Skip to content Skip to navigation

Article: Is the number of species on earth increasing or decreasing? Time, chaos and the origin of species

Publication: Palaeontology
Volume: 56
Part: 6
Publication Date: November 2013
Page(s): 1305 – 1325
Author(s): K. D. Bennett
Addition Information

How to Cite

BENNETT, K. D. 2013. Is the number of species on earth increasing or decreasing? Time, chaos and the origin of species. Palaeontology, 56, 6, 1305–1325.

Online Version Hosted By

Wiley Online Library
Get Article: Wiley Online Library [Pay-to-View Access] |

References

  • Avise, J. C. and Walker, D. 1998. Pleistocene phylogeographic effects on avian populations and the speciation process. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 265, 457–463.
  • Baker, A. J., Pereira, S. L. and Paton, T. A. 2007. Phylogenetic relationships and divergence times of Charadriiformes genera: multigene evidence for the Cretaceous origin of at least 14 clades of shorebirds. Biology Letters, 3, 205–209.
  • Bennett, K. D. 1987. Holocene history of forest trees in southern Ontario. Canadian Journal of Botany, 65, 1792–1801.
  • Bennett, K. D. 1990. Milankovitch cycles and their effects on species in ecological and evolutionary time. Paleobiology, 16, 11–21.
  • Bennett, K. D. 1997. Evolution and ecology: the pace of life. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 241 pp.
  • Bennett, K. D. and Willis, K. J. 2000. Effect of global atmospheric carbon dioxide on glacial–interglacial vegetation change. Global Ecology and Biogeography, 9, 355–361.
  • Benton, M. J. 1989. Mass extinctions among tetrapods and the quality of the fossil record. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London Series B, 325, 369–386.
  • Benton, M. J. and Emerson, B. C. 2007. How did life become so diverse? The dynamics of diversification according to the fossil record and molecular phlogenetics. Palaeontology, 50, 23–40.
  • Berger, A., Loutre, M. F. and Dehant, V. 1989. Influence of the changing lunar orbit in the astronomical frequencies of pre-Quaternary insolation patterns. Paleoceanography, 4, 555–564.
  • Bird, C. E., Fernandez-Silva, I., Skillings, D. J. and Toonen, R. J. 2012. Sympatric speciation in the post ‘modern synthesis’ era of evolutionary biology. Evolutionary Biology, 39, 158–180.
  • Birks, H. J. B. 1981. The use of pollen analysis in the reconstruction of past climates: a review. 111–138. In Wigley, T. M. L., Ingram, M. J. and Farmer, G. (eds). Climate and history: studies in past climates and their impact on man. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 544 pp.
  • Birks, H. J. B. and Lotter, A. F. 1994. The impact of the Laacher See volcano (11 000 yr B.P.) on terrestrial vegetation and diatoms. Journal of Paleolimnology, 11, 313–322.
  • Bowman, D. M. J. S., Balch, J. K., Artaxo, P., Bond, W. J., Carlson, J. M., Cochrane, M. A., D'antonio, C. M., Defries, R. S., Doyle, J. C., Harrison, S. P., Johnston, F. H., Keeley, J. E., Krawchuk, M. A., Kull, C. A., Marston, J. B., Moritz, M. A., Prentice, I. C., Roos, C. I., Scott, A. C., Swetnam, T. W., van der Werf, G. R. and Pyne, S. J. 2009. Fire in the Earth system. Science, 324, 481–484.
  • Boyd, J. H. III 2012. Aves – a taxonomy in Flux: http://jboyd.net/Taxo/index.html.
  • Bromham, L. and Woolfit, M. 2004. Explosive radiations and the reliability of molecular clocks: island endemic radiations as a test case. Systematic Biology, 53, 758–766.
  • Budd, G. E. 2006. On the origin and evolution of major morphological characters. Biological Reviews, 81, 609–628.
  • Campagna, L., Benites, P., Lougheed, S. C., Lijtmaer, D. A., di Giacomo, A. S., Eaton, M. D. and Tubaro, P. L. 2012. Rapid phenotypic evolution during incipient speciation in a continental avian radiation. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 279, 1847–1856.
  • Carrión, J. S., Andrade, A., Bennett, K. D., Navarro, C. and Munuera, M. 2001. Crossing forest thresholds: inertia and collapse in a Holocene sequence from south-central Spain. The Holocene, 11, 635–653.
  • Cartwright, M. L. and Littlewood, J. E. 1945. On non-linear differential equations of the second order: I. The equation , k large. Journal of the London Mathematical Society, s1–20 (3), 180–189.
  • Casdagli, M. 1991. Chaos and deterministic versus stochastic non-linear modelling. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society B, 54, 303–328.
