Evolution and Escalation : : An Ecological History of Life / / Geerat J. Vermeij.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Princeton eBook Package Archive 1931-1999
• VerfasserIn: Vermeij, Geerat J.,
• Place / Publishing House: Princeton, NJ : : Princeton University Press, , [2021]; ©1987
• Year of Publication: 2021
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (547 p.)
• Other title: Frontmatter --; Contents --; Preface --; PART ONE: A Theory of Adaptation --; CHAPTER ONE: Aptations and Selective Agencies --; CHAPTER TWO: Limits to Adaptation --; CHAPTER THREE: Hypotheses and Their Evaluation in a Historical Science --; PART TWO: The Acquisition of Resources --; CHAPTER FOUR: Mechanisms and History of Competition --; CHAPTER FIVE: Safe Places, Anachronistic Aptations, and the Recycling of Resources --; CHAPTER SIX: The Predators of Armored Animals: Functional Morphology and History --; PART THREE: The Evolution of Armor and Locomotion --; CHAPTER SEVEN: The Functional Morphology and History of Gastropod Armor --; CHAPTER EIGHT: Opportunistic Armor: The Evolution of the Conchicolous Habit --; CHAPTER NINE: Locomotion and the Evolution of Movement in Gastropods --; CHAPTER TEN: Armor and Locomotion in Cephalopods --; CHAPTER ELEVEN: Armor and Locomotion in Bivalved Animals --; CHAPTER TWELVE: Armor and Locomotion in Articulated Animals --; PART FOUR: Escalation, Diversification, and Extinction --; CHAPTER THIRTEEN: The Dynamics of Escalation --; CHAPTER FOURTEEN: Extinction --; CHAPTER FIFTEEN: Implications, Difficulties, and Future Directions --; Appendix --; References --; Index
• Format: Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.
• ISBN: 9780691224244; 9783110442496
• DOI: 10.1515/9780691224244?locatt=mode:legacy
• Access: restricted access
• Hierarchical level: Monograph
• Statement of Responsibility: Geerat J. Vermeij.

Here is one biologist's interpretation of the chronology of life during the last six hundred million years of earth history: an extended essay that draws on the author's own data and a wide-ranging literature survey to discuss the nature and dynamics of evolutionary change in organisms and their biological surroundings. Geerat Vermeij demonstrates that escalation--the process by which species adapt to, or are limited by, their enemies as the latter increase in ability to acquire and retain resources--has been a dominant theme in the history of life despite frequent episodes of extinction.