Stark raving mad...

Notice the usual mispelling of Niles Eldredge's name in the Dr. Stark's article.

Why does he have to have that disclaimer at the start of his article claiming some sort of neutrality? One would think a neutral professor would have read works from both sides. One would hope he would flunk students for doing what he has done.

The article is about as bad as the stuff by Kent Hovind.

--
Anti-spam: replace "usenet" with "harlequin2"

This is shocking and quite tragic. Rodney Stark is an eminent sociologist, and should stick to what he knows. Quite a few points in my master thesis (history, sociology) was based on his work :(

One ought to mention here that even had he got the Linnaean ranks correct, they are artificial anyway. Even Linnaeus said so. In fact Linnaeus thought that variation was continuous across the biological world, as any Great Chain of Being theorist would have. Natura non facit saltum...

Just another example of not knowing the difference between science and rationalizing. I suspect it's not dishonesty, but ignorance. Ignorance can be highly effective with an appropriate audience.

If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and walks like a duck then it must be a platypus.

According to Steven Stanley, another distinguished evolutionist, doubts raised by the fossil record were "suppressed" for years.

— Rodney Stark

The actual 'surpression' was due to, "the crystallization of Darwinian gradualism and the accompanying misguided attack upon the quality of the fossil record [which] sent paleontology into a major decline." (Stanley 1981, p. 109). It was the thought that the fossil record could not provide detailed information which led to a decline in the input of paleontology into evolution theory - that was the 'supression'. There was no actual conspiracy.

Not being religious is similar to any other shortsighted, risky and impulsive behavior that some men -- primarily young males -- engage in, such as assault, robbery, burglary, murder and rape."

I write as neither a creationist nor a Darwinist, but as one who knows what is probably the most disreputable scientific secret of the past century:

Today, the fossil record is enormous compared to what it was in Darwin's day, but the facts are unchanged. The links are still missing; species appear suddenly and then remain relatively unchanged. As Steven Stanley reported: "The known fossil record...offers no evidence that the gradualistic model can be valid."

— Stark

"Some distinctive living species clearly originated in the very recent past, during brief instants of geologic time. Thus, quantum speciation is a real phenomenon. chapters 4 through 6 provide evidence for the great importance of quantum speciation in macroevolution (for the validity of the punctuational model). Less conclusive evidence is as follows:...(5)The known fossil record fails to document a single example of phyletic evolution accomplishing a major morphologic transition and hence offers no evidence that the gradualistic model can be valid. Evaluations of overall genetic distance, which ignore the fact that large evolutionary steps result from a very small number of regulatory genetic changes, have little bearing on the distribution of morphologic changes within phylogeny." [Steven M. Stanley, Macroevolution: Pattern and Process, W. H. Freeman and Co., New York, 1979, p. 39]

"This test is labeled the test of adaptive radiation because its conclusion is that during a typical adaptive radiation, major evolutionary transitions have occurred during geological intervals that have been brief relative to intervals over which species produced during the radiation have survived almost without change. Established species are evolving so slowly that major transitions between genera and higher taxa must be occurring within small, rapidly evolving populations that leave no legible fossil record. In the present contribution I will describe new evidence that strengthens the verdict of the test of adaptive radiation in favor of the punctuational model." [Steven M. Stanley, "Macroevolution and the Fossil Record", Evolution, Vol. 36, No. 3, 1982, p. 460]

"Many of the discontinuities [in the fossil record] tend to be more and more emphasized with increased collecting," noted the former curator of historical geology at the American Museum of Natural History.

— stark

". . . experience shows that the gaps which separate the highest categories may never be bridged in the fossil record. Many of the discontinuities tend to be more and more emphasized with increased collecting.

Writing in Nature in 1999, Eörs Szathmay summarizes that, "The origin of species has long fascinated biologists. Although Darwin's major work bears it as a title, it does not provide a solution to the problem."

