摘要
INTRODUCTION Earth scientists have long sought universal features of past extinction crises.It can be argued that each past extinction event was a singularity,caused by combinations of circumstances that are unique in each case,and therefore that the search for common causes is futile.However,a key feature of the uniformitarian approach to geology is that past processes are the same as modern-day processes and,with that in mind,earth scientists are keen to use their knowledge to contribute some understanding to the study of the present and future climate crisis.