19. The Fossil Record and Life's History
Principles of Evolution, Ecology and Behavior (EEB 122)
The fossil record holds a lot of evolutionary information that can't be seen on shorter time scales, although the more recent fossil record is more complete. Among other things, the fossil record demonstrates that extinctions can open up ecological space for new speciation and radiation, and that life forms tend to begin small and evolve to be bigger over time.
00:00 - Chapter 1. Introduction
04:18 - Chapter 2. Cambrian Animal Radiation
14:52 - Chapter 3. Plant Radiation and Vertebrates Coming Ashore
24:39 - Chapter 4. Patterns in Radiation of Life
31:46 - Chapter 5. Vanished Communities of Life
40:21 - Chapter 6. Stasis
46:57 - Chapter 7. Summary
Complete course materials are available at the Open Yale Courses website: http://open.yale.edu/courses
This course was recorded in Spring 2009.