William Dawson, who, by the way, the mineral Dawsonite is 0:07:51.800 --> 0:07:54.920 named in his honor. He was particularly taken by a 0:07:55.000 --> 0:07:59.480 large specimen with the with the peculiar interior structure. It 0:07:59.560 --> 0:08:02.280 resembled a large tree, but under a microscope, it became 0:08:02.320 --> 0:08:07.720 clear that the fossilized tissue was uh solicified, you know, 0:08:07.760 --> 0:08:12.360 containing an entangled mesh that resembled fungal my cilia. He 0:08:12.400 --> 0:08:16.480 even noted the mysilia resemblance himself in his writings, but 0:08:16.520 --> 0:08:19.440 he didn't really explore it further. Uh, I mean, he 0:08:19.440 --> 0:08:22.600 did not explore the explore the fungal angle further, but 0:08:22.640 --> 0:08:24.920 he was very interested this fossil. He traveled to seal 0:08:25.280 --> 0:08:29.360 Cove himself and obtained additional samples. Okay, so they've found 0:08:29.360 --> 0:08:32.719 this giant fossilized trunk of something. It looks like it 0:08:32.760 --> 0:08:35.559 could be the trunk of a tree, but examining it 0:08:35.600 --> 0:08:38.839 on a microscopic level, it looks more like the texture 0:08:39.040 --> 0:08:42.800 of fungus than it does the texture of plant matter. Right, Yeah, 0:08:42.840 --> 0:08:46.040 particularly my cilia. And now now my cilium is the 0:08:46.200 --> 0:08:49.760 vegetative part of a fungus. Just reminded everybody. It's a 0:08:49.800 --> 0:08:53.599 It's a mass of branching vein like hi fe that 0:08:53.720 --> 0:08:57.640 you'll find underground or in whatever The mushroom or the 0:08:57.920 --> 0:09:01.920 fruiting body is emerging from the mushroom itself is a 0:09:02.040 --> 0:09:06.160 death emergence. Life is actually thriving beneath the surface, the 0:09:06.280 --> 0:09:09.800 mushroom comes up to to release spores. Yeah, it's a 0:09:09.880 --> 0:09:13.800 reproductive organ Yeah. Now, the way Dawson interpreted this, this uh, 0:09:13.880 --> 0:09:16.680 this fossil was Okay, we have something that looks like 0:09:16.679 --> 0:09:19.679 like fungus. So what we have here is probably a 0:09:19.800 --> 0:09:23.640 rotting conifer tree, you know, an early conifer tree. It's rotting, 0:09:23.720 --> 0:09:28.560 it's decomposing. So I'm seeing the decomposer fungus within the 0:09:28.720 --> 0:09:32.839 decomposing uh specimen, all of this preserved in a single 0:09:32.880 --> 0:09:35.240 fossil specimen. Well, that would make sense. It's it is 0:09:35.280 --> 0:09:40.280 a tree trunk, it's infested with fungal Mysilia type structures, right, 0:09:40.360 --> 0:09:43.120 And so he gave it the name proto tax I 0:09:43.240 --> 0:09:46.920 t s or essentially, first you referring to the U 0:09:47.120 --> 0:09:51.960 family Texas Cia, so the U tree right. Yeah. So 0:09:51.960 --> 0:09:55.960 so the the actual name is is referring to a 0:09:56.080 --> 0:10:00.880 conifer resemblance. So he puts these eyes ideas out there, 0:10:00.920 --> 0:10:04.120 and then, um, you know, quite as a surprise to Dawson, 0:10:04.520 --> 0:10:08.280 a Scottish botanist by the name of William C. Carruthers 0:10:08.440 --> 0:10:11.680 proposed a different interpretation. Uh. He said, well, this is 0:10:12.160 --> 0:10:16.960 perhaps the fossil remains of a very large algae aquatic 0:10:17.080 --> 0:10:20.520 or perhaps terrestrial in nature. Algae, of course, can grow 0:10:20.559 --> 0:10:24.240 in weird places like on ice and snow. So he 0:10:24.280 --> 0:10:26.880 declared a new name. He said, Nope, we're not going 0:10:26.960 --> 0:10:29.040 to call this proto tax i t s. We're gonna 0:10:29.120 --> 0:10:32.880 call this nemato ficus. Okay, but wait a minute, an 0:10:32.920 --> 0:10:36.680 algae that like a giant fossilized algae the size of 0:10:36.679 --> 0:10:39.840 a tree trunk. Yeah, I mean that's creepy. Well. Yeah. 0:10:40.160 --> 0:10:41.800 One of the things, and this is pointed out by 0:10:41.840 --> 0:10:45.520 others that have studied, is like there's basically no non 0:10:45.640 --> 0:10:49.840 weird explanation for this fossil. We'll get to several comments 0:10:49.880 --> 0:10:52.360 like that later. Yeah, there's no like normal way of 0:10:52.400 --> 0:10:56.640 looking at it. Now. Here's here's the thing about Carruthers 0:10:56.679 --> 0:10:59.880 coming along and saying, no, this is Nemo Nemato fight. 