7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
The Dinosaurs done gone long ago, October 4, 2009
This review is from: Greenhouse of the Dinosaurs: Evolution, Extinction, and the Future of Our Planet (Hardcover)
Greenhouse of the Dinosaurs is a meaningless title. The dinosaurs are long since gone and the major portion of this book deals with the dating of the dramatic change from the Eocene hot greenhouse earth to the cold Oligocene snow ball earth. A better title would be "Greenhouse after the Dinosaurs (and a clutter of other unrelated things)". This volume seems to have been written with no master plan or aim. It is a collection of after thoughts, anecdotes and dropped sections from the authors voluminous and generally top grade other writings. That is what is so frustrating in trying to review the present volume. Some sections are excellent and relevant to understanding questions of the day in evolutionary biology and paleogeology. These include one of the best discussions yet of "Punk Eek" puctuated equilibrium and it's tremendous effect on evolutionary theory today, plus a meaningful and incisive examination of the events in the "last days" of the dinosaurs and the impact of the bolide out of the sky on the Cretaceous Tertiary Extiction, together with a fine and comprehensible presentation on the revolution in classic taxonomic methodologies brought about by the "invasion" of the standard historic principles by the new field of cladistics. All these sections are presented with a history of the individuals involved, "the Young Turks vs. the Old Guard", the personalities of the players often with the authors personal obervations. There is so much good information and insightful observation here that makes the book worthwhile reading through more than once. But there is also a lot of clutter; the search for paleomagnetic dates and who made the coffee on that trip gets to be a little tedious. This along with other side issues seems like deliberate filler. Yes but --I'm glad I have the scholarly volume warts and all.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Pop science with teeth!, August 14, 2009
This review is from: Greenhouse of the Dinosaurs: Evolution, Extinction, and the Future of Our Planet (Hardcover)
Prothero has done it again - by adding personal stories, opinions, and photos, he takes a comprehensive discussion of the science around climate change & extinction and makes it fun to read! I must disclose that Don is a personal friend of mine, and I was lucky enough to work with him in the field several summers collecting paleomag samples. I can say that Don's style, which is so well characterized in his book, is what got me into geology as a profession.
Don's encyclopedic knowledge of his subjects lets him show how a topic is connected to other topics, and throw in the spice of "behind the scenes" trivia as well. I never fail to be amused (and a little horrified) at how the insanely competitive personalities of the early 20th-century fossil collectors in the western US defined paleontological study for the rest of the century! But Prothero never leaves you scratching your head; his explanations are clear, and include the actual data needed to draw conclusions (my pet peeve with many pop-science books these days.)
One thing Don makes clear is that science can be messy, and our understanding of past extinction & climate change episodes is far from complete. What we do know, however, is critical for confronting the human-induced warming we are experiencing now on planet Earth.
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10 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A View Into the Past and Paleontology, July 9, 2009
This review is from: Greenhouse of the Dinosaurs: Evolution, Extinction, and the Future of Our Planet (Hardcover)
During the first Congressional hearing on the IPCC report on human-induced climate change in 2007 Republican Representative Dana Rohrabacher floated a rather unusual idea. Citing warmer global climates of the distant past, like that which dominated the Eocene about 56 to 34 million years ago, Rohrbacher implied that the current warming trend was just the symptom of a natural phenomenon. If past warming events were triggered by unknown causes, Rohrabacher suggested "dinosaur farts" as the cause of the Eocene hothouse, then perhaps present rises in temperatures had nothing at all to do with human activities.
For years anthropogenic (human-caused) global warming critics have claimed that what we are going through now is just part of a cycle that has been going on for millions of years. It's not our fault and there's nothing we can do to stop it, they say, so we might as well kick back with some umbrella drinks and enjoy the endless summer. This logic might comfort politicians with oil company money lining their pockets, but it just isn't so. As paleontologist Donald Prothero points out in his forthcoming book (due out in late June), Greenhouse of the Dinosaurs, studying the climates of the past only bolsters the case that humans are altering the global environment in dramatic ways.
As the old uniformitarian saying goes "The present is the key to the past", but the converse is also true. By studying ancient climates and environments we can learn something about how the gases in the atmosphere, the constant shifting of the continents, and the paths of ocean currents influence the atmosphere. Fossils of extinct plants and animals also provide windows into these lost worlds, and while the triggers of ancient climate change might be debated these traces allow us to better understand how our planet has evolved.
The traditional way to tackle such a large (and relevant) subject would be to tell the story by the earth's chronology, starting during the Cretaceous "greenhouse of the dinosaurs" and working towards the present. This approach would be fitting of titles like Prothero's own After the Dinosaurs, but in his newest book he takes a different tack. In the tradition of Edwin Colbert's A Fossil Hunter's Notebook, G.G. Simpson's Attending Marvels, and W.B. Scott's Some Memories of a Paleontologist, Prothero's book delivers scientific information through autobiography. During the course of the book we encounter new scientific techniques, leading academics, and debates just in the order Prothero did.
The advantage of this technique is that it makes the book much more personal. Despite the widespread interest in global climate change there are few people who would want to sit down with a by-the-numbers explication of paleoclimates. Prothero's method is much more entertaining, but it makes some key points difficult to follow. At times it feels more like a straight autobiography than an autobiography meant to highlight scientific discoveries. Careful attention is required, and readers who want to know of paleontology's relevance to discussions about modern climate change may want to skip to the penultimate chapter of the book first and then start from the beginning.
Arguably the most important chapter of Prothero's book, however, has little to do with ancient climates. In the last chapter he lays out a no-nonsense assessment of what it takes to become a paleontologist, and this especially important during a time when job opportunities for paleontologists are shrinking. It is a romantic profession, scores of children dream of digging up fossils for a living, but only a minuscule fraction of those enthralled children ever become paleontologists. Even of those who publish papers and conduct research, few get to turn paleontology from a job or hobby into a full-blown career. It is not a career path to be taken on a whim.
No doubt Prothero's words will break a few hearts, but not everyone should feel dismayed. For those who truly need to become paleontologists, those who feel they have no other path to the fulfillment of their dreams, there is some hope. Becoming a paleontologist is by no means easy, but passion is an integral part of profession.
Admittedly there are some parts of the book (like the section on paleomagnetism) that drag and others (the section on the end-Cretaceous extinction) that seem to wander far afield of the book's main premise, but this is forgivable. Prothero has not only given us another popular summary of why paleontology is important for the public to understand but a personal narrative of debate and discovery. Whether you are looking to understand the evolution of earth's climate or gain an insider's view into the profession of paleontology, Greenhouse of the Dinosaurs is well-worth picking up.
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