Artificial intelligence finds surprising patterns in Earth’s biological mass extinctions

Scientists have long believed that mass extinctions create productive periods of species evolution, or “radiations,” a model called “creative destruction.” However, new analysis provide evidence for different outcome. A new study led by scientists affiliated with the Earth-Life Science Institute (ELSI) at Tokyo Institute of Technology used machine learning to examine the co-occurrence of fossil species and found that radiations and extinctions are rarely connected, and thus mass extinctions generally don’t cause mass radiations.
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