  • Chen, Z. J. and Ni, Z. 2006. Mechanisms of genomic rearrangements and gene expression changes in plant polyploids. BioEssays, 28, 240–252.
  • Clark, J. S., Dietze, M., Chakraborty, S., Agarwal, P. K., Ibanez, I., Ladeau, S. and Wolosin, M. 2007. Resolving the biodiversity paradox. Ecology Letters, 10, 647–659.
  • Cole, K. 1985. Rate of change, species richness, and a model of vegetational inertia in the Grand Canyon, Arizona. The American Naturalist, 125, 289–303.
  • Cole, K. 1986. In defense of inertia. The American Naturalist, 127, 727–728.
  • Coope, G. R. 1979. Late Cenozoic fossil Coleoptera: evolution, biogeography, and ecology. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, 10, 247–267.
  • Cornette, J. L. and Lieberman, B. S. 2004. Random walks in the history of life. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 101, 187–191.
  • Cornette, J. L., Lieberman, B. S. and Goldstein, R. H. 2002. Documenting a significant relationship between macroevolutionary origination rates and Phanerozoic pCO2 levels. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 99, 7832–7835.
  • Costello, M. J., May, R. M. and Stork, N. E. 2013. Can we name Earth's species before they go extinct? Science, 339, 413–416.
  • Coyne, J. A. and Orr, H. A. 2004. Speciation. Sinauer Associates, Sunderland, MA, 545 pp.
  • Cracraft, J., Barker, F. K., Braun, M., Harshman, J., Dyke, G. J., Feinstein, J., Stanley, S., Cibois, A., Schikler, P., Beresford, P., García-Moreno, J., Sorenson, M. D., Yuri, T. and Mindell, D. P. 2004. Phylogenetic relationships among modern birds (Neornithes). 468–489. In Cracraft, J. and Donoghue, M. J. (eds). Assembling the tree of life. Oxford University Press, New York, NY, 576 pp.
  • Dansgaard, W., Johnsen, S. J., Clausen, H. B., Dahl-Jensen, D., Gundestrup, N. S., Hammer, C. U., Hvidberg, C. S., Steffensen, J. P., Sveinbjörnsdottir, A. E., Jouzel, J. and Bond, G. 1993. Evidence for general instability of past climate from a 250-kyr ice-core record. Nature, 364, 218–220.
  • Darwin, C. 1859. On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. John Murray, London, 490 pp.
  • Davis, M. B. 1976. Pleistocene biogeography of temperate deciduous forests. Geoscience and Man, 13, 13–26.
  • Davis, M. B. 1986. Climatic instability, time lags, and community disequilibrium. 269–284. In Diamond, J. and Case, T. J. (eds). Community ecology. Harper & Row, New York, NY, 665 pp.
  • Dawkins, R. 1986. The blind watchmaker. Longman Scientific & Technical, Harlow, UK, 332 pp.
  • Dawkins, R. 2004. The ancestor's tale: a pilgrimage to the dawn of evolution. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 688 pp.
  • Doebeli, U. D. M. 1999. On the origin of species by sympatric speciation. Nature, 400, 354–357.
  • Donges, J. F., Donner, R. V., Trauth, M. H., Marwan, N., Schellnhuber, H. J. and Kurths, J. 2011. Nonlinear detection of paleoclimate-variability transitions possibly related to human evolution. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 108, 20422–20427.
  • Drake, J. W., Charlesworth, B., Charlesworth, D. and Crow, J. F. 1998. Rates of spontaneous mutation. Genetics, 148, 1667–1686.
  • Eldredge, N. and Gould, S. J. 1972. Punctuated equilibria: an alternative to phyletic gradualism. 82–115. In Schopf, T. J. M. (ed.). Models in paleobiology. Freeman, Cooper, San Francisco, 250 pp.
  • Eldredge, N. and Gould, S. J. 1988. Punctuated equilibrium prevails. Nature, 332, 211–212.
  • Eldredge, N., Thompson, J. N., Brakefield, P. M., Gavrilets, S., Jablonski, D., Jackson, J. B. C., Lenski, R. E., Lieberman, B. S., McPeek, M. A. and MILLER, W. III 2005. The dynamics of evolutionary stasis. Paleobiology, 31, 133–145.
  • Endler, J. A. 1986. Natural selection in the wild. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 354 pp.
  • Eyles, N. 2008. Glacio-epochs and the supercontinent cycle after ∼3.0 Ga: tectonic boundary conditions for glaciation. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, 258, 89–129.
  • Field, M. H., Huntley, B. and Müller, H. 1994. Eemian climate fluctuations observed in a European pollen record. Nature, 371, 779–783.
