gjk@talcott.UUCP (Greg Kuperberg) (12/17/84)
Dear Mr. Miller (an open letter): In your SOR pamphlets, you usually cite all of these sources which I haven't read, and thus I cannot dispute what you claim that the paleontologists say. SOR pamphlet #4, however, is different. I happen to be taking a course from Steven Jay Gould, and I am well acquainted with his essays, the lectures from which the essays are derived, and his view of natural history. Thus, I will first present what his case for punctuated equilibrium is about. Professor Gould started off by talking about Darwinism. He noted that Darwin was a gradualist, and that gradualism was not a necessary part of the theory evolution, or even a necessary part of the theory of natural selection. In fact, Huxley made this very point in his oft-quoted letter to Darwin about evolution. He said, roughly, "Look, it's going to be hard enough for you to convince people that natural selection is the driving mechanism of evolution, so why throw in gradualism with it?" Anyway, a decade or so ago Stephen Jay Gould and Niles Eldridge proposed a non-gradualistic model of evolution. Whereas in the standard theory, evolution might look like this: ......|.............................................Present | _/ \ / \ _/ \ / ^ \ / | Time \ / <---> \ / / Variation \ / / \/ / \ / \ / ___ \/ | / | = 5 million years / _|_ in punc. eq., evolution would look like this: ......|..........................|..................Present | | | |_______| | | | | | | ^ |____| | |___| | Time | |______| <---> | | | Variation |____| | | |___| | | | | ___ |_____| | | | = 5 million years | _|_ | There are a bunch of technical reasons, which I won't go into, as to why it might look this, but in any case, the point is that evolution is like a staircase rather than an inclined plane. From looking at the above picture, you can see that on a five-million year scale, speciation is abrupt and without warning, while on a thirty-million year scale, it is not; there are definite trends and lineages. Professor Gould repeatedly emphasized this point in lecture. Now let's look at some of what the SOR pamphlet says: > Evolutionists believe that all life forms descended from the same source. >If this is true,then the fossil record should show the various kinds of plants >and animals converging to a common source. Creationists, on the other hand, >believe that all life forms have always been separate,with only limited poten- >tial for viable variations. If this is true, then the fossil record should >show life appearing suddenly,with no evidence of gradual step-by-step develop- >ment through transitional forms... While the genealogies in the fossil record are usually incomplete, they are not non-existent. Even if there are gaps, it doesn't mean that there are zero intermediate forms, just that there are not very many of them. You can see this clearly from the chart above. Also, you are (probably deliberately) confusing the two meanings of "all at once". "Species appear all at once" can mean either: 1) they all appear suddenly *and at the same time*, or 2) they all appear suddenly, but not necessarily at the same time. You further fog the issue by using the term "life" rather than "each species" or "all life forms". Look at the chart for more insight. > Each time a particular kind of plant or animal appears in the fossil >record, it does so fully formed, with no evidence of transitional forms indi- >cating how it evolved. Gaps are large, systematic, and continuous throughout >the fossil record, confirming the predictions of the creation model... >Even the prominent Stephen Gould wrote: ``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'' [5]. Relying upon ``inference'' and ``not the evidence'' >is not the mark of an objective scientist. Professor Gould was leading up to punc. eq., which is a beautiful attempt to resolve the whole issue of gaps, which in turn do not contradict evolution. How could you miss punctuated equilibrium if you read Steven Jay Gould's article? Why did you take his quote out of context? Sounds like intellectual dishonesty to me. Lastly, objective scientists can use inference all they want, as long as there is evidence. You fog the issue again by implicity assuming that evidence and inference are mutually exclusive. Surely you know better. > The famous horse series is often found in museums as one of the classic >cases of evolution. However, the observer is not usually told that all of the >various forms appear suddenly in the fossil record, the presumed reduction in >the number of toes has many contradictions in order,Eohippus is almost identi- >cal to the living African hyrax, and that modern horses have been found in the >same strata with their supposed ancestors. In fact, as more fossil evidence is >collected, it becomes clear that all of these various animals did not evolve, >but were merely contemporaries of each other... The horse series looks just like the model picture that I gave above. If you look at the picture above, you can clearly see that some species are almost identical to their ancestors, and ancestral species can coexist with their modified descendants. Evolution is a *branching bush*, not a ladder. Stephen Jay Gould often emphasizes this. How could you miss it in his article? > Not all evolutionists, however, are so quick to again repeat the mistakes >of the past. For example, Charles Oxnard's multivariate statistical analysis >indicates that Australopithecus probably did not walk upright and was not on >the main human lineage [9]. Furthermore, posture