Stephen Jones wrote:
> >SJ>...the "severity of the debate" is a major factor, but not the
> only one.
>
> DM>The "severity of the debate" is only a "testosterone and
> >entertainment" issue.
>
> SJ>If that were the case, it doesn't say much for your opinion of the
> leaders of evolutionary thought like Gould, Dawkins, Dennett and
> Maynard Smith!
Well spotted! I don't have much of an opinion of the efforts of Gould
especially, to overstate the differences between neo-Darwinian theory
and paleontological observation. Maybe I'm missing something but I don't
see any significant challenge to neo-Darwinian theory in any
paleontological evidence. Perhaps you can help me here.
> >SJ>The *content* of the debate itself is very important.
>
> DM>The content of the debate is the only thing that is
> >important.
>
> SJ>Agreed, but it's this very *content* that is generating all this
> vitriol. It seems to me that they are frustrated beyond endurance
> that they cannot find a theoretical Darwinian mechanism that
> accounts for the empirical facts.
I would have to agree that the Punk Eeks (particularly Gould - Eldredge
appears to be somewhat further advanced) appear to be having problems
reconciling paleontological observations with neo-Darwinian (not just
Darwinian) theory. On the other hand, the neo-Darwinians appear to have
liite difficulty in fitting these paleontological observations into
neo-Darwinian theory.
SJ> This is *precisely* what my model of Mediate Creation would expect.
It is precisely what the YEC model would predict also.
> >SJ>Basically the Dawkins side says that from from their
> >>specialties (Biology, Genetics) evolution could only have
> >>happened by Neo-Darwinian, tiny step-by-step, increments over
> >>long periods of time.
>
> DM>If we are talking about "long" in a biological sense, rather
> >than a geological sense, the proponents of punctuated
> >equilibria say this also. Both sides agree that, when
> >evolution occurs, it is in genetically small steps, i.e.
> >throughout the whole process, offspring are not markedly
> >different genetically from their parents.
>
> SJ>Agreed that they both say this, but in Gould's case it seems to be
> only lip service. He and Eldredge know the fossil record does not
> really support Neo-Darwinist gradualism:
>
> "The history of most fossil species includes two features
> particularly inconsistent with gradualism: 1. Stasis. Most species
> exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They
> appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they
> disappear; morphological change is usually limited and
> directionless.
At first glance, this looks OK - it once looked OK to me. Most of it
still looks OK. Stasis is only a specific case of gradualism, where no
genetic/phenotypic variations that arise in a population increase the
relative "fitness" of the variant individuals. When the fossils of a
population disappear from a site, it may mean that the population moved
to a similar environment as that for which it was already adapted.
Alternatively the population may have gone extinct, because it could not
move to a similar environment to that for which it was already adapted,
or adapt to the new environment.
But be careful! "They appear in the fossil record looking much the same
as when they disappear" is not quite in accordance with the evidence. It
should say "They appear in the fossil record IN A PARTICULAR LOCATION
looking much the same as when they disappear FROM THAT LOCATION." What
this implies is that the population variation (by neo-Darwinian
processes) has occurred somewhere else. In rare instances, this
"somewhere else" has been found.
SJ>2. Sudden appearance. In any local area, a species
> does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its
> ancestors; it appears all at once and "fully formed."...The extreme
> rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the
> trade secret of paleontology. The evolutionary trees that adorn our
> textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches;
> the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of
> fossils. (Gould S.J, "The Panda's Thumb", 1980, pp150-151)
"In any local area", indeed. If only Gould had used that phrase in point
1. And if only Gould had highlighted the full implications of that
phrase, I, at least, would not have taken so long in reconciling the two
positions.
> "We paleontologists have said that the history of life supports
> that interpretation [the story of gradual adaptive change], all the
> while really knowing that it does not." (Eldredge N., "Time
> Frames', 1985, p144)
There is plenty of "gradual adaptive change" evidenced in the fossil
record, in the field and in the laboratory. There is even more "no
adaptive change", i.e. stasis and extinction. But there is no "sudden
adaptive change" requiring processes that are inconsistent with
neo-Darwinian theory.
> Johnson observes:
>
> "In these frustrating circumstances, paleontologists clearly needed
> to find a theory that would allow them to report the projects as
> successful, but they felt constrained to operate within the
> boundaries of the neo-Darwinian synthesis. What was required was a
> theory that was saltationist enough to allow the paleontologist to
> publish, but gradualistic enough to appease the Darwinists.