  • Fodor, J. 2007. Why pigs don't have wings. London Review of Books, 20 (20), 19–20.
  • Fodor, J. and Piattelli-Palmarini, M. 2010. What Darwin got wrong. Profile Books, London, 258 pp.
  • Forster, P. 2004. Ice Ages and the mitochondrial DNA chronology of human dispersals: a review. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 359, 255–264.
  • Fuchs, J., Ohlson, J. I., Ericson, P. G. P. and Pasquet, E. 2007. Synchronous intercontinental splits between assemblages of woodpeckers suggested by molecular data. Zoologica Scripta, 36, 11–25.
  • Garcia, M. G., Silva, R. S., Carniello, M. A., Veldman, J. W., Rossi, A. A. B. and de Oliveira, L. O. 2011. Molecular evidence of cryptic speciation, historical range expansion, and recent intraspecific hybridization in the Neotropical seasonal forest tree Cedrela fissilis (Meliaceae). Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, 61, 639–649.
  • Gaston, K. J. 2000. Global patterns in biodiversity. Nature, 405, 220–227.
  • Gavrilets, S. 2004. Fitness landscapes and the origin of species. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 432 pp.
  • Ghiselin, M. T. 1974. A radical solution to the species problem. Systematic Zoology, 23, 536–544.
  • Gilman, R. T. and Behm, J. E. 2011. Hybridization, species collapse, and species reemergence after disturbance to premating mechanisms of reproductive isolation. Evolution, 65, 2592–2605.
  • Gleick, J. 1987. Chaos: making a new science. Viking Penguin, New York, NY, 352 pp.
  • Gould, S. J. 1979. Species are not specious. New Scientist, 83 (1166), 374–376.
  • Gould, S. J. 1985. The paradox of the first tier: an agenda for paleobiology. Paleobiology, 11, 2–12.
  • Gould, S. J. 1989. Wonderful life: the Burgess Shale and the nature of history. W. W. Norton, New York, NY, 352 pp.
  • Gould, S. J. 2002. The structure of evolutionary theory. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 1464 pp.
  • Gould, S. J. and Lewontin, R. C. 1979. The spandrels of San Marco and the Panglossian paradigm: a critique of the adaptationist programme. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Series B, 205, 581–598.
  • Graham, R. W. 1986. Response of mammalian communities to environmental changes during the late Quaternary. 300–313. In Diamond, J. and Case, T. J. (eds). Community ecology. Harper & Row, New York, NY, 665 pp.
  • Green, D. M. 1991. Chaos, fractals and nonlinear dynamics in evolution and phylogeny. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 6, 333–337.
  • Greenland Ice-Core Project (GRIP) Members. 1993. Climate instability during the last interglacial period recorded in the GRIP ice core. Nature, 364, 203–207.
  • Griffiths, A. J. F., Gelbart, W. M., Lewontin, R. C. and Miller, J. H. 2002. Modern genetic analysis, Second edition. W. H. Freeman and Company, New York, NY, 736 pp.
  • Grimm, E. C. 1983. Chronology and dynamics of vegetation change in the praire-woodland region of southern Minnesota. New Phytologist, 93, 311–350.
  • Gutschick, V. P. and BassiriRad, H. 2003. Extreme events as shaping physiology, ecology, and evolution of plants: toward a unified definition and evaluation of their consequences. New Phytologist, 160, 21–42.
  • Haberle, S. G. and Bennett, K. D. 2004. Postglacial formation and dynamics of North Patagonian Rainforest in the Chonos Archipelago, Southern Chile. Quaternary Science Reviews, 23, 2433–2452.
  • Hallam, A. 1989. The case for sea-level change as a dominant causal factor in mass extinction of marine invertebrates. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London Series B, 325, 437–455.
  • Hanel, R., Kauffman, S. A. and Thurner, S. 2007. Towards a physics of evolution: critical diversity dynamics at the edges of collapse and bursts of diversification. Physical Review, E76, 036110.
  • Harland, W. B., Armstrong, R. L., Cox, A. V., Craig, L. E., Smith, A. G. and Smith, D. G. 1990. A geologic time scale 1989. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 263 pp.
  • Hausberger, B., Kimpel, D., van Neer, A. and Korb, J. 2011. Uncovering cryptic species diversity of a termite community in a West African savanna. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, 61, 964–969.
  • Hays, J. D., Imbrie, J. and Shackleton, N. J. 1976. Variations in the earth's orbit: pacemaker of the ice ages. Science, 194, 1121–1132.
  • Heggarty, P., Maguire, W. and McMahon, A. 2010. Splits or waves? Trees or webs? How divergence measures and network analysis can unravel language histories. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 365, 3828–3843.
