WardKirschvink

Peter Ward and Joe Kirschvink

A New History of Life

The Radical New Discoveries about the Origins and Evolution of Life On Earth

2015, 576.82 WAR Beaverton Library

.p013 Geological time diagram, comparing Earth, Moon, and Mars.

Earth	Moon	Mars
Cenozoic	Copernican	Upper Amazonian
0.065 GYA	1.6 ± 0.5 GYA	0.45 ± 0.15 GYA
Mesozoic	Eratosthenian	Middle Amazonian
0.252 GYA	3.15 GYA	1.85 ± 0.35 GYA
Paleozoic	Upper Imbrian	Lower Amazonian
0.542 GYA	3.75 GYA	3.1 GYA
Neoproterozoic	Lower Imbrian	Hesperian
0.90 GYA	3.8 GYA	3.6 GYA
Mesoproterozoic	Nectarian	Noachian
1.60 GYA	3.92 GYA	4.55 GYA
Paleoproterozoic	Pre-Nectarian
2.50 GYA	4.51 GYA
Archean
3.96 GYA
Hadean
4.567 GYA	Stoffler	Hartman
	& Ryder	& Neukum
GSA 1998	2001	2001

p041 reference 11: Nick Lane "Bioenergetic Constraints on the Evolution of Complex Life" in The Origin and Evolution of Eukaryotes. Cold Spring Harbor Perspectives in Biology (2013)
p085 James Walker and Jim Kasting suggest escape from an ice catastrophe because of a pressure broadening of CO2 absorption spectrum, "but not included in global climate models, simply because no one ever suspected that this has actually happened.
- fooey. This is part of current climate models, part of the CO2 contribution to warming
p233 Triassic Rebound, 250 to 245 MYA ... Sulfur bacteria "... environmentally challenging world for animal life, trough in oxygen, new respiratory systems, emergence of mammals and dinosaurs
p354 hopeful future, or ..." carbon dioxide causes all ice on Earth to melt, raising sea levels, slowing the thermohaline circulation patterns, bringing stagnation followed by anoxia to the ocean bottoms, then to ever-shallower waters, at the same time liberating toxic levels of hydrogen sulfide to percolate out of every single ocean"
- no cite or quantification. (1) is that much sulfur actually available, and (2) how fast?, and (3) what technofixes are available. I agree that it is best to avoid this, but mostly believe that carbon is for construction, not combustion. How can we create high strength carbon fiber with all the excess carbon?
p373. chapter 12, reference 11, list of references
- Algeo Ingall " edimentary Corg:P Ratios, Paleoceanography, Ventilation, and Phanerzoic Atmospheric pO2" 256 (2007) 130-155
- C Winguth and A M E Winguth "Simulating Permian-Triassic Ocean Anoxia Distribution: Implications for Species Extinction and Recover,' Geology 40 (2012): 127-130
- S Xie et al "Changes in the Global Carbon Cycle Occured as Two Episodes during the Permian-Triassic Crisis" Geology 35 (2007) p1083-86
- S Xie et al "Two Episodes of Microbial Change Coupled with Permo-Triassic Faunal Mass Extinction" Nature 434 (2005) 494-97
- G Luo et al "Stepwise and Large-Magnitude Negative shift in d13Ccarb Preceded the Main Marine Mass Extinction of the Permian-Triassic Crisis Interval," Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 299 (2011) 70-82
- G A Brennecka et al "Rapid Expansion of Oceanic Anoxia Immediately before the End-Permian Mass Extinction" PNAS 109 (2011): 17631-34