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Introduction to quantitative palaeoecology
Sedimentary Geology-ElsevierPublishingCompany,Amsterdam-Printedin The Netherlands
Book Review Introduction to Quantitative Palaeoecology. R. A. REYMENT.Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1971, 226 pp., 36 illus., Dfl. 60,--. The last three decades have seen the increasing use of numerical methods in fields traditionally non-numerate. This has happened in ecology, taxonomy, geography, geology and archaeology, to name only some obvious examples. Once numerical methods have been shown to be useful in a particular field, there is an evident need for a general introduction in book form to explain and guide their application to the disciplines concerned. Such an introduction needs to be problem-orientated and is in no way a substitute for textbooks of statistics for the mathematically ignorant which are, rightly, method-orientated. This book is the first one to bring together numerical approaches to palaeoecology. After a brief introductory chapter outlining the author's view of the scope of palaeoecology, there is a chapter on basic concepts, covering the nature of quantitative observations and some elementary statistical concepts. This assumes no previous knowledge on the part of the reader, and the basic ideas are presented very clearly. The main body of the book follows in five chapters. It is interesting here to see how far approaches familiar in "neo-ecology" are useful in palaeoecology. "Environmental effects" draws mainly on comparison of means by t-tests and one-way analysis of variance, simple approaches familiar to all who use statistical analysis. "Predators, prey and population dynamics" has evident links with animal ecology. Fossils do not provide promising material for population studies and it is impressive that it has proved possible, using elementary techniques, to produce a life-table for a fossil and an approach to assessing changing competitive relationships. "Spatial palaeoecology" is concerned with problems of clustering and pattern familiar with plants and sessile animals. "Quantitative analysis of fossil assemblages" again deals with familiar problems, but with the added difficulty that a fossil assemblage may have arisen by transport of dead organisms to a site and does not necessarily represent a community. Bij contrast, "Orientation analysis" deals with a problem peculiar to this field, and uses approaches which will be new to most ecologists. The book is completed by appendices of statistical tables and some FORTRANprogrammes. How successful is the book ? The presentation is in terms of"case histories". This inevitably involves repetition and cross-references but one of the objectives of the first book in the field must be to persuade workers of the value of numerical techniques; the case-history approach, even if some of the examples are trivial in themselves, will certainly maximize the book's impact. The writing is direct and informal, and there is a very welcome attitude of caution and common sense in. the interpretation of results; the author is clearly enthusiastic but has not let his enthusiasm run away with him.
BOOK REVIEW
240
The presentation is good, but one is left regretting that the book does not go further. Professor Reyment has been a pioneer in the application of much more sophisticated techniques (e.g., his paper in J. Animal. Ecol., 32: 535-47). He has been, no doubt, anxious not to deter his readers from using numerical techniques by making them seem difficult, but most readers could surely accept a rather fuller treatment of, for example, the quantitative analysis of fossil assemblages. Many readers are likely at least to know of the application of numerical techniques to pollen analysis. The author of such a book has a special responsibility to avoid misleading statements because many readers will use no other guide to statistical analysis. There are one or two unfortunate statements which should be corrected in the next edition (and there will surely be further editions). The definition of "monotonic" (p.75) is misleading; the smallest allowable value of F is 1 not 0 (p.75); a formula for t where variances differ includes the universe means, which cannot be known, only to dismiss them from the formula in the next paragraph (p.127); discussion of association between three species assumes equal expectation for all classes, although a more realistic null hypothesis based on the marginal totals for the species is available (p. 185). The book is attractively produced. There are a few misprints but they are mostly unlikely to cause misunderstanding. The author has been poorly served by his indexer. Many entries are trivial, including place names irrelevant in the context, and some verge on the ludicrous, e.g. " H " refers to an incidental reference to pH. More seriously, important entries are not adequately cross-indexed, e.g. "Robustness of t-test" is not included under " t " and the formula for t must be southt under "Student's t, formula for". A book which will be much referred to deserves a better index. P. GREIG-SMITH(Bangor)