  • Hennig, W. 1979. Phylogenetic systematics, Translated by D. Dwight Davis and Rainer Zangerl. University of Illinois Press, Urbana, IL, 263 pp.
  • Hodgkinson, A. and Eyre-Walker, A. 2011. Variation in the mutation rate across mammalian genomes. Nature Reviews Genetics, 12, 756–766.
  • Hooghiemstra, H. 1984. Vegetational and climatic history of the High Plains of Bogotá, Colombia: a continuous record of the last 3.5 million years. Dissertationes Botanicae, 79, 368 pp.
  • Hubbell, S. P. 2001. The unified neutral theory of biodiversity and biogeography. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 375 pp.
  • Hull, D. L. 1976. Are species really individuals? Systematic Zoology, 25, 174–191.
  • Hull, D. L. 1980. Individuality and selection. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, 11, 311–332.
  • Huntley, B. and Birks, H. J. B. 1983. An atlas of past and present pollen maps for Europe 0–13,000 years ago. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 667 pp.
  • Huson, D. H. and Bryant, D. 2006. Application of phylogenetic networks in evolutionary studies. Molecular Biology and Evolution, 23, 254–267.
  • Hutchinson, G. E. 1957. Concluding remarks. Cold Spring Harbor Symposia on Quantitative Biology, 22, 415–427.
  • Hutchinson, G. E. 1959. Homage to Santa Rosalia or why are there so many kinds of animals? The American Naturalist, 93, 145–159.
  • Huybers, P. 2009. Pleistocene glacial variability as a chaotic response to obliquity forcing. Climate of the Past Discussions, 5, 237–250.
  • Imbrie, J. and Imbrie, K. P. 1979. Ice ages: solving the mystery. Macmillan, London, 368 pp.
  • Inoue, J. G., Miya, M., Venkatesh, B. and Nishida, M. 2005. The mitochondrial genome of Indonesian coelacanth Latimeria menadoensis (Sarcopterygii: Coelacanthiformes) and divergence time estimation between the two coelacanths. Gene, 349, 227–235.
  • Iversen, J. 1941. Landnam i Danmarks Stenalder. Danmarks Geologiske Undersøgelse Række II, 66, 68 pp.
  • Iversen, J. 1958. The bearing of glacial and interglacial epochs on the formation and extinction of plant taxa. Uppsala Universitets Årsskrift, 1958 (6), 210–215.
  • Jablonski, D. 1989. The biology of mass extinction: a palaeontological view. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London Series B, 325, 357–368.
  • Jackson, S. T. and Overpeck, J. T. 2000. Responses of plant populations and communities to environmental changes of the late Quaternary. Paleobiology, 26 (Suppl), 194–220.
  • Jackson, S. T. and Weng, C. 1999. Late Quaternary extinction of a tree species in eastern North America. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 96, 13847–13852.
  • Jakosky, B. M., Henderson, B. G. and Mellon, M. T. 1995. Chaotic obliquity and the nature of the Martian climate. Journal of Geophysical Research, 100E, 1579–1584.
  • Jetz, W., Thomas, G. H., Joy, J. B., Hartmann, K. and Mooers, A. O. 2012. The global diversity of birds in space and time. Nature, 491, 444–448.
  • Johnson, N. K. and Cicero, C. 2004. New mitochondrial DNA data affirm the importance of Pleistocene speciation in North American birds. Evolution, 58, 1122–1130.
  • Kauffman, S. A. and Johnsen, S. 1991. Coevolution to the edge of chaos: coupled fitness landscapes, poised states, and coevolutionary avalanches. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 149, 467–505.
  • Kershaw, A. P. 1974. A long continuous pollen sequence from north-eastern Australia. Nature, 251, 222–223.
  • Kirschenmann, P. 1974. Two forms of determinism. Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association, 1974, 393–422.
  • Klicka, J. and Zink, R. M. 1997. The importance of recent ice ages in speciation: a failed paradigm. Science, 277, 1666–1669.
  • Koch, P. L. and Barnosky, A. D. 2006. Late Quaternary extinctions: state of the debate. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics, 37, 215–250.
  • Laskar, J. 1990. The chaotic motion of the Solar System: a numerical estimate of the size of the chaotic zones. Icarus, 88, 266–291.
  • Law, R. and Morton, R. D. 1993. Alternative permanent states of ecological communities. Ecology, 74, 1347–1361.
  • Levinton, J. 1988. Genetics, paleontology, and macroevolution. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 637 pp.
  • Liao, Y. Y., Yang, X. Y., Motley, T. J., Chen, J. M. and Wang, Q. F. 2011. Phylogeographic analysis reveals two cryptic species of the endangered fern Ceratopteris thalictroides (L.) Brongn. (Parkeriaceae) in China. Conservation Genetics, 12, 1357–1365.
