Dynamic Paleontology, Softcover reprint of the original 1st ed. 2016
Using Quantification and Other Tools to Decipher the History of Life
Springer Geology Series

Using a series of case studies, the book demonstrates the power of dynamic analysis as applied to the fossil record. Written in an engaging and informative style, Dynamic Paleontology outlines the best application of quantitative and other tools to critical problems in the paleontological sciences including such topics as analysis of the Cambrian Explosion and the question regarding the presence of life on Mars. The book considers how we think about certain types questions and shows how we can refine our approach to analysis right from the beginning of any particular research effort. The analytical tools presented here will have wide application to other fields of knowledge; as such the book represents a major contribution to our deployment of modern scientific method.

Mark McMenamin is a Professor of Geology and author or co author of several books and numerous research articles that consider the origin of animals and other forms of complex life, the origin of land plants, and the Snowball Earth glaciation. In 2008, Mark received (as director of the Keck Geology project to study the rocks of the Boston Basin) a teaching award from Southern Utah University for student project excellence (the student in question, Jessica Williams, demonstrated the Snowball Earth glacial origin of the Cambridge Argillite). His 2007 book for the Smithsonian Science Series, Science 101: Geology, has received wide national distribution. In 1988 he received a Presidential Young Investigator Award from the National Science Foundation, and in 1992-1993 he was named a Sigma Xi National Lecturer. He named the supercontinent Rodinia in The Emergence of Animals (Columbia University Press, 1990). His research was featured in 2006 in the National Geographic Channel program Naked Science: Colliding Continents and in the History Channel’s 2007 program How the Earth Was Made. In 1994, Mark and Dianna McMenamin introduced Hypersea theory to explain the diversification of life forms on land. The thesis of their book on the subject, Hypersea: Life on Land, was called one of "seven ideas that could change the world" by Discover magazine.

This book is needed because many contemporary analytical projects in the earth sciences would greatly benefit by refinement of the research approach at the initial stages of each investigation No other book has its focus as an analysis of analytical techniques in the earth sciences This book will help to clarify matters, and dispel confusion with regard to proper deployment of analytical technique in the earth sciences The analytical tools presented a have wide application to other fields of knowledge Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras