| Era or period |
Epoch |
Summary of milestones |
| |
|
|
| Quaternary |
Holocene (9,000BC to now) |
modern man appears |
| 1.8 mya to now |
Pleistocene (1.8mya to 9,000BC) |
Neanderthals appear and disappear |
| |
|
Homo erectus and H. sapiens |
| |
|
|
| Tertiary |
Pliocene (5 to 1.8mya) |
ape-like creatures appear |
| 65 to 1.8 mya |
Miocene (23 to 5mya) |
grazing horses and antelopes appear |
| |
Oligocene (38 to 23mya) |
birds and most mammals have radiated |
| |
Eocene (54 to 37mya) |
grasses appear, primates, cats, camels,
dogs |
| |
Paleocene (65 to 54mya) |
flowering plants and first mammals appear |
| |
|
|
| Mesozoic |
Cretaceous (146 to 65mya) |
extinction of dinosaurs, placentals
appear |
| 245 to 65mya |
Jurassic (208 to 146mya) |
birds, crabs, frogs appear |
| |
Triassic (245 to 208mya) |
crocodiles, seed plants appear, extinctions. |
| |
|
|
| Paleozoic (544 to 245mya) |
|
fish, reptiles, conifers, etc, develop |
| Proterozoic (2500 to 544mya) |
|
soft-bodied (sea) creatures |
| Archaean (3800 to 2500mya) |
|
first simple creatures and photosynthesis |
| Hadean (4500 to 3800mya) |
|
very hostile environment |
| |
|
|
| about 4500 million years ago |
|
formation of the earth |
This summarises very briefly the scientific
view. The main cornerstone of the scientific view is evolution,
and central to that is Darwinism - one element of that
is the belief that there is a "missing link",
that mankind and the apes have a common ancestor, and
that over time, both man and apes have evolved from the
same parent.
Theosophy disagrees entirely with this.