— Stark

It is true that in getting to these nuggets, needs to show patience with mannerisms that can easily annoy. Topics get introduced with tightly compressed summaries of earlier scholarship that end with ritually brusque dismissals: "All false": "Not so!"; "Nonsense and outright fabrication." Further, in Stark's prickly reckonings, indictments rain on liberals and secularists, while religious conservatives routinely walk free. Along with Freudians, Marxists and advocates of political correctness, the index of the highly disfavored includes all rationalists who lived in, or now admire, the age of Enlightenment, all scholars with biases too pro-Protestant and progressive or prejudices too anti-Catholic, all secular humanists, theological liberals, moral relativists, scientific atheists, confident Darwinians and sundry similar voices among religion's cultured despisers. It is, to say the least, odd that an author so alert to the partisan motives of others should extend a different courtesy to himself, curtly announcing from the outset that "my personal religious views are of concern only to me." Irritations aside, this study offers much that followers of the Christian story in both the academy and the churches can draw upon with real profit, so long as they also read with critical eves. To summarize things in theological terms, there may be only one Professor Stark, but he appears to exist in three persons: the sociologist who resigned on principle at the start of the project; the comparative religionist who signed on but then declined to compare; and the church historian who conscientiously shouldered most of the work. All credit then to the historian, who works hard and well to discern the Christian soul of the cultural West--and mostly succeeds in finding it.

— Daniel L. Pals

Stark correctly notes on page 176 that the historic "battle over evolution is not an example of how 'heroic' scientists have withstood the relentless persecution of religious 'fanatics.' Rather, from the very start it has been primarily an attack on religion by militant atheists who wrap themselves in the mantle of science in an effort to refute all religious claims concerning a Creator - an effort that has also often attempted to suppress all scientific criticism of Darwin's work"

There's so much info, I think the Fox News / WorldNutDaily crowd will probably succeed in not only convincing their followers that 'real' science comports with the bible, evolution's wrong, global warming's wrong, the earth is young, etc, but doing so with so much misused info that talking sense into them will be impossible. For the most part, we've seen attacks against science at the public school and school-board level, but biologists like PZ should probably expect to see more comprehensive movements which seek to influence your university curricula soon, as a result of this.

In Europe, the field of sociology has great prestige and continues to attract high quality researchers and theorists. Alas, American sociology, like American journalism, is for the most part an affirmative action program for the lazy, inept, and shallow.

I fear that this book has been deliberately pitched at those who would dearly like to believe that the unifying thread through European and North American progress toward modernity has been and remains an explicitly Christian set of beliefs. I base this conclusion on a section that Stark tucks into the discussion of the emergence of science and which is headed "Evolution and Religion." Here he argues with characteristic directness that the hostility of Christianity to evolutionary theory derives from shortcomings within that theory, rather than from any more general difficulty the church may have had historically with science. Darwinism, he maintains, is not actually a theory at all but rather a set of surmises. Problems with evolutionary theory have been "hushed up." A recent survey of biologists found that 45 percent "acknowledged that the process of evolution is guided by God." In spite of his many disclaimers, stressing the even-handedness and sociological rigor of his approach, Stark appears here himself to adopt the skeptical position of the creationists.

Stark claims that, "There is no plausible scientific theory of the origin of species!"

Obviously, that is the crux of his argument whether he is able to support it or not. The question seems to be batted about in the Creationist/Evo arguments but I can't recall ever seeing it addressed in a definitive manner.

If a layman (such as myself) were to ask what *is* the most plausible scientific theory of the origin of species what would be the answer. Gradualism? PE? Is there a dominant theory? Many plausible explanations?

Perhaps shedding some light on that matter would help clear up the confusion.

Once two groups get reproductively isolated, their gene pools will start to drift apart. At some point they no longer could reproduce fertile offspring between the groups.

Biologists have seen several speciations. Looks like they've just seen another.

http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2004/802/3

Hi Joe,

There are probably several equally plausible answers to that question. How do you define species?

***There are probably several equally plausible answers to that question. How do you define species?***

That's a good question. I don't know. I assumed that there was a rather standard definition.

I think most people who aren't that knowledgeable about the subject are curious about the variation in morphological body types. I can grasp, at least on the theoretical level, how the process could work between similar species (i.e., gene pool drift) but I hear different things when the body types vary. For example, Dawkins proposes a gradualism (the climb up Mt. Improbable). But I had always thought that Gould put an end to that sort of theory.

