THE SHORTEST AND LONGEST LIFESPANS OF ANIMALS

Here is a list of of the shortest and longest lifespans of some animals, and they are longer and shorter than you might think.

Life as we know it hasn't been around for that long in comparison to the age of the Earth, let alone the age of the universe. Earth is around 4.6 billion-years-old, and the earliest life formed around 3.5 billion years ago, but by no means were those prehistoric lifeforms any resemblance to what we call animals. The earliest lifeforms that began here on Earth were self-replicating molecules. Over millions of years, they adapted to their environments, which made them grow into more complex organisms thanks to an evolutionary trait called natural selection.

Evolution by natural selection aims to achieve two main things, one being the ability to adapt to change to their environment, and the other being the ability to reproduce. In some species, the ability to pass on evolutionary genes and reproduce does not favour a longer life span, and in others, it is absolutely vital. Human beings, however, are the one and only exception as we have a third influence to evolution, and that is called unnatural selection. This is caused by two main things, the first is that we are largely responsible for chance within our environment and second, we have the ability to add and remove genes to our offspring. We also have advanced scientific medical knowledge and practice at our disposal, which drastically influences our lifespan.

However, we are not the longest living animals, not even close.

Take a look at the video below by YouTube channel, Bight Side, on The Shortest and Longest Lifespans of Animals.