> Punctuated equilibrium accomplishes this feat of statesmanship by
> making the process of change inherently invisible. You can imagine
> those peripheral isolates changing as much and as fast as you like,
> because no one will ever see them. Gould and Eldredge have
> consistently described punctuated equilibrium as a Darwinist theory,
> not a saltationist repudiation of Darwinism. On the other hand, it
> is easy to see how some people the impression that saltationism was
> at least being hinted, if explicitly advocated. Gould and Eldredge
> put two quotes by T.H. Huxley on the front of their 1977 paper,
> both complaints about Darwin's refusal to allow a little "saltus" in
> his theory. At about the same time, Gould independently endorsed a
> qualified saltationism and predicted Goldschmidt's vindication....As
> a scientific theory, "saltationist evolution" is just what Darwin
> called it in the first place: rubbish. Gould and Eldredge
> understand that, and so despite hints of saltationism particularly
> by Gould) they have always kept open their lines of retreat to
> orthodox Darwinian gradualism." (Johnson P.E., "Darwin on Trial",
> 1993, pp61-62)
I have no difficulty in understanding why it suits Johnson's purposes to
tar the Punk Eeks with the "saltationist" brush. And I do see how they,
Gould particularly, must accept some of the responsibility for this
characterisation. However, let's hear Eldredge and Dawkins set the
record straight. I apologise for the Eldredge quote; the most relevant
parts are in the last four paragraphs, with the punchline in the last
paragraph, but I felt that the rest was needed to set it up.
Eldredge first:
"Generalizing a bit, Steve [Gould] and I said that most species of
marine invertebrates - that vast bulk of species of the fossil record -
last between five and ten million years, a rough estimate that has
actually stood up pretty well over the years. .....
As against five to ten million years of stasis, we claimed that
evolutionary change - tied up in speciation events - happens rather
quickly. Here we are at the smallest level of resolution of geological
time often (but not always) possible with the fossil record. .... I came
up with the figure 'five to fifty thousand years,' which was consistent
with some of the events we believed we had some direct data on from our
own studies.
The real point, of course, is that 'five to fifty thousand years' is in
the neighbourhood of 1,000 times shorter than the average duration of
species. It is the contrast in rates - between vast periods of
essentially no change, and brief intervals of actual change - that is
most important. What we were saying is that evolution looks
instantaneous in the fossil record, but is not. Indeed some evolutionary
geneticists have said that the 'five to fifty thousand years' estimate
is, if anything, overly generous. Speciation events may often require
even less time to take place.
Nonetheless, we were accused of being saltationists. Steve Gould wrote
two consecutive essays on Richard Goldschmidt in his monthly column in
Natural History in 1977. Among other things, Steve speculated that the
recent discovery of regulatory genes - genes that turn other genes on
and off - raised the possibility that mutations in the regulatory
apparatus might occasionally have the sort of effect Goldschmidt had in
mind with his notion of 'macromutations.' These macromutations had the
large-scale effects of the sort he posited for his 'hopeful monsters.'
Nowhere in either article did Steve mention punctuated equilibria.
But it was enough, it seems, that he, champion of a new model positing
bursts of relatively rapid change, would, a few years later, discuss
Goldschmidt in favourable terms. Mayr was one of the first to level the
charge that punctuated equilibria is nothing but old saltationism in new
guise. Our debt to Mayr's concept of species and speciation, so central
to the idea of punctuated equilibria, eventually induced him to do an
about face. Mayr came to prefer taking credit for punctuated equilibria
rather than seeing it linked to his old nemesis Goldschmidt.
Gould annd I were regularly derided and dismissed as neo-saltationists
for many years thereafter, and still occasionally hear the charge. ....
Suffice it to say that Russell Lande is right: five to fifty thousand
years is right on the money, even a bit of an overestimate, for normal
Darwinian within-population processes to effect the average (generally
not very great) amount of change that occurs in conjunction with
speciation events. Whatever we are, we are not saltationists!"
(Niles Eldredge, "Reinventing Darwin", 1995, Weidenfeld & Nicolson,
pp.99-100)
Now Dawkins:
"At the risk of spending longer on macro-mutations than they deserve,
there remains one possible source of confusion that I must anticipate.