I'm a "creationist" in the broad sense of the term. I believe that ultimately, whatever process occurred, God is responsible. So I'm open to giving a hearing to a range of ideas and don't have a particular bias against any particular view. But as soon as I think I have a handle on what the basic consensus is on the origin of species, I find that either the terms have changed (i.e., the old school definition of species) or the theories appear to conflict (i.e., PE vs. gradualism).

What theory gives a general enough overview that you could say, "This is the basic consensus" and the scientific community would nod their head in agreement?

To you too I will recommend Ernest Mayr's What Evolution Is as a good starting point for learning the basics of the theory.

One ought to mention here that even had he got the Linnaean ranks correct, they are artificial anyway. Even Linnaeus said so. In fact Linnaeus thought that variation was continuous across the biological world, as any Great Chain of Being theorist would have. Natura non facit saltum . . .

Thus it was that from the end of the 16th century to the end of the 18th century, the project of distributing all living beings, animal or vegetable, into a hierarchy of collective units enclosed one within another, gained such a hold upon naturalists, that it finally seemed to them the formulation of their scientific task. Lovejoy A.O. (1961) "The Great Chain of Being" Harvatd University Press pg 228

What we call branches express, in fact, a purely ideal connection between animals, the intellectual conception which unites them in creative thought. It seems to me that the more we examine the true significance of this kind of group, the more we shall be convinced that they are not founded upon material relations. Louis Agassiz (1857) "Essay on Classification" reprinted 1962 Harvard University Press pg 147

Joe,

The most popular species defintion is the "biological species" concept developed by Ernst Mayr. This defines a species as one or more interbreeding or potentially interbreeding populations. If two populations cannot interbreed, and if there are no intermediate populations through which their genes can flow, then they are considered separate species. There are problems with the biological species concept, because reproductive isolation is often ambiguous, and there are serious practical limitations in applying it. (For example, it doesn't apply to asexual species.) But it's still the most commonly used definition because for evolutionary purposes, it gives us a way to assess when speciation has occured. When two gene pools become permanently isolated, such that they can never again share genes, then they will from that point forward tend to drift further and further apart. Hence, reproductive isolation is the definitive point at which two populations begin to diverge.

The question then becomes how reproductive barriers get set up in the first place. There are many recognized reproductive barriers, which can be genetic, morphological, or behavioral. All of these traits are known to vary within populations, so it's a matter of individuals (or subpopulations) within a larger population changing to the point at which they can no longer interbreed with the larger population. This can be caused by something as simple as a small shift in the mating season, a minor change in breeding colors, or a slight alteration to a receptor protein in a gamete. These things change all the time due to drift, but the question is, how does a subpopulation become distinct when it's constantly sharing genes with the larger population? Normally, hybridization will smear out distinctiveness.

The most widely accepted answer is that small populations become geographically isolated from larger ones. This geographical isolation prevents a small population from hybridizing with the larger one, so it's able to change over time along its own distinct path. This change may be due to drift, selection, or a combination of the two (people argue about which is more important). And it may be given a kick-start by the founder effect or by a bottleneck event. But either way, after sufficient time has passed, the isolated populations will have changed to the point at which they can no longer interbreed. And at that point, they are considered separate species, even if their geographical ranges once again begin to overlap. This process is known as allopatric speciation.

It gets a lot more complicated than that (and I'm certainly no expert), but that should give you plenty to think about for now.

The most popular species defintion is the "biological species" concept developed by Ernst Mayr. This defines a species as one or more interbreeding or potentially interbreeding populations. If two populations cannot interbreed, and if there are no intermediate populations through which their genes can flow, then they are considered separate species.

