Review of the Scientific American: Impact from the Deep By Peter D. Ward

There are times when science actually fascinates me, and I want to be scientist to make the great discovery that will change the face of the world forever. This is what I mean, when I was growing up in school, it had been pretty much accepted that asteroids had collided with the Earth to create mass extinctions.

Every school kid knew that, a massive rock from outer space had killed the dinosaurs. This was the practical answer, the oversimplified answer. In reading Peter Ward article, the explanation appears to be more complex. There appears to be “geochemical” evidence from the geologic reord that some of the mass extinction came via the climate over long periods of time.

Peter Ward builds his case through graphs and assumptions that, along with those within his field, greenhouse emissions may have been responsible for at least two of the mass extinctions: the Permian and the Triassic. Through scientific method, data collection, and fossil records the information appeared skewed.

He weaves a compelling story of how some of the mass extinctions were a gradual process through carbon dating, fossilized materials, and new statistical protocols for analyzing the fossilized ranges. He then sets forth in proving his thesis forward. The critical analysis suggests that the mass extinction is recurring, more of a historic event than a random one like the extraterrestrial events.

In his modeling, of when the events are triggered, is up for much debate and research. However, in his clip notes he points out that:

• “More than half of all life on the earth has been wiped out, repeatedly, in mass extinctions over the past 500 million years.

• One such disaster, which included the dinosaurs’ disappearance, is widely attributed to an asteroid impact, but others remain inadequately explained.

• New fossil and geochemical evidence points to a shocking environmental for the largest of the mass extinctions and possibly several more: an oxygen-depleted ocean spewing poisonous gas as a result of the global warming.”

And similar types of ecological events have made his and others arguments compelling. His graphs and charts of the plausibility make the article more readable for the layperson.

Toward the end of the article, the article drags a bit with the accounting of volcanic, CO2, and H2S concentrations that common student eyes might roll back into their head. Nonetheless, the explanation of CO2 parts per million, and where possible greenhouse emissions by the end of the next century for the present day modernity seemed to be a bit convenient for global warming debate.

One final point, the author’s tone of the article seemed to be filled with an urgency to take notice. The overall tone was a warning for humanity to take better control of emissions. At the end of the article, there seem to be agenda blossoming. This bit of preaching concerns me, in that, there may have been some scientific dogma encroaching within the article itself—but nevertheless the excitement of discovery had me tweaked for discovery in the geologic record.