From the Cambrian Explosion to the Great Dying

Learn more about Audible at or text “Eons” to 500-500 PBS Member Stations rely on viewers like you. To support your local station, go to The first era of our current eon, the Paleozoic Era, is probably the most deceptively fascinating time in Earth’s history. With near-constant revolutions in life, punctuated by catastrophic extinctions, it is also one of the most chaotic. Correction! At 9:19, we erroneously refer to Dimetrodon as an herbivore. It was definitely a carnivore. We even made a whole video about Dimetrodon and their carnivorous ways in a previous episode: Thanks to everyone who pointed out our error!