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Extinction:

bad genes or bad luck?
Front Cover
5 Reviews
W. W. Norton & Company, 1992 - Science - 210 pages
In the geological record, there are five major mass extinctions--the "Big Five." The most famous happened at the end of the Cretaceous Period, when the dinosaurs and two-thirds of all marine animal species were wiped out, opening the door for the age of mammals and the rise of Homo Sapiens. Using this example as a springboard, David M. Raup leaps into an egaging discussion of the theories, assumptions, and difficulties associated with the science of species extinction. Woven is along the way are stories of the trilobite eye, tropical reefs, flying reptiles, and the fate of the heath hen on Martha's Vineyard, a very modern extinction.

This is the first major book to present a comprehensive overview of the current state of extinction studies. At the end of the journey, Raup has put forward the best science of the day to answer the question posed by the title: Bad genes or bad luck?
  

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2010-2011 Environmental Science student:
I think that I would recommend this book to people that are interested in the topic of extinction. You don’t need to know much about the dinosaurs or of historic eras. In this book, Raup uses fairly comprehensible language and explains to you a summary of basic but important events. He also uses good anecdotes to explain theories. He appeals to the common man and explains things in a way anybody can fully understand. He talks about a plethora of theories like the K-T theory of extinction and other mass extinctions throughout history. He explains of how every species will eventually die, as told by the Gambler’s Ruin problem. He helps the reader understand what scientists think about extinction and species. He used many graphs to help the reader interpret the data. Raup also touches upon some problems that need to be solved. At the beginning of the book he talks about how extinction hasn’t been fully investigated and how even though extinction plays a big part in our lives, it doesn’t have its own specialty. It’s a good book that hopefully can help you understand the good side of extinction. 

Review: Extinction: Bad Genes or Bad Luck?

User Review  - Tycoon - Goodreads

Slightly out of date, lots of focus on the causes of KT extinction. I liked the ambiguity expressed, however. Read full review

All 5 reviews »

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Selected pages

Contents

COULD ALL EXTINCTIONS BE CAUSED
10
A BRIEF HISTORY OF LIFE
22
GAMBLERS RUIN AND OTHER
45
MASS EXTINCTIONS
64
SELECTIVITY OF EXTINCTION
88
THE SEARCH FOR CAUSES
107
BIOLOGICAL CAUSES OF EXTINCTION
118
PHYSICAL CAUSES OF EXTINCTION
139
ROCKS FALLING OUT OF THE SKY
156
PERSPECTIVES ON EXTINCTION
181
We Choose a Safe Planet?
195
INDEX
201
Copyright

Common terms and phrases

ammonites animals asteroid average bad genes Big Five biodiversity biological birds Cambrian casino causes of extinction chance chapter climate comet common complex continental shelves craters Cretaceous Devonian dinosaurs earth estimate evolution evolutionary evolved example extinction events extinction rate Field of Bullets Figure fossil record Gambler's Ruin genera genus geographic geologic glaciation global go extinct groups habitable area habitat heath hen human intervals iridium island Jablonski Jurassic K-T boundary K-T extinction kill curve land lineages mammals marine mass extinction meteorite impact million natural North America number of species occurred oceans organisms paleontologists past patterns percent Permian Phanerozoic Pleistocene Precambrian probably problem pterosaurs rain forests range Raup reefs reptiles research article rocks scenario sea level selectivity Sepkoski Simberloff SOURCES AND FURTHER spans speciation species extinction species kill species living species-area effect statistical Stephen Jay Gould survived taxonomic temperature theory tinction tion trilobites tropical volcanic

References to this book

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References from web pages

Extinction - bad genes or bad luck? - endangered-species - 14 ...
Many more species have existed than survive today – where did they all go
environment.newscientist.com/ channel/ earth/ endangered-species/ mg13117862.300

Extinction: Bad genes or bad luck? By David M. Raup. New York: ww ...
AMERICAN JOURNAL OF. PHYSICAL. ANTHROPOLOGY 88:563-569 (1992). Book. Reviews. THE. MINER’S. CANARY:. UNRAVELING. THE. MYSTER-. IES OF. EXTINCTION. ...
doi.wiley.com/ 10.1002/ ajpa.1330880410

Reference: Raup, dm, 1991, Extinction: bad genes or bad luck: New ...
Raup, dm, 1991, Extinction: bad genes or bad luck: New York, ww Norton and Co., 210 p. Catastrophic Events Conference. 3074.pdf.
www.lpi.usra.edu/ meetings/ impact2000/ pdf/ 3074.pdf

Extinction: Bad Genes or Bad Luck? by David M. Raup, reviewed by ...
Extinction: Bad Genes or Bad Luck? by David M. Raup, reviewed by Victor Niederhoffer. August 14, 2006 |. This book by David M. Raup, a biologist at the ...
www.dailyspeculations.com/ wordpress/ ?p=9

The Extinction of Darwinism(The Atlantic): Johnson, Phillip
The Extinction of Darwinism. Review of Extinction: Bad Genes or Bad Luck by David M. Raup, (Norton 1991). Phillip E. Johnson ...
www.arn.org/ docs/ johnson/ raup.htm

Extinction (Main Page)
David M. Raup. Extinction. Bad Genes or Bad Luck? Introduction by Stephen Jay Gould In the geological record, there are five major mass extinctions—the "Big ...
www.wwnorton.com/ catalog/ backlist/ 030927.htm

Extinction: bad genes or bad luck (Raup, David M) -- Bibliography ...
Extinction: bad genes or bad luck (Raup, David M) -- Bibliography (issues) Online by the Union of International Associations (UIA), an international ...
www.diversitas.org/ db/ x.php?dbcode=re& sort=FM_19& sortad=desc& go=e& id=13512130

David M. Raup - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Extinction: Bad Genes or Bad Luck? ISBN 0-393-30927-4; Raup, David 1999. The Nemesis Affair: A Story of the Death of Dinosaurs and the Ways of Science. ...
en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/ David_Raup

JSTOR: Life's Revolutions Revisited
Books Life's revolutions revisited Extinction: Bad Genes or Bad Luck? David M. Raup. ww Norton, New York, 1991. 210 pp., illus. $19.95 (ISBN 0-393-03008-3 ...
links.jstor.org/ sici?sici=0006-3568(199205)42%3A5%3C368%3ALRR%3E2.0.CO%3B2-N

Extinction: bad genes or bad luck?
Extinction: bad genes or bad luck? Raup D. University of Chicago, USA. mesh Terms:. Adaptation, Biological · Animals · Evolution* · Fossils · Paleontology ...
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ pubmed/ 11540932

About the author (1992)

David M. Raup is the Sewell Avery Distinguished Service Professor and a statistical paleontologist at the University of Chicago.

Bibliographic information

QR code for Extinction
TitleExtinction: bad genes or bad luck?
AuthorDavid M. Raup
Editionreprint
PublisherW. W. Norton & Company, 1992
ISBN0393309274, 9780393309270
Length210 pages
Subjects ›  › 

Science / Life Sciences / Evolution
Science / Life Sciences / Microbiology
Science / Paleontology
  
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