evidence?

Equating P.E. with "hopeful monsters" is among the stupidest of creationist mistakes, one that could only be made by not reading anything by Gould and Eldredge, despite the presence of quotes by Gould and Eldredge intermingled with the stupid mistake.

It is an "un" official OFFicial line then. HOW do I know.
1)I KNEW herps BETTER than graduate students of the species' as a FRESHMAN
2)This information was NOT part of the allegations removing me from a program in Evolution ("offical" stuff ya know!!) and yet Robert Zappolarti who briefs the STATE OF NJ on environemental issues WANTED *****AND********A*S*K*ED ME, Brad McFall- for everything I knew about the creepy and crawly in Western NJ.
3)My Gradfather's PENMANSHIP IS telling. Willard F. Stanley TAUGHT evolution in NY from 1930s-1970s. HE DREW A LINE-... from worms though amphibians TO reptiles with SIDE brances for birds and mammals.
4)Calculus is requiste in higher education.
5)The argument with creationists SINCE the 60s has been about genetic continutiy trumping ANY non-linearity of HERITIBLITY
6)One NEED not inherit the tension of creation and evolution
7)There are correlations of "phenotypes" and "stratigraphy"
8)there is not common way to discuss "statistical significance" of amorphs vs a morphs
9)Horns are horns are horns
10)gradually coming to this understanding can be infintesimally continued
11)cause lost some of it's say when biometry split Mendelianism AWAY from MEdels' name.
12)modernism became post-modernism======>It is official. like it or not? Me - NOT!!The only issue is when to label something "official" or in gould's terms "within" The historians can only read back to 1930. I challenge every student of biological change to do better and read back to MENDEL. It is that easy. Dont turn the lights off when you are ready to sleep.

Do you want to know why I hate these creationists quotes? Because the article that this is from is about punctuated equilibrium, and how the fossil evidence doesn't support gradualism in most cases, it supports PEOf course it doesn't support gradualism, so the only alternative that religious adherents of evolution could devise to keep their theory from slipping into a watery grave was punctuated equilibrium.If I have very little logic on my side, then explain this to me . It should be a cinch for those who have resolved every issue through the evolutionary model. Why does fruit grow on trees?

It's a distribution mechanism. Animals eat the fruit and in doing so, carry the seeds away from the tree.The idea is that if the seeds fall straight down from the tree, then the parent tree's leaves prevent the saplings from getting light. Therefore it's advantageous for the tree to make sure it's offspring grow up far enough away from the parent so that they're not competing against each other.This is 1st grade biology stuff. How did you miss it the first time?

Gemster, again you display your lack of familiarity with the subject matter you're discussing. PE only appears at the lowest levels of evolution (and as a consequence is a more recently encountered phenomina); furthermore, PE is not a single big jump - it is an increase in the rate of gradual changes due to a change in selective factors.Let's put it in a form that you are capable of understanding. Picture that you're trying out to be a housekeeper. There are hundreds of applicants trying for the one job. Your potential boss gives everyone just one task for the entire night - make a bed. At first, you're making huge improvements. The sheets are getting straightened, the pillows are getting where they belong, etc. Eventually, you get to where you're working out wrinkles. Then picking out lint. Eventually, you're just making tiny adjustments to the bed. All of the sudden, the employer comes in and says "actually, now I need you to have that bed made upside down." Suddenly, you're completely changing everything again.This is the same thing in evolution. Niches become stable. Eventually, creatures in the niches reach an relative equilibrium, and rates of adaptation slow. However, no niche is permanent. Sometimes the changes are slow, such as steady desertification and flooding. In such cases, you'll see pure gradualism in the organisms living in such a niche. However in others, you may get a diverted river or a newly migrated predator completely change the niche. Suddenly, the rules are all different. The extinction rate suddenly becomes significant, and creatures now have completely different selective factors encouraging change.This isn't just speculation - we witness this in laboratories on everything from bacteria to fruit flies (it's hard to do population studies with anything much larger than fruit flies due to generation length). You have a culture growing in a petri dish, and it steadily slows its mutation rate. If you let it grow long enough, the rate of genetic change approaches nil. However, introduce one predator to your colony, and all of the sudden rates of genetic change skyrocket. The skyrocketted rate peaks, and then steadily slows down back into a gradualistic change environment.Occasionally there are "breakthroughs" that lead to PE, but that usually is not the case. Unfortunately, that's what creationists picture all of the time when they think of PE.------------------
"Illuminant light,
illuminate me."

So basically your argument is to
1) Deny the truth so you can call evolution a religion2) Misrepresent science3) Claim that if you don't understand why something evolved it is a logical argument against evolution.And you expect us all to put aside what we know and just believe what you say.OK if you expect us to believe you instead of the facts then explain WHY.

Hi Rei, What you are describing isn't PE, it's changes in the rate of evolution within a single lineage. To be PE, cladogenesis has to have occurred, a rate of change has to occur immediately after cladogenesis, followed by relative stasis. It doesn't help gemster, of course, since rate's of change of evolution has plenty of evidence in the fossil record, it's just that none of it can be attributed to a cladogenetic event. In fact, I would go as far to say that there is no evidence of PE at all, but lot's of evidence of phyletic rate changes.Mark------------------
"I can't prove creationism, but they can't prove evolution. It is [also] a religion, so it should not be taught....Christians took over the school board and voted in creationism. That can be done in any school district anywhere, and it ought to be done." Says Kent "consistent" Hovind in "Unmasking the False Religion of Evolution Chapter 6."

