Does Neo-Darwinian evolution require change ?

In which case: why do we care? The modern synthesis predates such cutting edge discoveries as the structure of DNA.In a bit more answer to your question: evolutionary theory can cope just fine with stasis (which is much less common than Gould and Eldridge's incorrect punctuated equilibrium hypothesis would have us believe). Habitat tracking is a major part of the explanation, though, so the actual environmental change experienced by an organism is much less than that apparent in the environment as a whole.Also, if you compare apparently morphologically static organisms using genetic techniques you find that there's just as much change going on as in morphologically divergent organisms.Edited by Mr Jack, : Typo: habitat tracking, not habit tracking

Avise et al (1994) 'A Speciational History of "Living Fossils": Molecular Evolutionary Patterns in Horseshoe Crabs' Evolution Vol. 48, No. 6 (Dec., 1994), pp. 1986-2001

1. Mutational accumulation in offspring is statistical, you cannot say the average is 5, therefore every offspring will be worse.
2. Recombination, anyone?
3. Compensating mutations, anyone?

Ok, so what size population might be limited to 5000 deaths a generation? What kind of organism are we talking about here?Let's take a typical mammal, which have very low fecundity by most standards, let's say a cat. A cat has 3-5 kittens in the average litter. An adult female produces can produce 2 (or more) litters a year. So let's conservatively suppose that a typical female that breeds at all, breeds 4 times, for a total of 16 kittens on average.The male is likely to vary, but each kitten has one father and one mother, so we know that if the population stays steady only two of these kittens must survive to the next generation. That means just 1 in 8 or 12.5% of kittens survive. So your 5000 that can be killed per generation while maintaining a stable population suggests a population size of just 625.That's a very small population, using conservative numbers on the number that can be killed. Consider a frog, a turtle or a bacterium and you can easily see that the number that can be killed per generation outnumber the actual population size by many orders of magnitude.Edited by Mr Jack, : subtitle

There's a really simple way to test your ideas: have viruses, within your lifetime, failed to demonstrate stasis? Viruses have mindboggling high error rates, and incredibly rapid generation times. If you're right, viruses should be fundamentally changing all around us.Don't like viruses? How about E. coli? They can rock through a generation every 20 minutes under ideal conditions. If you're right, why haven't they succumb to your weight of mutations?