News and Reviews – Discussion of the paper by Wimbledon et al., 2020b, entitled “The proposal of a GSSP for the Berriasian Stage (Cretaceous System): Part 1” [Volumina Jurassica, XVIII (1)]

Authors

  • Bruno Granier Département des Sciences de la Terre et de l’Univers, Faculté des Sciences et Techniques, Université de Bretagne Occidentale, CS 93837, 29238 Brest, France
  • Raymond Énay Département des Sciences de la Terre, Bât. Géode, Université Claude Bernard – Lyon 1, Campus universitaire de La Doua, 2 rue Raphaël Dubois, 69622 Villeurbanne cedex, France; 1 impasse de la Garde, 69005 Lyon, France
  • Jean Charollais Sciences de la Terre et de l’Environnement, Université de Genève, 13 rue des Maraîchers, CH–1211 Genève 4, Switzerland

Abstract

The current definition of the Jurassic/Cretaceous boundary results from a 50 year long “status-quo” that postponed decision making on the matter. That the temporary nature of this situation had become permanent has been rarely questionned until recently. This long-lasting situation is symptomatic of the fact that selection of the Tithonian/Berriasian boundary as the default option was probably not the best solution. Today the Berriasian Working Group is still defending this conservative option whereas the present authors refer to the reformist option known as Oppel’s view (or Granier’s diversion) with the Berriasian/Valanginian boundary as the system boundary. In that sense this position paper can be considered a counterproposal for the system boundary (not for the stage boundary) because it corrects some errors found in the first part of the Berriasian WG proposal as well as it opens minds to the best alternative according to the present authors

Downloads

Published

2020-07-28

Issue

Section

Articles