Hypersea: Life on Land - Softcover

Mark A. S. McMenamin; Dianna L. S. McMenamin

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0231075316 ISBN 13: 9780231075312

Publisher: Columbia University Press, 1996

Synopsis

This text describes the evidence for how life moved from sea to land, beginning more than 400 million years ago, employing the concept of Hypersea which is the idea that the barren land surfaces of the Earth could only have been colonized by multicellular organisms working in concert.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

Why is life on land such a spectacular success? Because, say Dianna and Mark McMenamin, 450 million years ago life created Hypersea-a vast new ocean of interconnected tissues.'-Discover

From Library Journal:

The authors (The Emergence of Animals: The Cambrian Breakthrough, Columbia Univ. Pr., 1990) claim that an association exists among terrestrial organisms to the extent that their body fluids commingle and that this connectedness forms a sea through which other organisms (symbionts) and nutrients can move. Authoritative, up-to-date research results are recounted from the areas of paleontology, ecology, physiology, embryology, and evolution to corroborate this radical vision of life. A convincingly clear and upbeat style drives home "hypersea" as both a proposed scientific theory with testable hypotheses and a philosophical viewpoint providing a novel perspective on our living world. Continuing in the symbiogenetics vein of Lynn Margulis and Dorian Sagan's Microcosmos (LJ 1/3/87), this book will spur controversy and is essential reading for the science buff as well as the specialist. Highly recommended.
Frank Reiser, Nassau Community Coll., Garden City, N.Y.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0231075316
• ISBN 13: 9780231075312
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 343