Re: Paleontology textbook

["King, Norm" <nking.ucs@smtp.usi.edu>]

I used Prothero's new textbook last Spring, and didn't like it very much. 
 I thought that some of the discussions on principles of paleontology 
(first half or so of the book) were at more of a seminar level, and not 
really right for many students, for whom this may be their first 
upper-level geology class, and who have not previously had in-depth study 
of the principles of evolution or ecology.  Some of the discussions 
seemed to go on and on, well past the point where ever more angles of 
looking at an issue continue to be useful to the average undergraduate 
geology major.  Some issues are left totally open-ended, and, while I 
realize this is the way it actually is in the real world and our students 
need to know that, these discussions could have been terminated in a more 
definitive matter.  I think that would be appropriate at the 
undergraduate level for students who generally are not going to become 
paleontologists--give them something to hang their hats on.

I had no problem with the treatment of individual animal groups.

However, I was surprised by the number of typographical errors.  The most 
amusing was reference to demosponges at "demonsponges".  Many of the 
typos are simply extra  spaces between words; there  are literally  
hundreds of those.  See how distracting  that can be? (it's even more so 
in a typeset manuscript).  I use WordPerfect for my writing, and I 
supplied camera-ready copy to my publisher also (as did Prothero); you 
can set WP to automatically eliminate double spaces, and I suspect the 
high-powered desktop system Prothero used could be set to do that, too.  
A good editor will also pick them out for you.  My copy of the book is at 
home, and I'm in my office now, so I can't specify any other examples of 
typos, but suffice it to say there are plenty, and my students caught 
them all.

I do not like any of the paleo books out there.  Once, I just used the 
best chapters from a variety of books, without giving students a specific 
book to buy.  They didn't seem to like that.  This time I'm using an 
older book, *Stearn and Carroll's _Paleontology:  The Record of Life_.  
It suffers from poorer line drawings and few photographic illustrations.  
Although necessarily becoming somewhat dated (published in 1989), it does 
cover cladistics and molecular phylogeny.  It's certainly more expensive 
than Prothero's (it's hardcover).  You just have to decide what is most 
important for YOU, and what materials fit your way of doing things 
best--what you are most comfortable with.  I certainly would not question 
anyone for using Prothero's book.  I just felt the students were drowning 
in conceptual and theoretical detail that isn't necessary at this level.

I use my own lab write-ups, and everyone does an individual project.  My 
students get their hands dirty in paleontology!


*Colin W. Stearn and Robert L. Carroll, 1989, Paleontology: The Record of 
Life: John Wiley & Sons, hardcover, 453 pp. 


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Norman R. King                                       tel:  (812) 464-1794
Department of Geosciences                            fax:  (812) 464-1960
University of Southern Indiana
8600 University Blvd.
Evansville, IN 47712                      e-mail:  nking.ucs@smtp.usi.edu