  • Lieberman, B. S. 2012. Adaptive Radiations in the Context of Macroevolutionary Theory: A Paleontological Perspective. Evolutionary Biology, 39, 181–191.
  • Lieberman, E., Hauert, C. and Nowak, M. A. 2005. Evolutionary dynamics on graphs. Nature, 433, 312–316.
  • Liebers, D., de Knijff, P. and Helbig, A. J. 2004. The herring gull complex is not a ring species. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 271, 893–901.
  • Lister, A. M. 2004. The impact of Quaternary Ice Ages on mammalian evolution. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 359, 221–241.
  • Livezey, B. C. 2010. Phylogenetics of modern shorebirds (Charadriiformes) based on phenotypic evidence: analysis and discussion. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, 160, 567–618.
  • Lockwood, J. G. 2001. Abrupt and sudden climatic transitions and fluctuations: a review. International Journal of Climatology, 21, 1153–1179.
  • Lorenz, E. N. 1963. Deterministic nonperiodic flow. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, 20, 130–141.
  • Lovette, I. J. 2005. Glacial cycles and the tempo of avian speciation. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 20, 57–59.
  • Maclean, I. M. D. and Wilson, R. J. 2011. Recent ecological responses to climate change support predictions of high extinction risk. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 108, 12337–12342.
  • Magri, D., Vendramin, G. G., Comps, B., Dupanloup, I., Geburek, T., Gömöry, D., Latałowa, M., Litt, T., Paule, L., Roure, J. M., Tantau, I., van der Knaap, W. O., Petit, R. J. and de Beaulieu, J. L. 2006. A new scenario for the Quaternary history of European beech populations: palaeobotanical evidence and genetic consequences. New Phytologist, 171, 199–221.
  • Marie Curie SPECIATION Network. 2011. What do we need to know about speciation? Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 27, 27–39.
  • May, M. R., Provance, M. C., Sanders, A. C., Ellstrand, N. C. and Ross-Ibarra, J. 2009. A Pleistocene clone of Palmer's Oak persisting in southern California. PLoS One, 4 (12), e8346.
  • May, R. M. 1974. Stability and complexity in model ecosystems, Second edition. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 265 pp.
  • May, R. M. 1976. Simple mathematical models with very complicated dynamics. Nature, 261, 459–467.
  • May, R. M. 1977. Thresholds and breakpoints in ecosystems with a multiplicity of stable states. Nature, 269, 471–477.
  • May, R. M. 1986. When two and two do not make four: nonlinear phenomena in ecology. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Series B, 228, 241–266.
  • May, R. M. 1987. Chaos and the dynamics of biological populations. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Series A, 413, 27–44.
  • May, R. M. 1988. How many species are there on Earth? Science, 241, 1441–1449.
  • May, R. M. 1989. The chaotic rhythms of life. New Scientist, 1691, 37–41.
  • May, R. M. 2010. Tropical arthropod species, more or less? Science, 329, 41–42.
  • Mayden, R. L. 1997. A hierarchy of species concepts: the denouement in the saga of the species problem. 381–424. In Claridge, M. F., Dawah, H. A. and Wilson, M. R. (eds). Species: the units of biodiversity. Chapman & Hall, London, 439 pp.
  • Mayer, A. L. and Khalyani, A. H. 2011. Grass trumps trees with fire. Science, 334, 188–189.
  • Mayr, E. 1942. Systematics and the origin of species from the viewpoint of a zoologist. Columbia University Press, New York, NY, 334 pp.
  • Mayr, E. 2000. A defense of the biological species concept. 161–166. In Wheeler, Q. D. and Meier, R. (eds). Species concepts and phylogenetic theory: a debate. Columbia University Press, New York, NY, 230 pp.
  • Mayr, G. 2011. The phylogeny of charadriiform birds (shorebirds and allies) – reassessing the conflict between morphology and molecules. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, 161, 916–934.
  • McElwain, J. C. and Punyasena, S. W. 2007. Mass extinction events and the plant fossil record. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 22, 548–557.
  • McKinnon, G. E., Jordan, G. J., Vaillancourt, R. E., Steane, D. A. and Potts, B. M. 2004. Glacial refugia and reticulate evolution: the case of the Tasmanian eucalypts. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 359, 275–284.
  • Meredith, R. W., Janečka, J. E., Gatesy, J., Ryder, O. A., Fisher, C. A., Teeling, E. C., Goodbla, A., Eizirik, E., Simão, T. L. L., Stadler, T., Rabosky, D. L., Honeycutt, R. L., Flynn, J. J., Ingram, C. M., Steiner, C., Williams, T. L., Robinson, T. J., Burk-Herrick, A., Westerman, M., Ayoub, N. A., Springer, M. S. and Murphy, W. J. 2011. Impacts of the Cretaceous terrestrial revolution and KPg extinction on mammal diversification. Science, 334, 521–524.