0:11:00.600 --> 0:11:04.480 First of all, there are rules with the naming of things, 0:11:04.480 --> 0:11:07.480 even at the time, so you're not allowed to just 0:11:07.559 --> 0:11:09.880 come and give it a new name. That it's an 0:11:09.920 --> 0:11:14.800 illegitimate renaming. So so that alone is kind of weird 0:11:15.000 --> 0:11:19.000 and and rude. But then also, according to Huber, Carruthers 0:11:19.040 --> 0:11:22.800 was just scathing and very personal in his criticism quote 0:11:22.840 --> 0:11:28.720 scathing and slanderous. Uh in terms of criticizing Dawson, and 0:11:28.760 --> 0:11:32.400 it seemed to have like really caught Dawson off guard. Um. 0:11:32.440 --> 0:11:34.680 You know, based on these descriptions, one is tempted. I 0:11:34.679 --> 0:11:37.760 don't do not know much about William C. Caruthers, but 0:11:37.760 --> 0:11:39.840 but just based on Huber's writing, one is tempted debut 0:11:39.920 --> 0:11:43.120 Caruthers is something of a bully in his field while 0:11:43.160 --> 0:11:48.120 also being an extremely respected botanist. But then again, perhaps 0:11:48.160 --> 0:11:51.440 our our our vision of this rivalry is incomplete. Well, 0:11:51.480 --> 0:11:54.600 if that interpretation is correct, he would not be the 0:11:54.679 --> 0:11:58.320 only legitimately good scientist who also is lacking in manners 0:11:58.360 --> 0:12:02.959 and or another so um. According to Hubert, Dawson fought 0:12:03.000 --> 0:12:05.719 for his initial classification, but but then later he ends 0:12:05.760 --> 0:12:09.520 up rejecting it, apparently even trying to make it seem 0:12:09.559 --> 0:12:12.480 as as if he never connected the fossil to conifers 0:12:12.480 --> 0:12:15.280 at all. And then he himself, in his eight book 0:12:15.480 --> 0:12:19.920 The Geological History of Plants illegitimately used the name nomato 0:12:19.960 --> 0:12:24.800 ficus instead of proto taxi t s uh. So. I 0:12:24.800 --> 0:12:27.200 imagine that at least of the time that Huber was 0:12:27.240 --> 0:12:30.040 writing in like two thousand one. You don't do this. 0:12:30.240 --> 0:12:32.839 You don't just like switch the name to something else 0:12:32.880 --> 0:12:34.800 without a I don't know. I'd imagine a lot of 0:12:34.840 --> 0:12:37.960 fields have like an international naming committee that if there 0:12:38.040 --> 0:12:39.600 is going to be a name change, would have to 0:12:39.640 --> 0:12:41.920 agree on it or something. Yeah, I mean it's it's 0:12:41.920 --> 0:12:45.240 why for instance, Uh, like one's fossil that we've discussed 0:12:45.240 --> 0:12:49.880 on the on the show before U basil Osaurus. Okay, uh, 0:12:49.920 --> 0:12:52.280 I hear saw us in there. That means lizard, it 0:12:52.320 --> 0:12:55.920 means king lizard. But it was not we know now 0:12:56.000 --> 0:12:59.000 it was not a lizard at all. It was a mammal. 0:12:59.600 --> 0:13:02.160 But we we we don't go back and change the 0:13:02.280 --> 0:13:05.320 name in this case. So it's a similar case here. 0:13:05.520 --> 0:13:09.440 The name prototax I t stuck and did stick despite 0:13:09.840 --> 0:13:13.560 carruthers uh notion that we should switch to a different name. 