Proving Evolution in the Age of Genetics

increasingly it is evident that species is an arbitrary designation that was originally based on convenience form observed forms, that all such forms are in a continual state of change\transition and that each can be traced back to one ancestor through a series of changes small enough that the differentiation values of speciation do not apply. in this regard every living thing is a ring species in time.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

I absolutely adore that phrase. I'd like to use it in an essay I'm working on. Did you invent it or is it something you remember reading somewhere? (I need to know for attribution issues.)

I know you understand, but I'm not sure your correspondent does, which is the only reason I added to/clarified what you wrote. You're totally correct that this is an example of the continuum of species. This was really Darwin's biggest contribution IMO: the break from typological to population thinking (essentialism vs evolution).

The following is quickly becoming my favorite quote within the evo/creo debate. The author of the quote (Ernst Mayr) was involved in evolution during the time the theory was "finalized" in the form of the Evolutionary Synthesis (now called the Modern Synthesis). He was around well before the discovery of DNA. The following quote deals with how the discovery of DNA and its manipulation has affected how we look at the theory."By the end of the 1940s the work of the evolutionists was considered to be largely completed, as indicated by the robustness of the Evolutionary Synthesis. But in the ensuing decades, all sorts of things happened that might have had a major impact on the Darwinian paradigm. First came Avery's demonstration that nucleic acids and not proteins are the genetic material. Then in 1953, the discovery of the double helix by Watson and Crick increased the analytical capacity of the geneticists by at least an order of magnitude. Unexpectedly, however, none of these molecular findings necessitated a revision of the Darwinian paradigm--nor did the even more drastic genomic revolution that has permitted the analysis of genes down to the last base pair." --Ernst Mayr

I do not recall reading or hearing it -- you are free to use it as it seems pretty generic (spontaneously generatable) to me.enjoy.