  • Minelli, A., Fusco, G. and Sartori, S. 1991. Self-similarity in biological classifications. BioSystems, 26, 89–97.
  • Montero-Pau, J., Ramos-RodrÍguez, E., Serra, M. and Gomez, A. 2011. Long-term coexistence of rotifer cryptic species. PLoS One, 6 (6), e21530.
  • Mora, C., Tittensor, D. P., Adl, S., Simpson, A. G. B. and Worm, B. 2011. How many species are there on Earth and in the ocean? PLoS Biology, 9 (8), e1001127.
  • Murray, S. W., Campbell, P., Kingston, T., Zubaid, A., Francis, C. M. and Kunz, T. H. 2012. Molecular phylogeny of hipposiderid bats from Southeast Asia and evidence of cryptic diversity. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, 62, 597–611.
  • Nagalingum, N. S., Marshall, C. R., Quenta, T. B., Rai, H. S., Little, D. P. and Mathews, S. 2011. Recent synchronous radiation of a living fossil. Science, 334, 796–799.
  • Neusser, T. P., Jörger, K. M. and Schrödl, M. 2011. Cryptic species in tropic sands – interactive 3D anatomy, molecular phylogeny and evolution of meiofaunal Pseudunelidae (Gastropoda, Acochlidia). PLoS One, 6 (8), e23313.
  • Nikaido, M., Sasaki, T., Emerson, J. J., Aibara, M., Mzighani, S. I., Budeba, Y. L., Ngatunga, B. P., Iwata, M., Abe, Y., Li, W. H. and Okada, N. 2011. Genetically distinct coelacanth population off the northern Tanzanian coast. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 108, 18009–18013.
  • Nowak, M. A. 2006. Evolutionary dynamics: exploring the equations of life. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 363 pp.
  • O'Grady, P. and DeSalle, R. 2008. Out of Hawaii: the origin and biogeography of the genus Scaptomyza (Diptera: Drosophilidae). Biology Letters, 4, 195–199.
  • Öberg, L. and Kullman, L. 2011. Ancient subalpine clonal spruces (Picea abies): sources of postglacial vegetation history in the Swedish Scandes. Arctic, 64, 183–196.
  • Pagel, M. 2010. Human language as a culturally transmitted replicator. Nature Reviews Genetics, 10, 405–415.
  • Pagel, M., Venditti, C. and Meade, A. 2006. Large punctuational contribution of speciation to evolutionary divergence at the molecular level. Science, 314, 119–121.
  • Penhallurick, J. and Wink, M. 2004. Analysis of the taxonomy and nomenclature of the Procellariiformes based on complete nucleotide sequences of the mitochondrial cytochrome b gene. Emu, 104, 125–147.
  • Pereira, S. L. and Baker, A. J. 2006. A mitogenomic timescale for birds detects variable phylogenetic rates of molecular evolution and refutes the standard molecular clock. Molecular Biology and Evolution, 23, 1731–1740.
  • Pimm, S. L., Russell, G. J., Gittleman, J. L. and Brooks, T. M. 1995. The future of biodiversity. Science, 269, 347–350.
  • Pimm, S., Raven, P., Peterson, A., Şekerčioglu, C. H. and Ehrlich, P. R. 2006. Human impacts on the rates of recent, present, and future bird extinctions. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 103, 10941–10946.
  • Pulquério, M. J. and Nichols, R. A. 2007. Dates from the molecular clock: how wrong can we be? Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 22, 180–184.
  • Pyron, R. A. and Wiens, J. J. 2011. A large-scale phylogeny of Amphibia including over 2800 species, and a revised classification of extant frogs, salamanders, and caecilians. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, 61, 543–583.
  • Ramasindrazana, B., Goodman, S. M., Schoeman, M. C. and Appleton, B. 2011. Identification of cryptic species of Miniopterus bats (Chiroptera: Miniopteridae) from Madagascar and the Comoros using bioacoustics overlaid on molecular genetic and morphological characters. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 104, 284–302.
  • Ratnasingham, S. and Hebert, P. D. N. 2007. BOLD: The Barcode of Life Data System (www.barcodinglife.org). Molecular Ecology Notes, 7, 355–364.
  • Raup, D. M. 1981. Extinction: bad genes or bad luck? Acta Geològica Hispànica, 16, 25–33.
  • Raup, D. M. and Sepkoski, Jr J. J. 1982. Mass extinctions in the fossil record. Science, 215, 1501–1503.
