Evolution and Extinction
Published on 18. October 1990
Book
Hardback
256 pages
978-0-521-39003-3 (ISBN)
Description
There has been much debate as to whether the pace and nature of evolutionary change is gradual and more or less constant, or whether it is of an erratic, pulsed nature. Linked to this is the related question of whether so called 'mass extinctions' seen in the fossil record are merely the result of a wide range of extinction phenomena, or whether they represent extinctions resulting from catastrophic events rather than the result of random fluctuations in the fortunes of survival. This book brings together palaeontologists and evolutionary biologists to examine and deliberate on all aspects of evolution and extinction ranging from the earliest known extinctions in the fossil record to threatened extinctions associated with human activity. Graduate students and researchers in evolution, palaeobiology and ecology will find much of interest and value in this book.
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Content
Preface; Introduction; 1. The causes of extinction; 2. What, if anything, are mass extinctions?; 3. Synchronology, taxonomy and reality; 4. Evolution and extinction in the marine realm; 5. Plants at the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary; 6. Ammonoid extinction events; 7. There are extinctions and extinctions: examples from the lower Palaeozoic; 8. The biology of mass extinction: a palaeontological view; 9. Mass extinctions among tetrapods and the quality of the fossil record; 10. The Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary and the last of the dinosaurs; 11. Diversification and extinction patterns among Neogene perimediterranean mammals; 12. The case for extraterrestrial causes of extinction; 13. The case for sea-level change as a dominant causal factor in mass extinction of marine vertebrates; 14. Natural extinctions on islands; 15. The present, past and future of human-caused extinctions; 16. Mass extinction and the evolution of the human species.