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:17.600 And that name also Prototaxids is still used today but 0:13:17.880 --> 0:13:21.440 names aside. So Carruthers is pushing this interpretation. Okay, this 0:13:21.520 --> 0:13:24.079 is not a rotting conifer tree that's full of kind 0:13:24.120 --> 0:13:27.800 of fungal infestation. This is a giant alga. So what 0:13:27.880 --> 0:13:31.559 happens with this interpretation, Well, this becomes the dominant interpretation 0:13:32.240 --> 0:13:35.800 for a while, and it basically goes unquestioned until nineteen 0:13:35.880 --> 0:13:39.520 nineteen when one A. H. Church brings up the possibility 0:13:39.559 --> 0:13:42.480 that this is a fungus after all, considering the size 0:13:42.520 --> 0:13:47.960 is achieved by by certain contemporary fungus specimens such as uh, 0:13:48.000 --> 0:13:52.280 you know, various woody decomposer fun guy. But this idea 0:13:52.320 --> 0:13:55.559 didn't take off. He seems to have coined to Huber. Basically, 0:13:55.600 --> 0:13:59.520 this guy was ignored and the alta interpretation continued with 0:13:59.520 --> 0:14:01.920 papers and you know it's it's reacent. It's say nineteen 0:14:01.960 --> 0:14:05.439 seventy nine and ninety three, continuing this threat of interpretation. 0:14:05.960 --> 0:14:08.679 I think it is worth stepping back to just appreciate 0:14:08.720 --> 0:14:12.200 again the physical form of this thing we're talking about. 0:14:13.040 --> 0:14:17.280 The fossil records indicate that whatever this was, alga rotting 0:14:17.320 --> 0:14:21.200 conifer tree or even fungus, it was huge. You know, 0:14:21.960 --> 0:14:25.240 I've seen estimates of a maximum known height of six 0:14:25.400 --> 0:14:28.680 or even eight meters, like twenty to twenty five ft. 0:14:28.920 --> 0:14:31.720 So you've got a giant six m high stalk of 0:14:31.920 --> 0:14:36.080 whatever it was. So something that was alive at a 0:14:36.120 --> 0:14:39.320 time when we have no evidence that any vertebrates had 0:14:39.400 --> 0:14:42.760 yet left the water, there were no trees or anything 0:14:42.800 --> 0:14:44.600 like that. Yeah, it's it's kind of like it's like 0:14:44.640 --> 0:14:47.320 a tree. It's not a tree, h It's it's a 0:14:47.400 --> 0:14:51.680 it's a weird column of life that exists before there 0:14:51.680 --> 0:14:54.720 should be anything like a column. Yeah, and you mentioned earlier, 0:14:54.760 --> 0:14:57.160 I think that this would have been at a time 0:14:57.160 --> 0:15:00.280 where this would have been, without question, the tallest living 0:15:00.320 --> 0:15:03.400 thing on land. No, no trees, nothing's to it, above it. 0:15:03.880 --> 0:15:06.800 And I'm trying to imagine the implications of that if 0:15:06.840 --> 0:15:10.120 we were to live in this world. Because here's one 0:15:10.160 --> 0:15:12.840 for you. When you think of the word nature, what's 0:15:12.880 --> 0:15:15.480 the first thing that pops into your head? Might very 0:15:15.520 --> 0:15:17.480 person to person. Maybe you're not like me, but I 0:15:17.520 --> 0:15:21.400 think most people, at least in tree filled ecoregions, think 0:15:21.480 --> 0:15:24.520 trees when they think nature. Yeah, Or you know, even 0:15:24.520 --> 0:15:28.160 if I you know, I really love the landscape of 0:15:28.160 --> 0:15:31.360 of say Arizona, which, of course and Coke comes as 0:15:32.200 --> 0:15:35.480 a variety of different environments. But but even if you're 0:15:35.480 --> 0:15:39.440 thinking about the desert, you're probably thinking about cacti. Yeah, 0:15:39.480 --> 0:15:43.080 because like the tallest features in a landscape, I think 0:15:43.200 --> 0:15:47.440 naturally become definitive of that landscape force. When you think city, 0:15:47.680 --> 0:15:52.000 you think buildings when you think nature. Again, this might 