  • Raup, D. M. and Sepkoski, J. J. Jr 1984. Periodicity of extinctions in the geologic past. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 81, 801–805.
  • Raup, D. M., Gould, S. J., Schopf, T. J. M. and Simberloff, D. S. 1973. Stochastic models of phylogeny and the evolution of diversity. Journal of Geology, 81, 525–542.
  • Reydon, T. A. C. 2003. Discussion: species are individuals – or are they? Philosophy of Science, 70, 49–56.
  • Rheindt, F. E. and Austin, J. J. 2005. Major analytical and conceptual shortcomings in a recent taxonomic revision of the Procellariiformes – a reply to Penhallurick and Wink (2004). Emu, 105, 181–186.
  • Ribera, I. and Vogler, A. P. 2004. Speciation of Iberian diving beetles in Pleistocene refugia (Coleoptera, Dytiscidae). Molecular Ecology, 13, 179–193.
  • Richards, R. J. 2012. Darwin's principles of divergence and natural selection: why Fodor was almost right. Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, 43, 256–268.
  • Ridgway, I. D. and Richardson, C. A. 2011. Arctica islandica: the longest lived non colonial animal known to science. Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries, 21, 297–310.
  • Rieseberg, L. H. and Willis, J. H. 2007. Plant speciation. Science, 317, 910–914.
  • Ritchie, J. C. 1986. Climate change and vegetation response. Vegetatio, 67, 65–74.
  • Ritz, M. S., Millar, C., Miller, G. D., Phillips, R. A., Ryan, P., Sternkopf, V., Liebers-Helbig, D. and Peter, H. U. 2008. Phylogeography of the southern skua complex – rapid colonization of the southern hemisphere during a glacial period and reticulate evolution. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, 49, 292–303.
  • Royer, D. L., Hickey, L. J. and Wing, S. L. 2003. Ecological conservatism in the ‘living fossil’ Ginkgo. Paleobiology, 29, 84–104.
  • Ruse, M. 1987. Biological species: natural kinds, individuals, or what? British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 38, 225–242.
  • Sato, A., Tichy, H., Grant, P. R., Grant, B. R., Sato, T. and O'huigin, C. 2011. Spectrum of MHC class II variability in Darwin finches and their close relatives. Molecular Biology and Evolution, 28, 1943–1956.
  • Smith, A. G. 1965. Problems of inertia and threshold related to post-glacial habitat changes. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Series B, 161, 331–342.
  • Sniderman, J. M. K., Pillans, B., O'sullivan, P. B. and Kershaw, A. P. 2007. Climate and vegetation in southeastern Australia respond to Southern Hemisphere insolation forcing in the late Pliocene–early Pleistocene. Geology, 35, 41–44.
  • Solé, R. V., Manrubia, S. C., Benton, M. and Bak, P. 1997. Self-similarity of extinction statistics in the fossil record. Nature, 388, 764–766.
  • Solé, R. V., Manrubia, S. C., Benton, M., Kauffman, S. and Bak, P. 1999. Criticality and scaling in evolutionary ecology. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 14, 156–160.
  • Spencer-Cervato, C. and Thierstein, H. R. 1997. First appearance of Globorotalia truncatulinoides: cladogenesis and immigration. Marine Micropaleontology, 30, 267–291.
  • Stanley, S. M. 1985. Rates of evolution. Paleobiology, 11, 13–26.
  • Tausch, R. J., Wigand, P. E. and Burkhardt, J. W. 1993. Viewpoint: plant community thresholds, multiple steady states, and multiple successional pathways: legacy of the Quaternary? Journal of Range Management, 46, 439–447.
  • Taylor, K. C., Lamorey, G. W., Doyle, G. A., Alley, R. B., Grootes, P. M., Mayewski, P. A., White, J. W. C. and Barlow, L. K. 1993. The ‘flickering switch’ of late Pleistocene climate change. Nature, 361, 432–436.
  • Turgeon, J., Stoks, R., Thum, R. A., Brown, J. M. and McPeek, M. A. 2005. Simultaneous Quaternary radiations of three damselfly clades across the Holarctic. The American Naturalist, 165, E78–E107.
  • Tzedakis, P. C. 1993. Long-term tree populations in northwest Greece through multiple Quaternary climatic cycles. Nature, 364, 437–440.
  • Tzedakis, P. C. and Bennett, K. D. 1995. Interglacial vegetation succession: a view from southern Europe. Quaternary Science Reviews, 14, 967–982.
  • Tziperman, E., Raymo, M. E., Huybers, P. and Wunsch, C. 2006. Consequences of pacing the Pleistocene 100 kyr ice ages by nonlinear phase locking to Milankovitch forcing. Paleoceanography, 21, PA4206, 11.