Catching Fish Evolving Aug 2, 2004 "Science Now" The myriad of colorful cichlid fishes of the African Great Lakes is a classic example of explosive evolution, with thousands of species having appeared in the geological equivalent of a blink of an eye. Now, in a paper in this month's issue of Molecular Ecology, biologists report a close-up look at one spark in that burst of evolution. Lake Malawi, shared by Malawi, Mozambique, and Tanzania, is home to at least 500 species of cichlids, all of which probably took less than a million years to evolve from a common ancestor. Still, evolutionary biologist J. Todd Streelman of the University of New Hampshire, Durham, and his colleagues were not prepared for the speed of evolution they discovered at the lake's Thumbi West Island. Here, at a 100-meter-long promontory called Mitande Point, a fish dealer in the 1960s released Cynotilapia afra, a species restricted to the other end of Lake Malawi. Twenty years later, the fish hadn't ventured beyond Mitande Point. But in 2001, when the team dipped nets into the water at six spots along the island's 5-km-long coastline, the scientists found that it had spread everywhere. At each station, they netted some 40 individuals and recorded the color pattern for each. They also took a so-called microsatellite DNA fingerprint. As it turned out, C. afra had evolved into two distinct varieties in less than 20 years. The ones along the northern coast of the island had developed about four vertical blue bars on the black dorsal fin, whereas the ones along the southern coast had only two or three. (The original stock had no blue bars on the dorsal fin.) Also, DNA fingerprints of fish from the north coast sites were significantly different from those of fish in the south, making it likely that the two are well on their way toward becoming separate species. Fish evolution this hasty has been recorded so far only in salmon and sticklebacks. "We were not expecting [this]," Streelman says. Evolutionary ecologist Jacques van Alphen of Leiden University in the Netherlands is amazed at the speed with which C. afra has split in two. "It's a very nice finding," he says. But he hopes the researchers will continue their work to find out what is different about the two sides of the island to have caused the two forms to evolve.

Biologists have seen several speciations. Looks like they've just seen another.

The claim is that speciation has clearly begun, but not yet culminated. If my words were imperfect, people can always read the article. That's why I posted a link.

In some of the previous known examples of speciation, the beginning and end states are known, but the transitional data is unknown. Why I posted the article is, this is a great example where speciation is probably underway, and frequent data taken yearly for the next decade or two can show us genetic snapshots of a speciation event. How cool is that. Darwin would be drooling for that data.

Creationists in 2024 are going to have a bitch of a time arguing against that data, in between promoting whatever Capitalized Pseudoscientific Concept will come after IC and the EF and CSI and etc.

Not to mention the two NFLs. No Free Lunch and Nelson's FLaw.

It just made me wonder again what evolutionists mean when they use the terms "species" and "variety", which basically end up being whatever you think they mean.

— Charlie Wagner

Joe'

Lions and tigers are cross-fertile, though matings between the two occur only in captivity - the only place their ranges overlap any more is in India. I believe the offspring is usually fertile.

Horses and donkeys are cross-fertile, though the resulting mules are almost always sterile. Occasionally, I believe, there is a fertile female mule born. I think horses and zebras are also cross-fertile.

Domestic dogs, grey and red wolves, coyotes, foxes and jackals are all cross-fertile, and I think the offspring is almost always fertile.

I tend to think that the degree of fertility of offspring would have something to do with how long ago the isolation began.

Actually, not so amazing, given that you're stone deaf, but irritating nonetheless.

You're right, Charlie - it kinda does.

I was reminded of the Star Trek episode "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" where Frank Gorshin plays Commisioner Bele, whose body is white on one side and black on the other. He is trying to defeat Lokai.

Bob Maurus - You are quiet right about the cross breeding in all those animals.

Mules are normally sterile but it has been known for thousands of years that sometimes they are fertile. Hence the term "When a mule foals" which comes from the ancient Roman saying "Cum mula peperit"

These events are convergent. Given the right situation you could get a fertile hybrid species between horses and donkeys or horses and zebra and a donkey and zebra can also produce offspring.

Donkeys have 62 chromosomes while horses have 64 and most mules 63 while Zebra's can have 46, 44 or 32 chromosomes depending on the type. It is this chromosome difference that normally makes the offspring not fertile. Funny enough interbreeding between some types of zebras is very difficult.

I find it interesting that this well known situation is so easily ignored. When faced with evolution issues creationist want to see a monkey pop out a baby human. That isn't evolution. A parent doesn't give birth to a child that is drastically different. In most cases the offspring are completely compatible with the parents type/breed. Given enough time we see just what we see in the equids.

