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The ''Medea hypothesis'' is a term coined by paleontologist Peter Ward〔Peter Ward (2009), ''The Medea Hypothesis: Is Life on Earth Ultimately Self-Destructive?'', ISBN 0-691-13075-2〕 for the anti-Gaian hypothesis that multicellular life, understood as a superorganism, is suicidal; in this view, microbial-triggered mass extinctions are attempts to return the Earth to the microbial-dominated state it has been for most of its history.〔(Gaia's evil twin: Is life its own worst enemy? ) The New Scientist. Volume 202, Issue 2713, 17 June 2009, pages 28–31 (Cover story)〕 It is named after the mythological Medea, who killed her own children. Medea represents the Earth, and her children are multicellular life. Past "suicide attempts" include: *Methane poisoning, 3.5 billion years ago *The oxygen catastrophe, 2.7 billion years ago *Snowball earth, twice, 2.3 billion years ago and 790–630 million years ago *At least five putative hydrogen sulfide-induced mass extinctions, such as the Great Dying, The list does not include the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event, since this was, at least partially, externally induced by a meteor impact. ==See also== *Gaia hypothesis *Fermi paradox 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Medea hypothesis」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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