  • Urban, M. C., Tewksbury, J. J. and Sheldon, K. S. 2012. On a collision course: competition and dispersal create no-analogue communities and cause extinctions during climate change. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 279, 2072–2080.
  • van Tuinen, M. and Hedges, S. B. 2001. Calibration of avian molecular clocks. Molecular Biology and Evolution, 18, 206–213.
  • Venditti, C. and Pagel, M. 2010. Speciation as an active force in promoting genetic evolution. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 25, 14–20.
  • Venditti, C., Meade, A. and Pagel, M. 2011. Multiple routes to mammalian diversity. Nature, 479, 393–396.
  • Verheyen, E., Salzburger, W., Snoeks, J. and Meyer, A. 2003. Origin of the superflock of Cichlid fishes from Lake Victoria, East Africa. Science, 300, 325–329.
  • Via, S. 2001. Sympatric speciation in animals: the ugly duckling grows up. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 16, 381–390.
  • Vrba, E. S. 1985. Environment and evolution: alternative causes of the temporal distribution of evolutionary events. South African Journal of Science, 81, 229–236.
  • Vrba, E. S. 1993. Turnover-pulses, the Red Queen, and related topics. American Journal of Science, 293-A, 418–452.
  • Vrba, E. S. 1995. On the connections between paleoclimate and evolution. 24–45. In Vrba, E. S., Denton, G. H., Partridge, T. C. and Burckle, L. H. (eds). Paleoclimate and evolution, with emphasis on human origins. Yale University Press, New Haven, CT, 556 pp.
  • Vrba, E. S. and Gould, S. J. 1986. The hierarchical expansion of sorting and selection: sorting and selection cannot be equated. Paleobiology, 12, 217–228.
  • Walker, D. 1982. Vegetation's fourth dimension. New Phytologist, 90, 419–429.
  • Watts, W. A. 1961. Post Atlantic forests in Ireland. Proceedings of the Linnean Society of London, 172, 33–38.
  • Weir, J. T. and Schluter, D. 2004. Ice sheets promote speciation in boreal birds. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 271, 1881–1887.
  • West, R. G. 1980. Pleistocene forest history in East Anglia. New Phytologist, 85, 571–622.
  • White, T. D., Asfaw, B., Degusta, D., Gilbert, H., Richards, G. D., Suwa, G. and Howell, F. C. 2003. Pleistocene Homo sapiens from Middle Awash, Ethiopia. Nature, 423, 742–747.
  • Willis, K. J. and McElwain, J. C. 2002. The evolution of plants. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 378 pp.
  • Willis, K. J. and Niklas, K. J. 2004. The role of Quaternary environmental change in plant macroevolution: the exception or the rule? Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 359, 159–172.
  • Willis, K. J., Kleczkowski, A. and Crowhurst, S. J. 1999. 124,000-year periodicity in terrestrial vegetation change during the late Pliocene epoch. Nature, 397, 685–688.
  • Willis, K. J., Kleczkowski, A., New, M. and Whittaker, R. J. 2007. Testing the impact of climate variability on European plant diversity: 320 000 years of water-energy dynamics and its long-term influence on plant taxonomic richness. Ecology Letters, 10, 673–679.
  • Willis, K. J., Feurdean, A., Birks, H. J. B., Bjune, A. E., Breman, E., Broekman, R., Grytnes, J. A., New, M., Singarayer, J. S. and Rozema, J. 2011. Quantification of UV-B flux through time using UV-B-absorbing compounds contained in fossil Pinus sporopollenin. New Phytologist, 192, 553–560.
  • Wood, T. E., Takebayashi, N., Barker, M. S., Mayrose, I., Greenspoon, P. B. and Rieseberg, L. H. 2009. The frequency of polyploid speciation in vascular plants. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 106, 13875–13879.
  • Zachos, J., Pagani, M., Sloan, L., Thomas, E. and Billups, K. 2001. Trends, rhythms, and aberrations in global climate 65 Ma to present. Science, 292, 686–693.
  • Zanis, M. J., Soltis, D. E., Soltis, P. S., Mathews, S. and Donoghue, M. J. 2002. The root of the angiosperms revisited. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 99, 6848–6853.
  • Zink, R. M. 2002. A new perspective on the evolutionary history of Darwin's Finches. The Auk, 119, 864–871.
  • Zink, R. M., Klicka, J. and Barber, B. R. 2004. The tempo of avian diversification during the Quaternary. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 359, 215–220.
PalAss Go! URL: http://go.palass.org/5mp | Twitter: Share on Twitter | Facebook: Share on Facebook | Google+: Share on Google+