For a little bit of info on http://www.intl-pag.org/5/abstracts/p-5n-318.htmlchromosome evolution in equids

I've also heard from creationist, as an explanation of some of the logistic problems with Noah's ark that all equids came from a single equid pair on the ark. So there they seem to say evolution is ok but clearly a horse is a horse and a donkey is a donkey and a zebra is a zebra but they all came from a "common ancestor". They have a hard time realizing that in the future the types of equids will have diverged enough that interbreeding is no longer viable. Zebra types are almost to that point already with mountain zebras and plains zebras mating often ending in still birth.

For the vast majority of people that have never done any taxonomic work (which includes most biologists), the notion of "species" is actually less obvious than you suppose. Even just a few months keying out plants on a hillside will teach you that there is significant variation within a species. Spend a year on freshwater snails, or read a few thousand pages on ostracods and I think that you will at least have an idea about how to use the notion of species. This is in large part the motivation of Darwin's work on barnacles.

Or, just read Mayr. There is a good web article on species written by ERNST MAYR "What is a Species, and What is Not?".

If the chemists can work with at least three definitions of acids, biologists can operate with several different kinds of species.

One of the unspoken assumptions of creationism is the belief, shared by almost all undergraduates, that the world is obligated to be easy to understand. It isn't.

If anyone's interested in a critical assessment of Stark's sociological work, there's this article by Steve Bruce of Aberdeen University. Stark has a habit of putting ideology before the evidence:

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0SOR/is_2_62/ai_76759008

"If the chemists can work with at least three definitions of acids, biologists can operate with several different kinds of species. "

Very good point.

I reread the Stark article, and it occurs that this is a real help aginst the anti-science crowd. One of the major smokescreens employed by the IDiots has been that they are not "banjo twanging creationists." Stark's evidences put them right up there on the porch swing.

FYI-Joe Carter is discussing and challenging Ed and Steve by name on
http://www.evangelicaloutpost.com/

If anyone is interested.

***FYI-Joe Carter is discussing and challenging Ed and Steve by name on
http://www.evangelicaloutpost.com/ . . . ***

"Challenging them by name?" Come on, DS.

Here is what I wrote about Ed and Steve:

"As you might expect, not everyone agrees. Ed Brayton calls it "a delightfully ridiculous little article" and Steve Reuland says it "proves that there really is no rock-bottom when it comes to anti-evolutionist diatribes."

Don't you think you are being a bit misleading?

***FYI-Joe Carter is discussing and challenging Ed and Steve by name on
http://www.evangelicaloutpost.com/ . . . ***

Challenging them by name? Come on, DS. Don't you think you are being a bit misleading?

Here is what I wrote about Ed and Steve:

"As you might expect, not everyone agrees. Ed Brayton calls it "a delightfully ridiculous little article" and Steve Reuland says it "proves that there really is no rock-bottom when it comes to anti-evolutionist diatribes."

I've been following these types of arguments for almost twenty years now without coming closer to understanding which side is right.

I've been following these types of arguments for almost twenty years now without coming closer to understanding which side is right.

So let's be brave about this and admit (gasp!) the horrible truth. No one alive today has a shred of credible evidence to support either of these two paradigms. And I defy anyone to prove otherwise.

— Charlie

I also just wanted to mention that today is the 11th anniversary of the day my life changed. I'm happy to report that I'm still alive and still being a pain in the ass...

