According to calculations made on the basis of an enormous monster snake fossil found near the equator in Columbia, the Earth where the fossil was found was once 10ºF warmer. All reptiles in the rain forest were apparently much larger than comparable current reptiles.
Without bothering to calculate how far from the equator the find was at the time its occupant was alive, and what impact that might have on the global temperature differences (if Columbia was then further from the equator, the global temperature might have been even more different), it seems the Earth's typical temperature might have been significantly warmer. According to Jonathan Bloch, "[t]he result was, among other things, the largest snakes the world has ever seen...and hopefully ever will."
One question that comes to mind is whether the corals we currently have, which appear so sensitive to warming of their immediate environment, had not yet developed at the time the monster snake lived.
Interesting, no?
I wonder if the snakes picketed against global cooling ....
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