full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Lauren Sallan: How to win at evolution and survive a mass extinction

Unscramble the Blue Letters


(Laughter)

No, it is a good thing. 96 pnerect of all fish species died during the Hangenberg event, 359 million years ago: an interval of fire and ice. A crowded world was disrupted and swept away.

Now, you might think that's the end of the story. The mighty fell, the meek inherited the earth, and here we are. But winning is not that simple. The handful of survivors came from many groups — all greatly outnumbered by their own dead. They ranged from top predator to bottom-feeder, big to small, marine to freshwater. The eoniitctxn was a filter. It merely leleved the playing field. What really counted was what svoivrrus did over the next several million yares in that devastated world. The former overlords should have had an advantage. They became even larger, storing energy, itnsvneig in their young, spreading across the globe, fasnetig on fsiehs, keinepg what had always worked, and biding their time. Yet they merely persisted for a while, declining without innovating, becoming linivg fossils. They were too stuck in their ways and are now leaglry forgotten.

Open Cloze


(Laughter)

No, it is a good thing. 96 _______ of all fish species died during the Hangenberg event, 359 million years ago: an interval of fire and ice. A crowded world was disrupted and swept away.

Now, you might think that's the end of the story. The mighty fell, the meek inherited the earth, and here we are. But winning is not that simple. The handful of survivors came from many groups — all greatly outnumbered by their own dead. They ranged from top predator to bottom-feeder, big to small, marine to freshwater. The __________ was a filter. It merely _______ the playing field. What really counted was what _________ did over the next several million _____ in that devastated world. The former overlords should have had an advantage. They became even larger, storing energy, _________ in their young, spreading across the globe, ________ on ______, _______ what had always worked, and biding their time. Yet they merely persisted for a while, declining without innovating, becoming ______ fossils. They were too stuck in their ways and are now _______ forgotten.

Solution


  1. percent
  2. survivors
  3. years
  4. investing
  5. largely
  6. fishes
  7. keeping
  8. feasting
  9. living
  10. leveled
  11. extinction

Original Text


(Laughter)

No, it is a good thing. 96 percent of all fish species died during the Hangenberg event, 359 million years ago: an interval of fire and ice. A crowded world was disrupted and swept away.

Now, you might think that's the end of the story. The mighty fell, the meek inherited the earth, and here we are. But winning is not that simple. The handful of survivors came from many groups — all greatly outnumbered by their own dead. They ranged from top predator to bottom-feeder, big to small, marine to freshwater. The extinction was a filter. It merely leveled the playing field. What really counted was what survivors did over the next several million years in that devastated world. The former overlords should have had an advantage. They became even larger, storing energy, investing in their young, spreading across the globe, feasting on fishes, keeping what had always worked, and biding their time. Yet they merely persisted for a while, declining without innovating, becoming living fossils. They were too stuck in their ways and are now largely forgotten.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
million years 4


Important Words


  1. advantage
  2. biding
  3. big
  4. counted
  5. crowded
  6. dead
  7. declining
  8. devastated
  9. died
  10. disrupted
  11. earth
  12. energy
  13. event
  14. extinction
  15. feasting
  16. fell
  17. field
  18. filter
  19. fire
  20. fish
  21. fishes
  22. forgotten
  23. fossils
  24. freshwater
  25. globe
  26. good
  27. greatly
  28. groups
  29. handful
  30. hangenberg
  31. ice
  32. inherited
  33. innovating
  34. interval
  35. investing
  36. keeping
  37. largely
  38. larger
  39. laughter
  40. leveled
  41. living
  42. marine
  43. meek
  44. mighty
  45. million
  46. outnumbered
  47. overlords
  48. percent
  49. persisted
  50. playing
  51. predator
  52. ranged
  53. simple
  54. small
  55. species
  56. spreading
  57. storing
  58. story
  59. stuck
  60. survivors
  61. swept
  62. time
  63. top
  64. ways
  65. winning
  66. worked
  67. world
  68. years
  69. young