Abstract
PALEONTOLOGY, compared with zoology and botany, suffers many disabilities, but these are in part outweighed by one advantage which the sciences concerned with living organisms cannot possess—the time factor. This advantage is particularly evident in studies dealing with the broader aspects of phylogeny. In this present work is given a detailed examination of the phylogeny of the higher Crustacea. Two main periods of development are suggested, outside which no new types have arisen. At these times development was explosive, many new types arising between which no transitional forms are found. The course of development in the many other animal groups briefly analysed by the author appears to be parallel to that given for the Decapoda: each developmental cycle is characterised by two stages, the first in which new types suddenly appear, and the second in which these types undergo continuous modification.
Vergleichende Stammesgeschichte: Grundlagen, Methoden, Probleme unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der höheren Krebse.
Von K. Beurlen. (Fortschritte der Geologie und Pälaontologie, herausgegeben von Prof. Dr. W. Soergel, Band 8, Heft 26.) Pp. viii + 317 - 586. (Berlin: Gebrüder Borntraeger, 1930.) 30 gold marks.
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Vergleichende Stammesgeschichte: Grundlagen, Methoden, Probleme unter besonderer Berück-sichtigung der höheren Krebse . Nature 129, 745 (1932). https://doi.org/10.1038/129745a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/129745a0