August 4, 1993

It was around 6:00 p.m. on a hot and humid day, as you might
expect in August on Long Island. We had just finished dinner and were
sitting around listlessly. Someone decided it might be a good idea to go
to the beach to cool off. We got our sand chairs and a few other items
and threw them in the car and took off for Jones Beach.
When we arrived, the tide was going out, so we set up our beach
chairs near the high tide mark. There were people all up and down the
beach, just like us. I took off my shoes and opened the newspaper and
Gail took out a book. We were there for about 10 minutes and I was
beginning to feel relaxed. But I was suddenly filled with a sense that
something was not right. I looked over the top of the paper I was
holding and in front of my eyes, there was a wall of black water. I
tried to jump out of the way but it came upon us too fast. It smashed
into our bodies and knocked us to the sand. Our clothes were drenched,
my glasses were broken and the beach chairs were crushed.
Dazed and confused, we emerged from the chaos, trying to figure
out what had happened. We looked around us, up the beach and down the
beach, hopefully to draw sympathy from those similarly affected. What we
did see, was unbelievable. Not one other person on either side of us had
been affected by the wave. They were looking at us in amazement,
wondering, as we were, what this was all about. It was like a hand had
reached out from the sea and struck us intentionally and specifically.
Gail looked at me and said jokingly "I wonder what we did wrong?". But
the sense that something was not right was still with me. I turned to
Gail and said "let's just get out of here."
It was business as usual at the Wagner household at 10:30 p.m.
Gail and I were getting ready to go to bed and the kids were getting
ready to go out. We always used to joke about that; if the kids were
going out, it must be time for bed. Leslie was 18 and Carrie was 17 and
they usually got a late start. They weren't going anywhere in
particular, just around with their friends. Neither of them had a car,
so it was "shoeleather express" unless they could get a ride from
someone. They had a 1:00 a.m. curfew and they were almost always late,
sometimes offering an obligatory "sorry!" but most times, we didn't
bother making an issue. That was always the worst time for me, the
minutes between when they were supposed to be home and when they
actually arrived. Normally, I would lie in bed, waiting for the sound of
the door before falling asleep. Gail would always fall asleep and kid me
about being such a worrier. This particular night, however, I went right
to sleep.
The phone was on my side of the bed, and when it rang at 12:45
a.m., I picked it up on the 2nd ring. It was Paula, one of the local
kids. She asked me if anyone had called me. I said "no, why would
anyone call me"? And then I heard the words that I had hoped I would
never hear in my life. "There's been an accident." I turned to Gail and
she was awake. She looked at me and said "I know, I heard it." We both
jumped up and threw on some clothes and jumped into the car.
Not a word was spoken between us. I raced down the block and
around the corner onto Stewart Avenue. When I got to the corner, the
light was red, but ahead of me on the other side of the intersection I
could see the flashing red lights and the police cars. The rear end of a
blue firebird was wrapped almost completely around a tree on the corner
of Grand Blvd. I knew that car, it was always parked across the street
from my house. It belonged to the kid that lived across the street. I
stopped and we both jumped out and ran up to the car. People tried to
stop us, I don't know why. I guess it's instinctive and comes from
watching too much TV. When I got to the side of the car, Leslie and Gene
were sitting in the front seat. Both appeared dazed, but were conscious.
I looked for Carrie, but she wasn't there. I asked Leslie where she was,
but she didn't answer me. I asked her if she was hurt and she just shook
her head. I was relieved that she appeared to be alive and not seriously
hurt, and I turned to one of the onlookers and asked them if any of them
had seen Carrie. I was assuming that she had gone with someone else, or
perhaps was already home. The lady that lived in the house gave me the
word. They had just taken her away in the ambulance.
I got into the car and drove as fast as I could towards the
hospital. Further on up the road I could soon see the ambulance ahead of
us. Eventually we caught up with it and I remember wondering why their
sirens and lights were off. And why they were going so slow. The
ambulance pulled into the ER and I was right behind. I rushed from my
car and as they were opening the doors, I could see Carrie lying there
on the stretcher. It suddenly occurred to me why they were driving so
slowly. I was certain she was dead.
A lot has happened in the 10 years that have passed since that
night. Carrie has spent many months in hospitals and has had almost a
dozen surgeries. And every August 4th, I can't help remembering.
Someone drove me home that day and I walked into my empty house and I
went into the library and sat down in front of the computer. I posted my
first message on the compuserve bulletin board. For no other reason
than to keep from going insane. I've been at it pretty much continuously
for ten years. It seems to me like it's time to move on.
Carrie got married yesterday. Almost exactly 10 years to the day
after the accident. I don't know what the future holds for her or me.
But we've reached this point and it's time to turn the page. What this
means exactly, I don't know either. I haven't been back to Jones Beach
in the past 10 years. But tonight I think Gail and I will pack up our
car and take a ride there. And we'll set up our sand chairs at the high
tide line and open our books and newspapers and wait. To see what happens.

"So, we must analyze why the debate goes on." -Charlie Wagner

The debate goes on because one side has huge non-scientific interests in keeping it going. Same reason shrewd and determined lawyers can be found to defend the proposition that O.J. didn't kill his wife. It pays. Literally.

