ABSTRACT
The behavioral and coevolutionary evidence concerned with the selection of favored environments in which to live is well known in the present, and there is a vast literature concerning the many physical and biological variables involved on land and in the sea. The fossil record also provides a mass of evidence involving varied correlations of chiey physical variables and the presence or absence of taxa on land and in the sea. For example, in the marine benthic environment, the massive documentation of community evolution through time correlates with variables of distinctive kinds; this is particularly true for the infaunal and epifaunal benthic plus demersal environments (see Table 38 in Chapter 37 for some examples). In the marine environment, there are varied correlations between water depth and the presence or absence of varied pelagic organisms. For example, the presence of abundant myctophid sh is good evidence of a bathypelagic environment (Table 38) and suggests that depth and temperature controls are involved to a large extent (see discussion in Gaudant, 1978). Additionally, the presence of certain decapods (Oji, 2001) is also good evidence for bathyal, benthic environments. The presence of certain radiolarian taxa in bedded chert, beginning with the Ordovician, provides evidence for oceanic vs. neritic plankton.
