Re: Gould criticism and reviews

John Wilkins wrote:
John Harshman <jharshman.diespamdie@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

AC wrote:
On Thu, 28 Feb 2008 10:01:41 GMT, Tim Tyler <seemysig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
r norman wrote:

Gould was recognized by all as an important spokesperson for science
and scientific ideas, and especially for evolutionary ideas.
"Important" - in the sense that he made a lot of noise and created
a lot of confusion.
That's completely unfair. The people that "misunderstand" PE fall into two
categories; those who misunderstand and damned near every other aspect of
evolutionary theory and those who misrepresent it (and Gould) to further
their anti-science rhetoric.

I see absolutely no evidence that Gould created any confusion among those
who have some underlying understanding of evolution and biology. Just
because some snotty little Creationist comes along, invokes a strawman of
PE doesn't mean its Gould's fault.

It's not the creationists being talked about here, but various evolutionary biologists such as John Maynard Smith. I'm an evolutionary
biologist, and I think that Gould's PE did create some confusion. He managed to cause confusion about the meaning of "gradual", and about time scales of evolution, and about what species and speciation are. Largely this is because he was a bit confused himself.

Mind you, he made important contributions to biology. PE just wasn't one
of them.

I'm unsure about that. Sometimes just raising a controversial topic is a
contribution to the progress of the science. Anyway, Eldredge is the
more theoretical of the two (and Lewontin, who one cannot call confused,
even moreso).

I will go so far as to say that the PE controversy promoted greater investigation of variation in rates of morphological evolution and in stasis. For some reason, I have missed Lewontin's contribution to PE entirely. What publications were you thinking of?

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Gould criticism and reviews
    ... The people that "misunderstand" PE fall into two ... I see absolutely no evidence that Gould created any confusion among those ... time scales of evolution, and about what species and speciation are. ... he made important contributions to biology. ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: In the News: Sam Brownback clarifies his position (NYT)
    ... If belief in evolution means simply assenting to microevolution, ... confusion. ... that are simply not the responsibility of science to address. ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: In the News: Sam Brownback clarifies his position (NYT)
    ... If belief in evolution means simply assenting to microevolution, ... confusion. ... that are simply not the responsibility of science to address. ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: Gould criticism and reviews
    ... I see absolutely no evidence that Gould created any confusion among those ... He managed to cause confusion about the meaning of "gradual", and about time scales of evolution, and about what species and speciation are. ... he made important contributions to biology. ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: Gould criticism and reviews
    ... I see absolutely no evidence that Gould created any confusion among those ... time scales of evolution, and about what species and speciation are. ... he made important contributions to biology. ...
    (talk.origins)