The debate goes on because one side has huge non-scientific interests in keeping it going.

I have been involved with this debate for nearly 40 years.... Nothing really new is ever offered because there is nothing new.

— Charlie Wagner

It is a battle between two competing ideologies and has little or nothing to do with science.

While evolutionary issues are frequently debated inside legitimate science, the reality of evolution hasn't been in question since around 1900. There is no battle over evolution inside the sciences. That war has been over since Victoria was queen of England.

Meanwhile, the question at issue in the noisy squabbles on this thread has nothing to do with biology, which has long since moved on. It is a political and sociological question about whether people have to believe something they don't want to believe just because it happens to be true. The smart money is on the continuing viabiilty of denial.

Charlie,

Thanks for #6056 - you're an alright guy when you're not "being a pain in the ass." Congratulations and best wishes for the future to Carrie, and to you.

Charlie, is it really your belief that nothing new has come about in evolutionary biology and related fields in 40 years?

Have I missed something?

I should say so. The merging of evolution with ecology, which took place in the '70s, including the elucidation of kin selection; the merging of genomics with evolutionary theory, incuding the discovery of transposable elements, microsattelites, retroposons, etc; Gilbert's discovery of introns and exons, Ohno's hypothesis of gene duplication, palindromic gene conversion, just about everything else about molecular biology; not to mention some important fossils dug up since then, like feathered dinosaurs, whales with legs, and Lucy. Oh yeah, and a couple of people came up with a hotly debated theory that speciation does not occur gradually.

If you don't think much has changed since 1964, then I suggest you're not in much of a position to criticize evolutionary theory. Perhaps it's because you're fixated on creationism, which only changes in a reactionary sort of way.

Charlie, you're completely full of shit.

;-) (of course "Brownsville Girl" is the only really good thing on this album.)

GWW,

"Strange how people who suffer together have stronger connections than people who are most content.
I don't have any regrets, they can talk about me plenty when I'm gone.
You always said people don't do what they believe in, they just do what's most convenient, then they repent.
And I always said, "Hang on to me, baby, and let's hope that the roof stays on."

It is a battle between two competing ideologies and has little or nothing to do with science. And it's been going on for hundreds of years.

— Charlie Wagner

If you don't think much has changed since 1964, then I suggest you're not in much of a position to criticize evolutionary theory.

— Steve Reuland

Jim Harrison commented in #6037

"One of the unspoken assumptions of creationism is the belief, shared by almost all undergraduates, that the world is obligated to be easy to understand. It isn't."

Some bits are easy though. Leave all talk about species to the twitchers, the splitters and the lumpers.

If this is any sort of pub we should be setting the world to rights.

Since neither side can agree on their own consistent definitions of species or kind as the case may be, we have an opportunity. Deem the creationists' kind and the biologists' clade to be equivalent, and identical, since nobody will know the difference. Everybody can agree* chimps can't evolve into h. sap and that all of us reading this are kindred deuterostomes** apart from archie the cockroach and possibly one or two others.

So that's that. Only material difference is over the extent to which God*** may have tinkered with our genes along the way. Well, who's ever going to know in this life. Re-label ID "punctuated creation" so we all know what's what, and I'm sure we can all get along. Another round of drinks before we go home.

* and unite against the evil spectre of Margulian miscegenation destroying the integrity of nested hierarchies and family life.

** even the jellies. Hey it's not as though great-aunt Salp is near kin, that we should take on so.

*** that is, not some cr*ppy sub-contractor designer. One God, the Book says.

Pity about Kansas though, pity indeed for the USA, because a few fundamentalists' wordly-wise ambition combined with their evident hatred of science is a very thick wedge. Are you going through a crisis of confidence over there, an echo of the closure of the gate of ijtihad? Ironic, and spooky, if the USA were to lose its pre-eminence in the present century for the same reasons (according to some) as the Arabs lost theirs in the middle ages.

ARCHAEOPTERYX IS A BIRD, GOSH DARN IT!!

