Re: 1980 Eldredge: "time to reexamine" theory of NS

david ford <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message news:<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>...
> On Mon, 1 Dec 2003, Tracy Hamilton wrote:
> david ford:
> 
> > > Eldredge, Niles.  July 1980.  "An Extravagance of Species"
> > > _Natural History_, 47-51.  Paragraphs from 48, 50, and 51:
> >
> > I agree that 1980 was a good time to re-examine the role of natural
> > selection.  What do *you* think the outcome was, since this has been
> > done?
> >
> > Please use your own words, as we have seen no evidence of any
> > understanding on your part.
> 
> Except for a few fervent believers such as Dawkins, those that have
> considered the major problems with the theory of natural selection have
> concluded that the theory cannot account for the _how_ of how the
> biological world developed in the course of the earth's 4.5 billion year
> existence, and have concluded that the theory does not find confirmation
> in the fossil record, particularly at those locations in the fossil record
> where we have particularly good and numerous specimens.  Materialists that
> have concluded that the theory of natural selection/ the neo-Darwinian
> mechanism cannot account for the biological world believe that a superior
> theory of a blindwatchmaking mechanism or cluster of blindwatchmaking
> mechanisms will eventually be discovered.

Frankly this is an inadequate response because it is ambiguous.
Please rewrite with these issues in mind:

How *can* (not is!) natural selection be confirmed by the fossil
record?
(what should be seen and *why* it follows from natural selection
and taphonomy) If it *can't* be, then not confirming it is a red
herring.  You certainly wouldn't want to use such a rhetorical device,
now would you?

Are there no gradual changes, or is there no *pattern* of gradual
change
(that is, gradual change everywhere).  

What are the major problems with natural selection?  If it is that NS
*alone* cannot explain all of evolution, that does not mean that
natural selection has been invalidated *in any manner* (in trouble, or
about to collapse, whatever).  This is precisely what 
Eldredge was talking about, and which you still seem unaware of.
Is it a major problem that a hammer can't be used as a saw, but that
both
are needed to build a house?

This lack of awareness is precisely why John Wilkins wants you define
what you mean by neo-Darwinism: if it is a theory that *only* has
natural selection as the mechanism, nobody thinks that.
Not even Dawkins.

Drop the blindwatchmaking as an adjective.  It is stupid.

To be fair, I will summarize Eldredge in MY words:

A common view [one could argue whether it was common or a 
caricature] is that evolution is gradual *constant* accumulation 
of small improvements driven by natural selection.  The fossil record
does not bear this out.  Rather than assume it is a fault of
the fossil record, examine the theoretical assumptions.  Natural
selection
is still valid, but not the driving force for *speciation*, when
genetic isolation occurs.  Once isolation occurs, there are two random
walks (with some selection, so not completely random) rather than one,
so they wind up at quite different destinations,
the further apart as time progresses.  This is what the record, both
fossil and genomic, shows.

Tracy P. Hamilton