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Do Impacts Really Cause Most Mass Extinctions?

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From Fossils to Astrobiology

Part of the book series: Cellular Origin, Life in Extreme Habitats and Astrobiology ((COLE,volume 12))

Abstract

For the past 28 years, the trendy “bandwagon” in the geosciences has attempted to explain most mass extinctions by extraterrestrial impact events. However, the past decade of research has shown no significant evidence of impacts at any mass extinction horizon except for the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary at 65 Ma. In fact, numerous paleontologists have even questioned whether the Cretaceous-Tertiary impact was as important as once supposed. Alleged impact horizons at the other major mass extinctions have proven to be of the wrong age or the wrong size. By contrast, there were many major impacts (especially in the late Eocene) that had no effect on life whatsoever, further falsifying the impact hypothesis as a general explanation. Explaining all the major mass extinctions by huge mantle-derived flood basalt eruptions has also failed, as such eruptions occur at only three of the extinction horizons. Attempts to find a general explanation that explains all mass extinctions are usually unsuccessful, because there are no common signals at every mass extinction. Each event shows a distinct and different pattern. Currently, the trendy model postulates high carbon dioxide and low oxygen in the atmosphere, although it only works for the Permo-Triassic, Triassic-Jurassic, and possibly Paleocene-Eocene events, and no others, and it has not fared well in preliminary testing.

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  1. Department of Geology, Occidental College, Los Angeles, CA, 90041, USA

    Donald R. Prothero

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  1. The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel

    Joseph Seckbach

  2. School of Plant, Environmental, and Soil Sciences, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA, USA

    Maud Walsh

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Prothero, D.R. (2009). Do Impacts Really Cause Most Mass Extinctions?. In: Seckbach, J., Walsh, M. (eds) From Fossils to Astrobiology. Cellular Origin, Life in Extreme Habitats and Astrobiology, vol 12. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-8837-7_20

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