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Asymmetrical patterns of origination and extinction in higher taxa.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 April 2016

Norman L. Gilinsky  and
Richard K. Bambach
Norman L. Gilinsky
Affiliation:
Department of Geological Sciences, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia 24061-0796
Richard K. Bambach
Affiliation:
Department of Geological Sciences, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia 24061-0796
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Abstract

Using Sepkoski's compendium of fossil marine families (1982a, and updates), we have analyzed the changing pace of familial origination and extinction within 55 extinct and 44 extant higher taxa of marine organisms. Eight different metrics were calculated, and least-squares regression analysis was used to identify within-taxon trends in the data. All metrics and analyses gave essentially the same results. Origination metrics decline significantly with time during the histories of higher taxa, while extinction metrics increase significantly. The number of statistically significant declines of origination metric, however, substantially and invariably exceeds the number of statistically significant increases of extinction metric for each pair of corresponding metrics analyzed. It follows, therefore, that temporal trends in the pace of origination and extinction within higher taxa are highly asymmetrical.

Further analysis shows that truncating data from temporal endpoints has little effect upon the intensity of origination trends, implying that declining pace of origination is a sustained property of the long term histories of taxa. Such truncation, however, reduces the intensity of extinction trends to statistical insignificance and confirms Van Valen's (1985a) suggestion that extinction behaves largely as a stationary process. If the histories of higher taxa are characterized by substantial declines in the pace of origination while the pace of extinction remains largely stationary, it follows that declining pace of origination is an important controlling factor in long term taxic evolution.

Type
Articles
Information
Paleobiology , Volume 13 , Issue 4 , Fall 1987 , pp. 427 - 445
Copyright
Copyright © The Paleontological Society 

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