0:15:52.000 --> 0:15:54.480 be different for people who live and say like treeless environments, 0:15:54.480 --> 0:15:56.560 Say if you live in a step or something, But 0:15:56.720 --> 0:15:58.640 if you live in an area with there are trees, 0:15:58.800 --> 0:16:03.440 the trees become synonymous with nature. They're the iconic life form. 0:16:03.760 --> 0:16:06.480 Like what is the lorax speak for? You know, the 0:16:06.480 --> 0:16:09.360 the The suggestion is that he speaks for nature, but 0:16:09.480 --> 0:16:12.560 he speaks for the trees. Because the trees are nature 0:16:13.280 --> 0:16:15.960 by being the tallest living objects on the ground, you 0:16:15.960 --> 0:16:18.280 in some sense assume them to be the icon of 0:16:18.400 --> 0:16:21.400 nature itself. So what is this thing? It's almost like 0:16:21.440 --> 0:16:24.080 you could imagine that if you were to walk around 0:16:24.520 --> 0:16:27.840 the landscape of this period where these things were dominant, 0:16:27.840 --> 0:16:32.880 maybe Early Devonian or whatever, this might be your idea 0:16:33.000 --> 0:16:36.680 of nature. These giant mounds of whatever they are. Yeah, 0:16:36.680 --> 0:16:39.240 I mean they were basically the floral lords of the earth. 0:16:39.360 --> 0:16:41.760 There was nothing else to rival them. So I think 0:16:41.760 --> 0:16:45.680 we should explore more the continuing scientific debate about what 0:16:45.920 --> 0:16:49.160 the prototaxites is. But before that, let's take a break 0:16:49.160 --> 0:16:52.440 and then we come back. We can delve into mushroom theory. 0:16:52.480 --> 0:16:56.160 Today's episode is sponsored by a way whoever said, it's 0:16:56.160 --> 0:16:58.880 all about the journey. 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And there's 0:19:21.680 --> 0:19:24.320 been this great debate about what these fossils were when 0:19:24.320 --> 0:19:27.879 they were alive. Was it the trunk of a rotting 0:19:27.920 --> 0:19:31.880 conifer tree that was full of, you know, fungal fibers. 0:19:32.240 --> 0:19:34.880 Was it a giant alga or was it in fact 0:19:34.960 --> 0:19:37.359 a fungus And now we're going to get into the 0:19:37.520 --> 0:19:42.280 details of the fungus theory. Yeah, despite the conifer versus 0:19:42.320 --> 0:19:47.120 algy past, for prototax it t s the most popular 0:19:47.200 --> 0:19:52.239 hypothesis at the moment. Uh seems to be the fungus hypothesis. Uh. 0:19:52.440 --> 0:19:56.440 Not to say they are not criticisms or questions regarding 0:19:56.560 --> 0:19:58.600 the fungus hypothesis, but it does seem to be the 0:19:58.640 --> 0:20:03.359 most popular interpretation. Amazing a giant, six meter tall pillar 0:20:03.440 --> 0:20:06.520 of fungus right now. I do think it is important 0:20:06.560 --> 0:20:10.600 to note that we are not saying giant mushroom per se, 0:20:10.880 --> 0:20:15.600 because that brings to mind a certain image Shitaki's shape, right, yeah, 0:20:15.640 --> 0:20:19.320 sort of a super Mario Brothers kind of world or 0:20:19.640 --> 0:20:22.399 um or something that you would see on a on 0:20:22.440 --> 0:20:26.879 a black light fantasy painting in a room. Um. You know, 0:20:26.920 --> 0:20:30.720 we're no, nobody is interpreting this is is having looked 0:20:30.760 --> 0:20:34.480 like a straight up um uh you know, cliche mushroom 0:20:34.920 --> 0:20:37.320 with an airbrush ferry sitting on top of it. Right. 