伯吉斯頁巖
Burgess Shale

context: zh_tw: 在沃爾科特採石場重新開挖化石的行動是在三葉蟲專家哈利・布萊莫・惠靈頓（Harry Blackmore Whittington）的說服下由加拿大地質調查局（Geological Survey of Canada）進行。而一個由哈佛大學的波西・雷蒙德（Percy Raymond）在 1924 年建立的新採石場則位在化石嶺上高度約 20 公尺處 。惠靈頓與兩位幫助他的劍橋大學研究生德瑞克・布里格斯與西蒙・康威・莫里斯開始對伯吉斯頁岩進行完整的再調查，也揭露了伯吉斯動物群的演化分化比沃爾科特研究成果更廣且更特殊。確實，許多伯吉斯頁岩內的化石有令人驚訝的結構特徵，而且和其他已知生物只有少數地方相似。例如歐巴賓海蠍有 5 個眼睛與一個類似真空吸塵器軟管的口鼻部、Nectocaris 不但有類似甲殼亞門的鰭，還有一個和外殼在一起的脊椎、怪誕蟲最早的復原狀態和正確狀態上下相反，被誤認為使用兩邊對稱的刺走路。
en: Excavations were resumed at the Walcott Quarry by the Geological Survey of Canada under the persuasion of trilobite expert Harry Blackmore Whittington, and a new quarry, the Raymond, was established about 20 metres higher up Fossil Ridge. Whittington, with the help of research students Derek Briggs and Simon Conway Morris of the University of Cambridge, began a thorough reassessment of the Burgess Shale, and revealed that the fauna represented were much more diverse and unusual than Walcott had recognized. Indeed, many of the animals present had bizarre anatomical features and only the slightest resemblance to other known animals. Examples include Opabinia, with five eyes and a snout like a vacuum cleaner hose and Hallucigenia, which was originally reconstructed upside down, walking on bilaterally symmetrical spines.
qas: question: zh_tw: 誰幫助了惠靈頓？
en: Who helped Whittington?
answers: zh_tw: text: 德瑞克・布里格斯與西蒙・康威・莫里斯
en: text: Derek Briggs and Simon Conway Morris

question: zh_tw: 在哪裡繼續採挖？
en: Where were excavations resumed?
answers: zh_tw: text: 沃爾科特採石場
en: text: the Walcott Quarry

context: zh_tw: 史蒂芬・古爾德的書《奇妙的生命》於 1989 年出版，使伯吉斯頁岩受到一般大眾注意。古爾德認為化石的大幅分化顯示當時的生命形式分化幅度比現在分更大，而許多獨特的後裔是滅絕的演化嘗試。古爾德對寒武紀動物群的研究相當依賴西蒙・康威・莫里斯對沃爾科特的出版物重新研究的結果。但莫里斯強烈反對古爾德的結論，莫里斯認為幾乎所有的寒武紀動物群可以被分類在現代生物的門之下。
qas: question: zh_tw: 古爾德的書《奇妙的生命》是關注什麼的？
en: What did the novel Wonderful Life by Gould focus on?
answers: zh_tw: text: 化石

question: zh_tw: 《奇妙的生命》這本書主要觀點是什麼？
en: What did the book of Wonderful Life suggest?
answers: zh_tw: text: 化石的大幅分化顯示當時的生命形式分化幅度比現在分更大，而許多獨特的後裔是滅絕的演化嘗試。

