Abstract
The geologic record of Earth (Fig. 2-1) raises two questions that have baffled paleontologists for years. Why did animal and plant life appear suddenly and widely in Cambrian time? Why did plants and animals not appear on dry land until Late Silurian or Devonian time (Fig. 2-2)? These two questions and the landmarks in Earth’s history to which they point direct immediate attention to the basic concept underlying all biology: evolution. Evolution need not begin with recognizable fossils. The concept can be applied to changes that preceded obvious organisms, and to the causes of the two events depicted in Fig. 2-1. So our story begins with the evolution of planet Earth, without which there would be no fossil record and no life forms whose evolution we could study.
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Suggestions for Further Reading
Barghoorn, E. S., W. G. Meinschein, and J. W. Schopf, “Paleobiology of a Precambrian Shale,” Science, 148 (1965), pp. 461–472. See also the references following Chapter 3 in which Barghoorn’s name appears.
Berkner, L. V., and L. C. Marshall, “On the Origin and Rise of Oxygen Concentration in the Earth’s Atmosphere,” Journal of Atmospheric Science 22 (1965), pp. 225261. Gives an original account of their hypothesis.
Carnegie Institution of Washington, Reports of the Geophysical Laboratory. See Yearbooks, for example Nos. 62 and 63. The work of Abelson and of Hoering is especially pertinent. Source of many original papers on biogeochemistry.
Cloud, P. E. Jr., Chairman, “Symposium on the Evolution of the Earth’s Atmosphere,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, 53 (1965), pp. 1169–1226. Includes papers by Fischer, Davidson, Holland, Commoner, and Berkner and Marshall, together with remarks by Cloud and Urey.
Cloud, P. E. Jr., Chairman, “Pre-Metazoan Evolution and the Origins of the Metazoa,” in Ellen T. Drake, ed., Evolution and Environment (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1968), pp. 1–72.
Harland, W. B., A. Gilbert Smith, and B. Wilcock, “The Phanerozoic Time-Scale,” Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, 1205, pp. 1–458. This is the source of most of the dates used in this book.
Laporte, Leo F., Ancient Environments (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1968). A good source for consideration of such questions as the origin, transport, and deposition of sediments, environment of deposition, some geochemistry, interrelationships between organisms and their environment, and the chance that an organism will be fossilized.
Meinschein, W. G., “Soudan Formation: Organic Extracts of Early Precambrian Rocks,” Science, 150 (1965), pp. 601–605.
Newell, N. D., “Geology’s Time Clock: Radioactive Minerals and Fossils Both Aid in Decipherment of Earth History,” Natural History, (May 1962), pp. 33–37. A popular account of radioactive dating.
Oro, J., D. W. Nooner, A. Zlatkis, S. A. Wikström, and E. S. Barghoorn, “Hydrocarbons of Biological Origin in Sediments About Two Billion Years Old,” Science, 148 (1965), pp. 77–79.
Schopf, J. W., K. A. Kvenvolden, and E. S. Barghoorn, “Amino Acids in Precambrian Sediments: An Assay,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 59 (1968), pp. 639–646. Important evaluation of the biogeochemical data from ancient rocks.
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© 1970 Wadsworth Publishing Company, Inc.
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Banks, H.P. (1970). In the Beginning. In: Evolution and Plants of the Past. Fundamentals of Botany Series. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-01818-5_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-01818-5_2
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