Uploaded August 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Chris Cottrell of Dabbler's Den returns to catch up with Becket Fusik a year after his last Cosmic Summit appearance, and the update is substantial: two new books, a peer reviewed paper, and a research direction that has shifted since they last spoke.
Chris first encountered Carolina Bays in college around 2000, rediscovered them while pursuing a geoscience master's degree in 2015, and started his YouTube channel to make the research more accessible. After three years presenting at Cosmic Summit, including sharing the stage with Antonio Zamora, Chris spent five years convinced the Bays were Younger Dryas impact features, before evidence around sea level and coastal geology pulled him toward a different conclusion. That shift became the subject of his first book, The Enigma of the Carolina Bays.
His second book, Gone But Not Forgotten, moves away from the Bays entirely and into the megafauna extinction itself, roughly 73% of North American megafauna lost within the Younger Dryas timeframe, animals humans actually lived alongside, not distant fossils like dinosaurs. The Clovis culture, often blamed for hunting them to extinction, disappeared at the same moment. Chris used AI tools for editing and illustration throughout both books, and is now working on audiobook versions and additional peer reviewed papers, self-funding the publication costs through book sales.
The name Dabbler's Den traces back to a student who diagnosed Chris's pattern before he was formally diagnosed with ADHD as an adult: someone who picks up new subjects, goes deep, and moves on, which he has now channelled into a decade of sustained Carolina Bays research. He closes with his pick for which extinct megafauna he would want back: a mammoth, raised from birth in his backyard.
**CHAPTERS**
00:10 Introduction: catching up with Chris Cottrell
01:12 How Chris first discovered Carolina Bays
03:32 Three years on the Cosmic Summit stage
06:28 Why Chris moved away from the Younger Dryas impact hypothesis
09:58 Book two: Gone But Not Forgotten and the megafauna extinction
12:30 73% extinction and the Clovis culture connection
14:06 The Dabbler's Den origin story
17:32 Funding independent research through book sales
18:54 Lightning round: AI tools, ChatGPT vs Claude, Antonio Zamora's IBM history
22:36 Cosmic Summit 2027 wishlist
25:09 Where to find Chris's books and channel
**GUESTS**
Chris Cottrell / Dabbler's Den — @DabblersDen
The Enigma of the Carolina Bays
https://a.co/d/07mhZPPz
Gone But Not Forgotten
https://a.co/d/0fepdcI8
GBNF Coloring Book
https://a.co/d/04rRdmis
**ABOUT**
TTN News covers the cosmic history that shaped this planet and the deep human past still buried in the ground.
**FOLLOW TTN NEWS**
[facebook.com/cosmicsummit] · [https://x.com/Cosmicsummitx] · [instagram.com/cosmic.summit/] · [https://thetitan.network/]
#TTNNews #ChrisCottrell #DabblersDen #CarolinaBays #YoungerDryas #MegafaunaExtinction #BecketFusik #CosmicSummit
Chris Cottrell of Dabbler's Den returns to catch up with Becket Fusik a year after his last Cosmic Summit appearance, and the update is substantial: two new books, a peer reviewed paper, and a research direction that has shifted since they last spoke.
Chris first encountered Carolina Bays in college around 2000, rediscovered them while pursuing a geoscience master's degree in 2015, and started his YouTube channel to make the research more accessible. After three years presenting at Cosmic Summit, including sharing the stage with Antonio Zamora, Chris spent five years convinced the Bays were Younger Dryas impact features, before evidence around sea level and coastal geology pulled him toward a different conclusion. That shift became the subject of his first book, The Enigma of the Carolina Bays.
His second book, Gone But Not Forgotten, moves away from the Bays entirely and into the megafauna extinction itself, roughly 73% of North American megafauna lost within the Younger Dryas timeframe, animals humans actually lived alongside, not distant fossils like dinosaurs. The Clovis culture, often blamed for hunting them to extinction, disappeared at the same moment. Chris used AI tools for editing and illustration throughout both books, and is now working on audiobook versions and additional peer reviewed papers, self-funding the publication costs through book sales.
The name Dabbler's Den traces back to a student who diagnosed Chris's pattern before he was formally diagnosed with ADHD as an adult: someone who picks up new subjects, goes deep, and moves on, which he has now channelled into a decade of sustained Carolina Bays research. He closes with his pick for which extinct megafauna he would want back: a mammoth, raised from birth in his backyard.
**CHAPTERS**
00:10 Introduction: catching up with Chris Cottrell
01:12 How Chris first discovered Carolina Bays
03:32 Three years on the Cosmic Summit stage
06:28 Why Chris moved away from the Younger Dryas impact hypothesis
09:58 Book two: Gone But Not Forgotten and the megafauna extinction
12:30 73% extinction and the Clovis culture connection
14:06 The Dabbler's Den origin story
17:32 Funding independent research through book sales
18:54 Lightning round: AI tools, ChatGPT vs Claude, Antonio Zamora's IBM history
22:36 Cosmic Summit 2027 wishlist
25:09 Where to find Chris's books and channel
**GUESTS**
Chris Cottrell / Dabbler's Den — @DabblersDen
The Enigma of the Carolina Bays
https://a.co/d/07mhZPPz
Gone But Not Forgotten
https://a.co/d/0fepdcI8
GBNF Coloring Book
https://a.co/d/04rRdmis
**ABOUT**
TTN News covers the cosmic history that shaped this planet and the deep human past still buried in the ground.
**FOLLOW TTN NEWS**
[facebook.com/cosmicsummit] · [https://x.com/Cosmicsummitx] · [instagram.com/cosmic.summit/] · [https://thetitan.network/]
#TTNNews #ChrisCottrell #DabblersDen #CarolinaBays #YoungerDryas #MegafaunaExtinction #BecketFusik #CosmicSummit