Nature 430, 666 - 669 (05 August 2004);

The avian nature of the brain and inner ear of Archaeopteryx

PATRICIO DOMÍNGUEZ ALONSO1, ANGELA C. MILNER2, RICHARD A. KETCHAM3, M. JOHN COOKSON5 & TIMOTHY B. ROWE4

1 Departamento de Paleontologia, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Ciudad Universitaría, 28040 Madrid, Spain
2 Department of Palaeontology, The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD, UK
3 High-resolution X-ray CT Facility,
4 Department of Geological Sciences, 1 University Station C1110, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas 78712, USA
5 University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, Herts AL10 9AB, UK

Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to A.C.M. (A.Milner@nhm.ac.uk).

Archaeopteryx, the earliest known flying bird (avialan) from the Late Jurassic period, exhibits many shared primitive characters with more basal coelurosaurian dinosaurs (the clade including all theropods more bird-like than Allosaurus), such as teeth, a long bony tail and pinnate feathers. However, Archaeopteryx possessed asymmetrical flight feathers on its wings and tail, together with a wing feather arrangement shared with modern birds. This suggests some degree of powered flight capability but, until now, little was understood about the extent to which its brain and special senses were adapted for flight. We investigated this problem by computed tomography scanning and three-dimensional reconstruction of the braincase of the London specimen of Archaeopteryx. Here we show the reconstruction of the braincase from which we derived endocasts of the brain and inner ear. These suggest that Archaeopteryx closely resembled modern birds in the dominance of the sense of vision and in the possession of expanded auditory and spatial sensory perception in the ear. We conclude that Archaeopteryx had acquired the derived neurological and structural adaptations necessary for flight. An enlarged forebrain suggests that it had also developed enhanced somatosensory integration with these special senses demanded by a lifestyle involving flying ability.

ARCHAEOPTERYX IS A BIRD, GOSH DARN IT!!

Nature 430, 666 - 669 (05 August 2004); doi:10.1038/nature02706

The avian nature of the brain and inner ear of Archaeopteryx

PATRICIO DOMÍNGUEZ ALONSO1, ANGELA C. MILNER2, RICHARD A. KETCHAM3, M. JOHN COOKSON5 & TIMOTHY B. ROWE4

1 Departamento de Paleontologia, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Ciudad Universitaría, 28040 Madrid, Spain
2 Department of Palaeontology, The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD, UK
3 High-resolution X-ray CT Facility,
4 Department of Geological Sciences, 1 University Station C1110, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas 78712, USA
5 University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, Herts AL10 9AB, UK

Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to A.C.M. (A.Milner@nhm.ac.uk).

Archaeopteryx, the earliest known flying bird (avialan) from the Late Jurassic period, exhibits many shared primitive characters with more basal coelurosaurian dinosaurs (the clade including all theropods more bird-like than Allosaurus), such as teeth, a long bony tail and pinnate feathers. However, Archaeopteryx possessed asymmetrical flight feathers on its wings and tail, together with a wing feather arrangement shared with modern birds. This suggests some degree of powered flight capability but, until now, little was understood about the extent to which its brain and special senses were adapted for flight. We investigated this problem by computed tomography scanning and three-dimensional reconstruction of the braincase of the London specimen of Archaeopteryx. Here we show the reconstruction of the braincase from which we derived endocasts of the brain and inner ear. These suggest that Archaeopteryx closely resembled modern birds in the dominance of the sense of vision and in the possession of expanded auditory and spatial sensory perception in the ear. We conclude that Archaeopteryx had acquired the derived neurological and structural adaptations necessary for flight. An enlarged forebrain suggests that it had also developed enhanced somatosensory integration with these special senses demanded by a lifestyle involving flying ability.

Yawn, once again Charlie seems to have missed the point. 'Many shared primitive characters with more basal dinosaurs.

Sigh. And why post it twice... Do you think it would increase the level of your understanding?

Yawn, once again Charlie seems to have missed the point. 'Many shared primitive characters with more basal dinosaurs. Sigh. And why post it twice . . . Do you think it would increase the level of your understanding?

Question for Charlie - suppose we could look back at the biological ancestors of Archaeopteryx - its figurative parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, etc. Were they all "ever-loving, flying around with feathers, gosh darn BIRD!!"?

If so, where did the first one of those come from, and when?