These arguments were not universally accepted for several reasons (Watts, 1982; Thorne and Watts, 1984; Miall, 1986, 1992, 1994; Burton et al., 1987; Hubbard, 1988; Christie-Blick et al., 1990; Reynolds et al., 1991; Christie-Blick, 1991; Christie-Blick and Driscoll, 1995):
1.Basinward shifts in onlap were shown not to require sea-level changes that were either rapid or of large amplitude. Therefore, there was no reason to assume a eustatic causal mechanism or to exclude possible local tectonic mechanisms for sequence-boundary development.
2.No mechanism was discovered for rapid eustatic change during intervals such as the Mesozoic, for which there is little or no evidence for continental glaciation.
3.Limitations in the resolution with which sequence boundaries could be dated and correlated between basins cast doubt on the level to which global synchroneity had been established.
4.At least prior to 1987, the "sea-level curve" first published by Vail et al. (1977) was based
primarily on proprietary data (see Haq et al., 1987). Therefore, at the time of the Second
Conference on Scientific Ocean Drilling (COSOD II, 1987), there was a great deal of interest in
acquiring public data that might be used to establish a sea-level record independent of the Vail et
al. (1977) synthesis.
Following COSOD II, the role of scientific ocean drilling in sea-level studies was advanced by
means of a Joint Oceanographic Institutions, Inc. (JOI)/U.S. Scientific Advisory Committee
(USSAC) Workshop (Watkins and Mountain, 1990) and a JOIDES working group (JOIDES
Sea Level Working Group, 1992). Sea-level studies were also prioritized in the JOIDES
Sedimentary and Geochemical Processes Panel (SGPP) White Paper (1994) and in the Ocean
Drilling Program (ODP) Long Range Plan (1996). These reports differ in detail and emphasis,
but they endorse several broad objectives. These include (1) the dating of stratigraphic "events"
and associated surfaces that might be related to sea-level change; (2) investigating how
sedimentary architecture is related to sea-level variations (local or global); and (3) estimating the
magnitudes and rates of eustatic change through time, if a role for eustasy can be demonstrated.
All(reports recognized that multiple drilling legs would be required to make comparisons
between coeval successions at different locations and that ODP would be able to sample only a
small portion of earth's sea-level history. Therefore, three intervals were prioritized within the
Mesozoic to Cenozoic span accessible to ocean drilling: (1) the late Oligocene to Holocene
"Icehouse" Earth, dominated by the waxing and waning of continental ice sheets; (2) the mid
Cretaceous "Greenhouse" or "Hothouse" Earth, when ice sheets were essentially absent; and (3)
the intermediate interval from the latest Paleocene to the middle Eocene, for which the degree of
glaciation is unknown or uncertain and the term "Doubthouse" Earth was suggested (Miller et
al., 1987, 1991a; Watkins and Mountain, 1990; Barron et al., 1991; Frakes et al., 1992;
Browning et al., 1997).
The scientific ocean drilling community tacitly assumed that this approach would lead to insights
about possible mechanisms of eustatic change, as well as to a broader understanding of the
relationships among eustasy and various phenomena, including changes in continental ice
volume (and hence global climate), nearshore ecosystems, particle and nutrient transfer to the
deep sea, ocean circulation, biological evolution, and patterns of deposition, erosion and
hydrocarbon distribution in sedimentary basins. It is now clear that the main control on short
term eustasy is the continental ice budget, and that during nonglacial times sea-level change is
likely to have been influenced significantly by noneustatic mechanisms, including tectonics
(e.g., Christie-Blick and Driscoll, 1995). There is no evidence to support the long-held
assumption in sea-level studies that tectonic processes act only at long time scales (e.g., Vail et
al., 1991). Thinking has also matured about the stratigraphic response to eustatic change.
Modeling studies suggest that this may vary from one basin to another, according to such
factors as the local rate of subsidence and sediment supply, the relative abundance of siliciclastic
vs. carbonate sediment, compaction history, and the physiography of the depositional surface.
The locally determined timing of sea-level events is therefore expected to vary, even when the
events are global (Jordan and Flemings, 1991; Reynolds et al., 1991; Christie-Blick, 1991;
Steckler et al., 1993); strict stratigraphic synchroneity cannot be assumed as a criterion for
judging the role of eustasy in the origin of observed sedimentary cyclicity. Instead, precise
dating of stratigraphic successions at a number of well-chosen locations may permit predicted
leads and lags to be measured. Ocean drilling has been consistently envisioned as a primary tool
for such an approach to studying the history of sea-level change.
The JOIDES Sea Level Working Group (1992) endorsed a three-fold approach to sea-level
studies, involving: (1) passive continental margins (primarily siliciclastic); (2) carbonate atolls,
guyots and platforms, the so-called "dipstick" approach; and (3) the deep-sea oxygen isotopic
record, a proxy for the growth and decay of continental ice sheets. This strategy has since been
reaffirmed in the SGPP White Paper (1994) and in the JOIDES Long Range Plan (1996). ODP
Legs 133 and 166 addressed "Icehouse" sea-level issues at the seaward margins of carbonate
platforms off northeastern Australia and the western Great Bahama Bank, respectively. Legs
143 and 144 studied the "Greenhouse" drowning history of western Pacific guyots. Leg 174A
is a continuation of the New Jersey Mid-Atlantic Sea-level Transect (MAT), the first concerted
effort to evaluate the effects of "Icehouse" glacial-eustatic change at a passive continental margin
characterized by predominantly siliciclastic sedimentation. Leg 174A follows successful
sampling of the continental slope and rise during Leg 150 (Mountain, Miller, Blum, et al., 1994;
Miller et al., 1996b), and continuing studies of the adjacent New Jersey coastal plain (Legs
150X and 174AX; Miller, et al., 1994, 1996a; Miller and Sugarman, 1995; Pekar and Miller,
1996; Figs. 1 and 2).