Where do you get that cladogenesis is required for PE? It can occur, but I fail to see that it is required. If a species is found only in one particular region in one particular niche, it won't branch should the niche change - it will either begin rapid evolution or die out. Perhaps cladogenesis might be the majority case since most species are not isolated to a single small geographical area, but again, I fail to see how it is a requirement.------------------
"Illuminant light,
illuminate me."[This message has been edited by Rei, 09-26-2003]

its essential (two sister groups) for VISUALZATION of scaling onto the geological horizon. Gould has made some claims bout how it looks under a long time scale but I would rather do away with binomialism by the form of the organisims themselves not some apriori less reliacne on a probable view of any "branch" under divergence. The punc is a split from anagenesis and clade is what surfaces even if one prefers some other way of looking at the geometry involved. Gould has done a VERY VERY VERY creative reading in the history of science to prevent someone from reading geometry the way Pascal intended but I think the science will proove Gould mistaken in the end.TO ANSWER YOUR QUESTION FULLY ONE WOULD NEED TO RELY ON CROIZAT'S CRITICISM OF NELSON TAKING ROSEN'S WORK ON CARIBEEAN FISH AND THE RESUTANT CLAIMS OF VICARIANCE BIOGEOGRAPHY UNDERGRIDED ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE POND f o r any ADAMS 1902 view (habitat)of a peneplain. Modern scientists are not giving proper historical credit. They also prohibt the giveing of credit to students unconsciously.[This message has been edited by Brad McFall, 09-26-2003]

quote:

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"If I have very little logic on my side, then explain this to me . It should be a cinch for those who have resolved every issue through the evolutionary model. Why does fruit grow on trees? "

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There's a better way to phrase this question. The better question is:"Why do trees grow fruit?"Answer:
Because trees reproduce.There's more that could be said, but I don't know why. Is there something about fruits that needs special explanation?Every so often I come across questions like this that utterly baffle me. Why are they asked? They're delivered as if they're devastating to mainstream science, but seem utterly benign to me. Usually, there's some fundamental misunderstanding of science or the facts of nature lurking underneath the surface. I'll see if Gemster can clarify the question.

Brad, this has been bugging me for a long time... so I'm just going to ask:http://www.funwithquotes.com/?c=zippyAre you the author of the Zippy quotes? ------------------
"Illuminant light,
illuminate me."

Nope,you came on towards EvC after I used to use the public terminals to post from. Now I have a connectin at home. It used to be that the real non-image stuff was only about adding the "quote" brace and "bold" braces at a command line. But you surpassed that with your creative avatar. What this has to do with this thread head I dont know. I work simply with letters, lines, and symbols. To some this may be primative but to others it is that I see the complex as simple. Go figure.

Rei, Gould & Eldredge hypothesise that most evolution occurs at, or shortly after speciation. There is a good discussion here.

quote:

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(A) Punctuated Equilibria postulates that speciation events comprise most of the evolutionary change seen in adaptation. This is a consequence of the inhibitory effects of gene flow, genetic homeostasis, and large population sizes (6 above). The adaptations of newly speciated daughter populations are forever excluded from the ancestral population because of reproductive isolation (2 above).

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Changes in the rate of phyletic evolution has been postulated by Mayr et al since the modern synthesis. The indicator that would distinguish PE over phyletic rate change is rapid evolution after cladogenesis, & evidence of this is entirely absent. The modern synthesists, after the dust has finally settled, are strongly supported by evidence, & Gould & Eldredge have none.All the problems PE was supposed to explain was already adequately done so decades before, as J. Levinton notes, "punctuated equilibrium is a theory in search of a problem."Mark------------------
"I can't prove creationism, but they can't prove evolution. It is [also] a religion, so it should not be taught....Christians took over the school board and voted in creationism. That can be done in any school district anywhere, and it ought to be done." Says Kent "consistent" Hovind in "Unmasking the False Religion of Evolution Chapter 6."[This message has been edited by mark24, 09-28-2003]

I still fail to see how that addresses the issue that I posed: why the requirement for cladogenesis? Why must there be a population remaining which isn't changing? Cladogenesis would only seem to be a requirement for a population which has a large geographical distribution. It would seem that the definition of PE that you are using is simply a subset of the one that I am familiar with.------------------
"Illuminant light,
illuminate me."

Rei, Because Gould & Eldredge invented the term, & they said so. Anything else just isn't punctuated equilibrium, it's a change of rate of phyletic evolution. It would appear your definition of PE is wrong. Gould & Eldredge clearly links cladogenesis to PE.Mark------------------
"I can't prove creationism, but they can't prove evolution. It is [also] a religion, so it should not be taught....Christians took over the school board and voted in creationism. That can be done in any school district anywhere, and it ought to be done." Says Kent "consistent" Hovind in "Unmasking the False Religion of Evolution Chapter 6."[This message has been edited by mark24, 09-28-2003]