is not critical to the dis- >cussion, as the living pygmy chimpanzee Pan paniscus spends a great deal of >time walking upright. Since human evolution is also a branching bush, *no species* is on the main human lineage. Furthermore, the chimp can walk on two feet, but one could hardly call it upright. You confuse (probably deliberately again) walking on two feet with walking with a straight posture. > In fact, the fossil record so strongly supports the creation model's pred- >ictions, that Solly Zuckerman conceded that if humans had evolved from some >ape-like creature,then they had done so ``without leaving any fossil traces of >the steps of the transformation'' [10]. That may or may not be true. You overlook the fact a chimpanzee is physiologically very close to a human. In fact, you could cross a chimp with a human! The offspring, however, would be sterile, for the same reason that mules are sterile. Looking at chimps for a while should give you a good clue that they are most definitely human-like: same number of bones, almost identical hemoglobin, same diseases, and so on. >...Life appears suddenly, complete, and with >fixed boundaries between the various kinds of plants and animals. The conclu- >sion is that life did not evolve, but must have been created. You confuse individual species with life as a whole. And even if evolution did not happen, it doesn't mean creation. And even if creation were true, it doesn't mean Biblical creation, which is what the creationist textbooks use. This strict dichotomy between Darwin and Genesis is the most unscientific part of the creationist pap, and it makes a large number of Christians very disappointed when you consider the Bible a book about science instead of a book about morality. Now for some scolding. Half of my reply can be found in Stephen Jay Gould's writings on punctuated equilibrium, and most of the rest can be found in his other essays, never mind the other authors that you cited. You have misrepresented the man's theory; you have taken his sentences out of context; you have changed the meanings of the words of his sentences. If you read the above-mentioned book about morality carefully enough, you'll know that you're not supposed to misrepesent others, if even if you oppose them. I would like to see you post his essay in full in net.origins, so the others can also see how you operate. I strongly suspect that you are doing the same thing to the other evolutionists as well. You wanted suggestions? Quit writing these stupid pamphlets and sell shoes instead. --- Greg Kuperberg harvard!talcott!gjk "Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government." -Monty Python
dubois@uwmacc.UUCP (Paul DuBois) (12/17/84)
> You overlook the fact a chimpanzee is > physiologically very close to a human. In fact, you could cross a chimp > with a human! The offspring, however, would be sterile, for the same > reason that mules are sterile. Can anyone verify this? -- Paul DuBois {allegra,ihnp4,seismo}!uwvax!uwmacc!dubois "I will sing unto the Lord as long as I live: I will sing praise to my God while I have my being." Psalm 104:33
gjk@talcott.UUCP (Greg Kuperberg) (12/18/84)
> > You overlook the fact a chimpanzee is > > physiologically very close to a human. In fact, you could cross a chimp > > with a human! The offspring, however, would be sterile, for the same > > reason that mules are sterile. > > Can anyone verify this? > -- > Paul DuBois {allegra,ihnp4,seismo}!uwvax!uwmacc!dubois No one would dare try the experiment. The statement is based on what we know about fertilization and chromosomes, and on the genetic differences between a chimp and a human. (These are smaller than the genetic differences between a chimp and any other ape! The gorilla is the only possible exception to this.) Source: \Ever Since Darwin/, by Stephen Jay Gould --- Greg Kuperberg harvard!talcott!gjk " " -Charlie Chaplin, for IBM
mrh@cybvax0.UUCP (Mike Huybensz) (12/18/84)
In article <576@uwmacc.UUCP> dubois@uwmacc.UUCP (Paul DuBois) writes: > > You overlook the fact a chimpanzee is > > physiologically very close to a human. In fact, you could cross a chimp > > with a human! The offspring, however, would be sterile, for the same > > reason that mules are sterile. > > Can anyone verify this? I have not heard of any attempts, successful or otherwise, attempting to produce ape/human hybrids. The idea is not very far-fetched now that artificial insemination is commonplace in laboratories, hospitals, and zoos. It would be an ironic trick to play on the Nobel Laureate sperm bank in California. Talk about damage to their reputation! Not a nice thing to do to an unsuspecting mother though. There are any number of reasons why an interspecies cross might fail. There are unknown causes of spontaneous abortion at embryonic and fetal stages in some interspecies crosses. If the mother was an ape, there might be birth problems due to the larger cranial size of newborns with human genes, or perhaps premature birth of a fetus that would get larger if the mother was able to tolerate it. I'd say that it would be worth an attempt. I would not be surprised if it was successful. (Please, if we're going to discuss ethics of this sort of thing, move it to net.religion or net.philosophy.) It really would stick in the craw of creationists if they had to admit that humans and apes were "of a kind". But of course, they'd squirm away with some new BS claim equally unsupported by the facts and the Bible. -- Mike Huybensz ...decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!cybvax0!mrh