0:20:37.920 --> 0:20:41.800 But but basically the fungus interpretation comes comes down to 0:20:41.880 --> 0:20:46.199 the organism's internal structure. It's composed of interwoven tubes just 0:20:46.359 --> 0:20:50.080 five to fifty microns across, and this would indicate not 0:20:50.160 --> 0:20:54.440 a plant, but a fun guy, a likin, or perhaps 0:20:54.480 --> 0:20:56.720 even an algae. Uh. You know, some of this points 0:20:56.720 --> 0:21:00.320 in that direction here as well. But on this issue 0:21:00.359 --> 0:21:03.439 I want to turn back to Huber again because this 0:21:03.480 --> 0:21:06.320 is what he has to say about the algae interpretation 0:21:06.400 --> 0:21:12.159 and ultimately, uh, the the move towards the fungal interpretation quote. 0:21:12.560 --> 0:21:16.240 In my opinion, prototaxids does not have the structural anatomy 0:21:16.440 --> 0:21:23.360 nor morphology of an alga chemo Taxonomic analysis by Nicholas 0:21:23.400 --> 0:21:27.440 concluded that the chemical constituents found in prototax it certain 0:21:27.480 --> 0:21:32.159 fatty acids cuton and subarin differed from modern Alga, but 0:21:32.240 --> 0:21:36.280 did not preclude an algial affinity. Lack of evidence of 0:21:36.560 --> 0:21:40.639 lignified supporting structures in the otherwise weak tissues. Uh And 0:21:40.760 --> 0:21:44.600 presumed erect habit would have imposed considerable stress in a 0:21:44.720 --> 0:21:48.879 terrestrial habitat. The Presence of the compounds associated with a 0:21:49.000 --> 0:21:53.360 terrestrial habitat raised the possibility that the genus could survive 0:21:53.400 --> 0:21:56.480 on land, but did not prevent reiteration that the algial 0:21:56.480 --> 0:22:00.480 affinity was still possible. The anatomy morphology and a currences 0:22:00.680 --> 0:22:05.200 cannot be refuted so easily. He also points to UH 0:22:05.280 --> 0:22:11.600 nine six transmission electron microscope findings from Rudolph Schmidt uh And. 0:22:11.640 --> 0:22:16.080 This was a paper titled Septal Pores and prototax it 0:22:16.160 --> 0:22:19.840 t s an enigmatic Devonian plant. Uh In this he 0:22:19.880 --> 0:22:25.920 reveals that sceptal pores are are found here, suggesting fungal affinity. 0:22:26.280 --> 0:22:30.879 Septal pores are specialized dividing walls between cells, septa found 0:22:30.880 --> 0:22:33.960 in almost all species of fung guy in the phylum 0:22:34.560 --> 0:22:38.160 Bassidi of my Cota. He points out that the inherent 0:22:38.359 --> 0:22:41.240 size of prototax it tes has long been a barrier 0:22:41.520 --> 0:22:44.439 to some when it comes to accepting fungal affinity, and 0:22:44.480 --> 0:22:47.200 he counters this by pointing out that we have various 0:22:47.200 --> 0:22:51.199 examples of of of quite large contemporary fungi uh and 0:22:51.359 --> 0:22:57.040 extensive my Silian networks. He poses that perhaps prototaxites itself 0:22:57.080 --> 0:23:01.159 had a vast underground Mysilian at work as well, but 0:23:01.240 --> 0:23:05.160 we just don't have fossil evidence of that Mysilia network. 0:23:05.880 --> 0:23:10.080 But the possible picture here is is fascinating an underground 0:23:10.160 --> 0:23:15.560 kingdom of prototaxids erecting enormous fruiting bodies high into the 0:23:15.600 --> 0:23:19.080 air to send its spores on the breeze, spreading its 0:23:19.160 --> 0:23:22.480 kingdom even wider, which causes me to have deeper thoughts 0:23:22.480 --> 0:23:25.280 about the role of fungus in the evolution of land 0:23:25.320 --> 0:23:28.800 creatures and land ecosystems. Yeah, this is the kind of 0:23:28.520 --> 0:23:33.480 of of of mental image that the real hardcore fungus 0:23:33.520 --> 0:23:36.800 fans I think I could really get behind. This is like, 0:23:36.880 --> 0:23:41.119 this is a pulse stainments dream right here. I've got 0:23:41.160 --> 0:23:43.920 a question here. You ever ever wonder why we live 0:23:43.960 --> 0:23:49.399 on land and not underwater? Um less wet? I mean it, 0:23:49.560 --> 0:23:51.560 maybe it seems like a stupid question, but you know, 0:23:51.640 --> 0:23:53.760 I stand by that like, why why is it that 0:23:53.880 --> 0:23:57.880