context: zh_tw: 伯吉斯頁岩富含化石的沉積物與史蒂芬地層（Stephen formation）相關。這個地層是一系列細小的暗色石灰質泥岩層，年齡約 5.05 億年；地層的底部是位於一個高約 160 公尺的懸崖底部，這個位置遠低於暴風雨引起的強烈海浪。這個垂直的懸崖是和可能在伯吉斯頁岩之前短時間內形成的 Cathedral Formation 的石灰質珊瑚礁層組成。地層的詳細形成機制目前仍不清楚，但最被廣為接受的假說是在 Cathedral Formation 的珊瑚礁邊緣和珊瑚礁其他部分分離後下落與被運送到最遠在珊瑚礁邊緣數公里以外的距離，之後斷層在約 5.09 億年前活動使地層分離。這可能留下一個底部被保護的陡峭懸崖，因為 Cathedral Formation 的石灰岩是難以被來自板塊的減壓壓縮的。這樣的保護作用進一步解釋了為什麼 Cathedral Formation 無法儲存化石，因為板塊壓縮岩層產生垂直切割使岩石破裂，造成化石被垂直切割。沃爾科特採石場發現了這些特殊化時是因為這些地區靠近史蒂芬地層，該採石場確實挖掘到非常接近寒武紀時代的懸崖邊緣處。
en: The fossil-bearing deposits of the Burgess Shale correlate to the Stephen Formation, a collection of slightly calcareous dark mudstones, about 508 million years old. The beds were deposited at the base of a cliff about 160 m tall, below the depth agitated by waves during storms. This vertical cliff was composed of the calcareous reefs of the Cathedral Formation, which probably formed shortly before the deposition of the Burgess Shale. The precise formation mechanism is not known for certain, but the most widely accepted hypothesis suggests that the edge of the Cathedral Formation reef became detached from the rest of the reef, slumping and being transported some distance — perhaps kilometers — away from the reef edge. Later reactivation of faults at the base of the formation led to its disintegration from about 509 million years ago. This would have left a steep cliff, the bottom of which would be protected from tectonic decompression because the limestone of the Cathedral Formation is difficult to compress. This protection explains why fossils preserved further from the Cathedral Formation are impossible to work with — tectonic squeezing of the beds has produced a vertical cleavage that fractures the rocks, so they split perpendicular to the fossils. The Walcott quarry produced such spectacular fossils because it was so close to the Stephen Formation — indeed the quarry has now been excavated to the very edge of the Cambrian cliff.It was originally thought that the Burgess Shale was deposited in anoxic conditions, but mounting research shows that oxygen was continually present in the sediment. The anoxic setting had been thought to not only protect the newly dead organisms from decay, but it also created chemical conditions allowing the preservation of the soft parts of the organisms. Further, it reduced the abundance of burrowing organisms — burrows and trackways are found in beds containing soft-bodied organisms, but they are rare and generally of limited vertical extent. Brine seeps are an alternative hypothesis; see Burgess Shale type preservation for a more thorough discussion.
qas: question: zh_tw: 富含化石的沉積物在哪裡？
en: Where were the fossil-bearing deposits located?
answers: zh_tw: text: 懸崖底部
en: text: base of a cliff

context: en: Stephen Jay Gould's book Wonderful Life, published in 1989, brought the Burgess Shale fossils to the public's attention. Gould suggests that the extraordinary diversity of the fossils indicates that life forms at the time were much more disparate in body form than those that survive today, and that many of the unique lineages were evolutionary experiments that became extinct. Gould's interpretation of the diversity of Cambrian fauna relied heavily on Simon Conway Morris's reinterpretation of Charles Walcott's original publications. However, Conway Morris strongly disagreed with Gould's conclusions, arguing that almost all the Cambrian fauna could be classified into modern day phyla.The Burgess Shale has attracted the interest of paleoclimatologists who want to study and predict long-term future changes in Earth's climate. According to Peter Ward and Donald Brownlee in the 2003 book The Life and Death of Planet Earth, climatologists study the fossil records in the Burgess Shale to understand the climate of the Cambrian explosion, and use it to predict what Earth's climate would look like 500 million years in the future when a warming and expanding Sun combined with declining CO2 and oxygen levels eventually heat the Earth toward temperatures not seen since the Archean Eon 3 billion years ago, before the first plants and animals appeared, and therefore understand how and when the last living things will die out. See also Future of the Earth.
qas: question: zh_tw: 《奇妙的生命》這本書主要觀點是什麼？
answers: en: text: extraordinary diversity of the fossils indicates that life forms at the time were much more disparate in body form than those that survive today, and that many of the unique lineages were evolutionary experiments that became extinct

question: zh_tw: 古爾德的書《奇妙的生命》是關注什麼的？
answers: en: text: Burgess Shale fossils