There is an expertly publicized, and not uninteresting, theory known as
'punctuated equilibrium'. To go into detail would take me beyond this
book's scope. But, because the theory is heavily promoted and widely
misunderstood, I must just stress that the theory of punctuated
equilibrium does not have - or should not be represented as having - any
legitimate connection with macro-mutation. The theory proposes that
lineages spend long periods in stasis, undergoing no evolutionary
change, punctuated by occasional rapid bursts of evolutionary change
which coincide with the birth of a new species. But, rapid though these
bursts may be, they are still spread over large numbers of generations,
and they are still *gradual*. It is just that the intermediates usually
pass too quickly to be recorded as fossils. This 'punctuation as rapid
gradualism' is very different from macro-mutation, which is
instantaneous change in a single generation. The confusion arises partly
because one of the two advocates of the theory, Stephen gould (the other
is Niles Eldredge), also independently happens to have a soft spot for
certain kinds of macro-mutations, and he occasionally underplays the
distinction between rapid gradualism and true macro-mutation - not, I
hasten to add, miraculous Boeing 747 macro-mutation. Eldredge and Gould
are rightly annoyed at the misuse of their ideas by creationists who, in
my terminology, think that punctuated equilibrium is about huge,
747-type macro-mutations which, they are right to believe, would require
miracles. ....
Dr Gould would lessen the risk of such misunderstanding if he more
clearly emphasized the radical distinction between rapid gradualism and
saltation (i.e. macro-mutation). Depending on your definition, the
theory of punctuated equilibrium is either modest and possibly true or
it is revolutionary and probably false. If you blur the distinction
between rapid gradualism and saltation you may make the punctuation
theory seem more radical. But at the same time you offer an open
invitation to misunderstanding, an invitation that creationists are not
slow to take up."
(Richard Dawkins, "Climbing Mount Improbable", 1996, Viking, pp. 94-95)
So, even if Johnson continues to describe PE as saltationist (does he?),
there is no further reason for you to do likewise. Also, it might be
worthwhile for you to study how the paleontological observations of PE
proponents are explicable using the processes of neo-Darwinism.
SJ> If "habitat-tracking" was such a major feature of PE, it seems
> strange that it is only mentioned *once* in G&E's latest defence of
> PE (and that admitting that other theorists don't agree with them):
If, as I seem to remember, you have a copy of "Reinventing Darwin" you
will note that it contains extensive discussion of habitat tracking.
> DM>The question is, how does "habitat tracking" appear to a
> >paleontologist. If he is just looking in a single area, the
> >movement of a population in or out will look no different to
> >"sudden appearance" or "extinction" respectively. It is only
> >by fossil hunting over huge geographical expanses (often not
> >possible) that a paleontologist can find a pattern of
> >"habitat tracking".
>
SJ> All this to my mind is propping up a shaky theory with auxiliary
> hypotheses.
I would still appreciate your comment on the substance of the point I
raised.
Of course, if you *really* want to examine an example of "propping up a
shaky theory with auxiliary hypotheses", you might want to have a close
look at the historical development and continued use of the auxiliary
"Trinity" hypothesis to prop up the shaky theory that Jesus is God. If
one were to accept the author of Acts' description of Jesus as "a man
approved of God" at face value, then the "Trinity" hypothesis would not
be necessary.
SJ>My Mediate Creation model would *expect* sudden
> appearance, few transitional forms and stasis, but to Neo-Darwinism
> it is a major problem which must be explained away.
By expecting the direct action of a deity as an integral part of your
model, there can be very few unexpected phenomena.
> >SJ>This is a festering sore within Darwinism that has been
> >>going on since Darwin's day, and shows no signs of ever
> >>being resolved.
>
> DM>Not a "festering sore", but a lively, entertaining
> >and educational debate.
>
SJ> I am glad that we can both enjoy the spectacle of the world's
> leading Darwinists forming into two camps and tearing each other
> (and their theories) to pieces before the general public!
Maybe I'm not looking in the right places. What specific theories are
being substantively, not rhetorically, torn to pieces, i.e. falsified?
By the way, I'm also looking forward to the upcoming battle between the
"expansion of the universe is constant or decelerating" camp and the
newly-formed "expansion of the universe is accelerating" camp.
> >SJ>There always have been and it seems always will be, two
> >>Darwinist camps (the theoreticians vs the empiricists) locked in
> >>a civil war which neither side can win.
>
> DM>...the practice of science isn't a zero-sum game. It isn't
> >about warring and winning; its about discovering and testing.
>
SJ> That assumes that Darwinism is 100% "science".
No. I was only referring to that part of the evolutionary issue that
*is* science. The part that is not science, i.e. the arena of Jerry
Falwell, Gary Parker, Phillip Johnson and Daniel Dennett is most
definitely about warring and winning.
