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An insider's provocative account of one of the most contentious
debates in science today When Niles Eldredge And Stephen
Jay Gould, two of the world's leading evolutionary theorists proposed a bold new
theory of evolution -- the theory of "punctuated equilibria" -- they
stood the standard interpretation of Darwin on its head. They also ignited a furious
debate about the true nature of evolution.
On the one side are the geneticists.
They contend that evolution proceeds slowly but surely, driven by competition
among organisms to transmit their genes from generation to generation. On the
other are the paleontologists, like Eldredge and Gould, who show in the fossil
record that in fact evolution proceeds only sporadically. Long periods of no change
-- equilibria -- are "punctuated" by episodes of rapid evolutionary
activity. According to the paleontologists, this pattern shows that evolution
is driven far more by environmental forces than by genetic competition.
How can the prevailing views on evolution be so different? In
Reinventing Darwin, Niles Eldredge offers a spirited account of the dispute
and an impressive case for the paleontologists' side of the story. With the mastery
that only a leading contributor to the debate can provide, he charts the course
of theory from Darwin's day to the present and explores the fundamental mysteries
and crucial questions that underlie the current quarrels. Is
evolution fired by a gentle and persistent motor and fueled by the survival instincts
of "selfish genes"? Or does it proceed in fits and starts, as the fossil
record seems to show? What is the role of environmental changes such as habitat
destruction and of cataclysmic events like meteor impacts? Are most species inherently
stable, changing only very little until they succumb to extinction? Or are species
highly adaptable, changing all the time? Eldredge sorts
through the major findings and interpretations and presents a lively introduction
to the leading edge of evolutionary theory today. Reinventing Darwin offers
a rare insider's view of the sometimes contentious, but always stimulating work
of scientific inquiry. Niles Eldredge is a curator
in the Department of Invertebrates at the American Museum of Natural History.
He is the coauthor with Stephen Jay Gould of the 1972 paper that proposed the
theory of punctuated equilibria, and the author of numerous popular science books,
including The Miner's Canary, a New York Times Book Review Notable
Book of the Year for 1992. |
