The

Other Side

of the Medal

A Paleobiologist Reflects

on

the Art and Serendipity of Science

Everett C. Olson

Professor of Zoology Emeritus

University of California

Los Angeles, California

The McDonald & Woodward Publishing Company

Blacksburg, Virginia

 

Everett C. Olson (ca. 1986)

Dedication

To all of those graduate students who worked with me during the past 50 years; whose brilliance, challenges, knowledge and irreverence guided my intellectual growth and kept me young in mind; whose strong arms, willing backs and walking legs made possible our explorations, collecting and excavating of fossil vertebrates when found; who have gone forward to productive careers in their own fields and of their own choices.

 

 

 

^{Table of Contents}

 

Preface 1       The Permian and I 2       The Arroyo Formation, Coffee Creek and Ernest 3       Eyes West — to Younger Beds 4       Ignorant Ridge — the Vale and Choza Formations 5       Land, Weather and Dogs 6       The San Angelo Formation — and a Look Backwards 7       Eyes to the East 8       Impressions — Efremov, Museum, Friends 9       Efremov — the Man 10              Efremov, Science and Philosophy 11   Frivolity, Dialectical Materialism and Science 12              The Other Side of the Medal 13              Books, Writings and Ideals 14              What of Dreams — Now? Index

ix 1 17 27 37 51 63 79 97 111 119 129 147 161 173 181