Forrest Galante, host of “Extinct or Alive” on Animal Planet, explains why sharks are so important to their ecosystems. You’ll also learn about giant prehistoric sea scorpions who used to rule the sea and how cats affect online dating.
Forrest Galante, host of “Extinct or Alive” on Animal Planet, helps us celebrate Shark Week by explaining why sharks are so important to their ecosystems. You’ll also learn about giant prehistoric sea scorpions called Eurypterids who used to rule the sea and how cats affect online dating.
More from Animal Planet’s “Extinct or Alive” and host Forrest Galante:
Giant sea scorpions were the underwater titans of prehistoric Australia by Cameron Duke
Women harshly judge men who pose with cats on their dating profiles by Kelsey Donk
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Find episode transcript here: https://curiosity-daily-4e53644e.simplecast.com/episodes/sharks-arent-just-apex-predators-w-forrest-galante-how-cats-affect-online-dating-and-when-giant-prehistoric-sea-scorpions-ruled-the-seas
CODY: Hi! You’re about to get smarter in just a few minutes with Curiosity Daily from curiosity-dot-com. I’m Cody Gough.
ASHLEY: And I’m Ashley Hamer. And we’re celebrating SHARK WEEK! [cue music] Today, you’ll learn about why sharks are so important to ocean ecosystems, with special guest Forrest Galante, host of “Extinct or Alive” on Animal Planet. You’ll also learn about giant prehistoric sea scorpions who used to rule the oceans; and then we’ll switch gears to explain how having a cat in your profile picture can affect your online dating success.
CODY: Let’s satisfy some curiosity.
Earlier this week, Animal Planet aired a special called “Extinct or Alive: Land of the Lost Sharks.” In the show, wildlife biologist and conservationist Forrest Galante dove into some of the most treacherous, shark-populated waters in the southern hemisphere. And it was all in an attempt to rediscover three unique species lost to science for as long as 100 years. In case you missed it — first of all, it was awesome, so go check it out on the Animal Planet GO app. We’ll put a link in the show notes. But more importantly, it made us curious: why does one lost species matter? Well to help answer that question, we got back in touch with Forrest Galante. You heard him on this very podcast last November, and today he’s back to tell us about what he did for Shark Week — and why it's important.
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Again, that was Forrest Galante, host of “Extinct or Alive” on Animal Planet. And he’ll be back tomorrow to recap what he found during his shark search — and the surprising methods he used to do it.
The Great White shark is a fearsome predator; no doubt about it. But if you swam in the ocean millions of years ago, you wouldn’t have Jaws to worry about. Instead, you’d have to watch out for giant sea scorpions. These monsters struck fear into primordial ocean inhabitants the same way the Great White shark does today. Get ready to learn about the Eurypterids [yurr-RIP-turr-rids].
Eurypterids were the reigning ocean predators of the Paleozoic for around 200 million years, way back between 541 and 252 million years ago. That was when ecological conditions allowed some ancient species of arthropod — meaning the ancestors of scorpions, spiders, lobsters, and shrimps — to get really big. One arthropod in particular called Jaekelopterus [YEE-cal-OPP-tur-uss] is thought to be one of the largest predatory marine arthropods in the fossil record, and possibly the largest to ever exist. This scorpion-like predator was 2 and a half meters or about 8 feet long, which means that if you laid it next to the world’s tallest basketball player, it’d be longer.
And faster, too. Their legs were especially evolved for swimming, so they would have been really fast and agile. They would probably chase their prey to within claw’s reach before crushing them between long, toothlike structures on their legs. While what they ate isn’t completely clear, their dining habits probably weren’t very polite.
The first Eurypterid fossil was discovered in 1899 near Australia, which is infamous for its bizarre creatures. Looking at you, platypus. Anyway, while most of these fossils have been discovered in the Northern hemisphere, the largest ones lived in the Paleozoic waters off the coast of Gondwana, which is an ancient supercontinent that broke up to form Africa, Australia, and Antarctica. The vast majority of the known specimens are mostly just fragments of the scorpion’s exoskeleton, although paleontologists have been able to piece together enough complete specimens to get an idea of what the thing looked like. That being said, the scientific record of these creatures is patchy, so their evolutionary history is still very uncertain. Scientists know they are ancient arthropods related to modern scorpions and crustaceans, but they’ll need more information to figure out how they fit into those lineages.
Next time you find shrimp or lobster on your plate, be thankful. 300 million years ago, you might have been the meal.
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Next up is a non-shark story… that is, assuming you don’t have a shark in your dating profile picture. Even if you do have an apex predator to entice a mate, you’ve gotta admit that dating in quarantine is hard enough as it is. But we have some bad news for the single cat dads out there — a new study found that women harshly judge men who pose with cats on their dating profiles.
To find this out, researchers recruited 1,300 straight young women to take a survey. They women saw two different images of the same man. In both pictures, the man was sitting in a chair in front of a white background, wearing a blue button-down shirt and jeans. Pretty simple! But in one picture, the man was alone. In the other picture, he had a ginger cat sitting in his lap.
Researchers randomized the order in which participants got to look at the images. And just to make sure the results weren’t influenced by one guy’s appearance, the survey came in two versions. Each included a different man.
The women had to rate the men’s personalities based on the images. How extraverted did they seem? How agreeable, neurotic, conscientious, and open? Then, how masculine did the man seem? How dateable was he?
And to make sure there wasn’t anti-cat bias, participants had to say whether they considered themselves to be a cat person or a dog person.
When it came to the ratings, it depended on which man the women saw. When Man A, let’s call him, was alone, women rated him as more extraverted. When he was holding the cat, women rated him as more agreeable, neurotic, and open. Open and agreeable! Not bad things to be! But the women also said they didn’t want to date him.
Women rated Man B a little differently. They judged his personality exactly the same way whether he was pictured with a cat or not. But they did say that he looked less masculine with a cat, and they also thought he was less dateable in the short term. He did seem like a contender for a long-term relationship, though!
Of course, this study isn’t exactly rock solid. Both of the men pictured were young and white, so it’s unclear if those factors have an impact. And it’s also unclear if women would have the same response to men pictured with dogs or rabbits. Also? The majority of the women were self-described dog people. I smell some canine bias!
Basically this is just something fun to think about when you next find yourself scrolling through Tinder. But not necessarily a study that should change our behavior.
Let’s recap the main things we learned today
[ad lib optional]
CODY: Today’s stories were written by Cameron Duke and Kelsey Donk, and edited by Ashley Hamer, who’s the managing editor for Curiosity Daily.
ASHLEY: Today’s episode was produced and edited by Cody Gough.
CODY: Join us again tomorrow to learn something new in just a few minutes.
ASHLEY: And until then, stay curious!