# The Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event had to have been crazy fast, right? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Tags:** science-math\ **Created:** [August 2, 2026, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-cretaceous-paleogene-extinction-event-had-to-have-been-crazy-fast-right/1032096 "2026-08-02T15:55:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 5
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2026, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-cretaceous-paleogene-extinction-event-had-to-have-been-crazy-fast-right/1032096/5 "2026-08-02T17:41:31Z")
> [@steronz](#): > > Keep in mind that even though the [Alvarez hypothesis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvarez_hypothesis) was present in the “Dinosaurs for early readers” books I loved in the '80s, it was always present as a hypothesis among others. Even [in this thread from 1999](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dinosaur-extinction/16777/44) that Discourse recommended to me, it’s treated with some skepticism. In this thread in 2022 I discussed this as [an example of a controversial idea that prevailed](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-distinguish-between-minority-opinions-and-misinformation/958690/21). As I noted when I was taking first semester biology in Fall of 1985 it was treated as a controversial hypothesis and regarded skeptically by the biologist/paleontologist community. MrDibble then noted by the time he was taking geology in 1989 it was regarded as the leading hypothesis and by around 1995 was the dominant one. I would say Alvarez ended up largely winning the debate (though there is still arguments over it, there always are). --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-cretaceous-paleogene-extinction-event-had-to-have-been-crazy-fast-right/1032096)._