The Earth is much older than we thought.

The Earth is much older than we thought.

So now we know. The Earth is much, much older than was at first thought. After much scientific head scratching. scientists have finally concluded that the Earth is billions of years older than we always assumed it was. After much deliberation our friends in the scientific community have given it to us straight. Mankind goes back much further into the mists of time and the origin of everything and everybody has to be re-assessed. Stick a couple of zeroes into that billion year time zone and there you have it. Where it all began for you, I and the rest of the world. It's the most glorious revelation.

For years most of us frequently referred to the Black Hole as the starting point and some would have you believe that it all started with a group of dinosaurs huddling around a camp fire and discussing Brexit and Donald Trump's trouser leg measurements. No that's just way off the mark although it can't be that far from the truth. The truth is that the beginning of time can never be accurately gauged because even the Sun wasn't around at the time and they'd only just completed the House of Commons. Or maybe not.

For many decades rumours have circulated about the origin of the species, Darwinism and how mankind requested their first friend on Facebook. It was a time long ago when the ice caps were insufferably cold and always shifting, apples were fruits rather than technological devices and an I Pad was something you wrote on rather than something you made a flicking motion with your fingers.

Billions of years ago when primeval swamps bubbled with life and the universe was just some very outrageously unsubstantiated rumour, none of us could even begin to imagine what the future would hold. Maybe we all thought that  everything that happened so many billions of years ago would certainly be repeated on BBC Four if  the BBC could ever uncover any video evidence of the event. So where did it all begin and how did it develop through the ages and civilisations?

It is easy to be tongue in cheek but why has it taken a couple of scientists to reach some mind blowing but definitive discovery about the age of the universe? Surely a microscope in some very academic laboratory can barely get to the heart of the matter. This evening the BBC News gave us a graphic illustration of the ape, man and Woody Allen as a small lad. Well not quite. Only joking Woody.

Still historians, scientists and learned professors could never begin to make head or tail of some of the recent events that have taken place on planet Earth. We've all heard about the Big Bang and those very primitive stirrings in the world of mankind. First dinosaurs roamed the earth and then George Burns lit his first cigar.  Oh how witty I'm not. These were intriguing times and to those of a cynical turn of mind, purely hypothetical.

And then Enoch Powell, that alleged rabid racist. made the now infamous Rivers of Blood speech,  the whole of the world spun frantically on its axis, huge acres of lush woodland and forest sprung up from somewhere and Ken Dodd made his debut in a smoky working men's club in Oldham. But of course I joke and jest since sir Ken is our most widely adored British treasure and is exempt from any ridicule.

Anyway today's announcement about the arrival of mankind and its much older provenance has to be taken with the lightest pinch of salt. How to explain the ever present tragedies and disasters that have so scarred the face of humanity since those very early days? Where did it all go wrong or right for us and why are we still questioning and squabbling, holding our heads in despair and disbelieving?

Of course it happened billions of years ago but since time is just unquantifiable we'll have to just get on with our lives and accept that Patrick Moore, our late and dearly beloved man of science, was right. The world may be much older than we thought but what a crazy place it can be at times. It's at times like this that you become very grateful for your family and friends. Now what did I do with my encyclopaedia.