Reviews
Highly recommended.
A learned essay, written clearly and attractively for students and the public.
What makes Archibald’s book a highly recommendable example of the scientific process is that the author carefully lays out all the paleontological evidence available to him and uses that evidence to evaluate the many possible explanations of the extinction, discussing the strengths, weaknesses, and limitations of each explanation in the process.
This is a learned essay, written clearly and attractively for students and the public.
An excellent compendium of the current state of paleontological knowledge about the contemporaneous histories of these two groups.
A highly recommendable example of the scientific process is that the author carefully lays out all the paleontological evidence available to him and uses that evidence to evaluate the many possible explanations of the extinction.
The book itself is a handsome quarto volume illustrated by good drawings and graphs. It will be most useful to paleontologists, evolutionary biologists and biogeographers. It will stand as a good example of what can be accomplished in academia.
Books like Extinction and Radiation enable interested members of the general public to share in the excitement of the arugment.
This volume is logically organized, easily readable, and a noteworthy synthesis of the current state of our knowledge of the disappearance of nonavian dinosaurs and mammalian radiation. It is a useful reference from an acknowledged authority in the field and valuable for students, teachers, scientists, and all people interested in the evolution and fate of our planet and its biodiversity.
David Archibald is one of the most knowledgeable people in the world about extinctions, as well as the fairest analyst of their patterns and causes. In this book he invites his readers to consider not just dinosaurs but all the animals that lived at the end of the Age of Dinosaurs. He provides the clearest picture yet of this extremely complex time in the history of life. Anyone interested in paleontology or extinction, especially those who think they already know what did in the dinosaurs, should read this book.
Book Details
Preface
1. The Late Cretaceous Nonavian Dinosaur Record
2. In the Shadow of Nonavian Dinosaurs
3. In Search of Our Most Ancient Eutherian Ancestors
4. Patterns of Extinction at the K/ T Boundary
5. Causes
Preface
1. The Late Cretaceous Nonavian Dinosaur Record
2. In the Shadow of Nonavian Dinosaurs
3. In Search of Our Most Ancient Eutherian Ancestors
4. Patterns of Extinction at the K/ T Boundary
5. Causes of Extinction at the K/ T Boundary
6. After the Impact: Modern Mammals, When and Whence
Epilogue
Notes
References
Index