SJ>But as Ruse
> admits, it is also a type of secular religion:
>
> "Certainly, historically, that if you look at, say, evolutionary
> theory, and of course this was brought out I think rather nicely by
> the talk just before me, it's certainly been the case that evolution
> has functioned, if not as a religion as such, certainly with
> elements akin to a secular religion....And certainly, there's no
> doubt about it, that in the past, and I think also in the present,
> for many evolutionists, evolution has functioned as something with
> elements which are, let us say, akin to being a secular
> religion....Certainly, if you read Thomas Henry Huxley, when he's in
> full flight, there's no question but that for Huxley at some very
> important level, evolution and science generally, but certainly
> evolution in particular, is functioning a bit as a kind of secular
> religion....And there's no question whatsoever that for Julian
> Huxley, when you read <Evolution, the Modern Synthesis>, that Julian
> Huxley saw evolution as a kind of progressive thing upwards. I
> think Julian Huxley was certainly an atheist, but he was at the same
> time a kind of neo-vitalist, and he bound this up with his science.
> If you look both at his printed stuff, and if you go down to Rice
> University which has got all his private papers, again and again in
> the letters, it comes through very strongly that for Julian Huxley
> evolution was functioning as a kind of secular religion. I think
> that this -- and I'm not saying this now particularly in a critical
> sense, I'm just saying this in a matter-of-fact sense -- I think
> that today also, for more than one eminent evolutionist, evolution
> in a way functions as a kind of secular religion. And let me just
> mention my friend Edward O. Wilson....Wilson is quite categorical
> about wanting to see evolution as the new myth, and all sorts of
> language like this. That for him, at some level, it's functioning
> as a kind of metaphysical system." (Ruse M., "Nonliteralist
> Anti-Evolutionism: The Case of Phillip Johnson", 1993 Annual
> Meeting of the AAAS, Symposium "The New Antievolutionism", February
> 13, 1993)
Ruse couldn't have picked better examples of this than the Huxley's. On
the other hand, I don't find it difficult to separate the science from
the philosophy even when both come from the pen of the same author and
appear in the same publication. You've read "The Blind Watchmaker". From
your writings, I don't see that you find it difficult to separate the
philosophy from the science. Do you?
SJ> My analysis is that what we are now seeing between Gould and Dawkins
> looks more like the worst aspects of two religions fighting it out,
> than a scientific debate.
My observation is that your analysis (or Johnson's analysis which you
have adopted) focuses more on the flow of rhetoric among participants,
than on each participant's understanding of the substantive issues.
Johnson is a lawyer; for his profession the flow of rhetoric has a real
influence on decisions. What's your excuse? :-)
> >SJ>It seems to me that both sides are right about each
> >>other's position and therefore both sides are wrong about
> >>their own.
>
> DM>You've been peddling this hopeful line for a long time now,
> >but the writings of Dawkins, Maynard Smith, Williams, Gould
> >and Eldridge don't support it. It appears to me that they
> >are both mostly right about their own positions, but lack a
> >deep but necessary understanding of the other side. I have
> >no major problems fitting gradualism with PE to form a
> >coherent picture. Sure, I've had to read a lot, discount a
> >lot of rhetoric, burn more than a few straw men, but I got
> >there. And the thought-provoking discussions I've had with
> >you have also helped. In one sense it was easy for me
> >because I have no vested interest in the outcome,and, as a
> >technologist rather than a scientist, no reputation in the
> >scientific community.
>
SJ> Of course they don't admit it! That's the one thing both sides
> cannot admit - that neither of them are right.
Something you have in common with them? :-)
> >SJ>Dawkins is right that naturalistic evolution can only
> >>happen by Neo-Darwinian mechanisms.
>
> DM>A bit simplistic, but essentially right.
>
SJ> How can a one-sentence summary of Dawkins' position be anything else
> but "simplistic"? But thank you for conceding that my summary was
> "essentially right"
Do you want to make it even more "right"? Then try this. "Dawkins and
Eldredge are right that naturalistic evolution can only happen by
Neo-Darwinian mechanisms."
(continued)
Regards,
Derek
--------------6288F56630D3AD08036A0CDC
Content-Type: text/x-vcard; charset=us-ascii; name="vcard.vcf"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Content-Description: Card for Derek McLarnen
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="vcard.vcf"
begin: vcard
fn: Derek McLarnen
n: McLarnen;Derek
adr: ;;;Melba;ACT;2615;Australia
email;internet: dmclarne@pcug.org.au
title: Mr
x-mozilla-cpt: ;0
x-mozilla-html: TRUE
end: vcard
--------------6288F56630D3AD08036A0CDC--