Book Review Introduction to Quantitative Palaeoecology. R. A. REYMENT.Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1971, 226 pp., 36 illus., Dfl. 60,--. The last three decades have seen the increasing use of numerical methods in fields traditionally non-numerate. This has happened in ecology, taxonomy, geography, geology and archaeology, to name only some obvious examples. Once numerical methods have been shown to be useful in a particular field, there is an evident need for a general introduction in book form to explain and guide their application to the disciplines concerned. Such an introduction needs to be problem-orientated and is in no way a substitute for textbooks of statistics for the mathematically ignorant which are, rightly, method-orientated. This book is the first one to bring together numerical approaches to palaeoecology. After a brief introductory chapter outlining the author's view of the scope of palaeoecology, there is a chapter on basic concepts, covering the nature of quantitative observations and some elementary statistical concepts. This assumes no previous knowledge on the part of the reader, and the basic ideas are presented very clearly. The main body of the book follows in five chapters. It is interesting here to see how far approaches familiar in "neo-ecology" are useful in palaeoecology. "Environmental effects" draws mainly on comparison of means by t-tests and one-way analysis of variance, simple approaches familiar to all who use statistical analysis. "Predators, prey and population dynamics" has evident links with animal ecology. Fossils do not provide promising material for population studies and it is impressive that it has proved possible, using elementary techniques, to produce a life-table for a fossil and an approach to assessing changing competitive relationships. "Spatial palaeoecology" is concerned with problems of clustering and pattern familiar with plants and sessile animals. "Quantitative analysis of fossil assemblages" again deals with familiar problems, but with the added difficulty that a fossil assemblage may have arisen by transport of dead organisms to a site and does not necessarily represent a community. Bij contrast, "Orientation analysis" deals with a problem peculiar to this field, and uses approaches which will be new to most ecologists. The book is completed by appendices of statistical tables and some FORTRANprogrammes. How successful is the book ? The presentation is in terms of"case histories". This inevitably involves repetition and cross-references but one of the objectives of the first book in the field must be to persuade workers of the value of numerical techniques; the case-history approach, even if some of the examples are trivial in themselves, will certainly maximize the book's impact. The writing is direct and informal, and there is a very welcome attitude of caution and common sense in. the interpretation of results; the author is clearly enthusiastic but has not let his enthusiasm run away with him.
BOOK REVIEW
240
The presentation is good, but one is left regretting that the book does not go further. Professor Reyment has been a pioneer in the application of much more sophisticated techniques (e.g., his paper in J. Animal. Ecol., 32: 535-47). He has been, no doubt, anxious not to deter his readers from using numerical techniques by making them seem difficult, but most readers could surely accept a rather fuller treatment of, for example, the quantitative analysis of fossil assemblages. Many readers are likely at least to know of the application of numerical techniques to pollen analysis. The author of such a book has a special responsibility to avoid misleading statements because many readers will use no other guide to statistical analysis. There are one or two unfortunate statements which should be corrected in the next edition (and there will surely be further editions). The definition of "monotonic" (p.75) is misleading; the smallest allowable value of F is 1 not 0 (p.75); a formula for t where variances differ includes the universe means, which cannot be known, only to dismiss them from the formula in the next paragraph (p.127); discussion of association between three species assumes equal expectation for all classes, although a more realistic null hypothesis based on the marginal totals for the species is available (p. 185). The book is attractively produced. There are a few misprints but they are mostly unlikely to cause misunderstanding. The author has been poorly served by his indexer. Many entries are trivial, including place names irrelevant in the context, and some verge on the ludicrous, e.g. " H " refers to an incidental reference to pH. More seriously, important entries are not adequately cross-indexed, e.g. "Robustness of t-test" is not included under " t " and the formula for t must be southt under "Student's t, formula for". A book which will be much referred to deserves a better index. P. GREIG-SMITH(Bangor)