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From: dubois@uwmacc.UUCP (Paul DuBois)
Newsgroups: net.origins
Subject: Snake Birds
Message-ID: <1058@uwmacc.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 10-May-85 15:13:13 EDT
Article-I.D.: uwmacc.1058
Posted: Fri May 10 15:13:13 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 12-May-85 02:08:26 EDT
Organization: UW-Madison Primate Center
Lines: 38


>> What is the difference
>> between God creating Adam, and a reptile giving birth to a bird?

> Nothing, since neither happened.
> Dan:
>    Thats not what the Punctuationists say. You better had read up on
>    the new evolutionary trend. Hopeful monsters is where its at, man!

The punctationalists do not say that a reptile gave birth to a bird.
This is, at best, a caricature of what they do say.  Goldschmidt
mentioned this as a possibility (I think) but not as a serious
suggestion.  Goldschmidt postulated systemic mutations which would
result in large-scale changes in an organism, but nothing like that of
a reptile giving birth to a bird.

Gould (punctuationalist par excellence) does not say this either.
What he *does* say is a bit difficult to determine, for reasons I've
already gone into before, but it seems to be more along the lines of
something in between what Goldschmidt proposed and the gradualism of
Darwin and his disciples.  I am not much taken with his rationale for
formulating the dividing line between what he proposes and what he calls
"fairy tales" (that is to say, changes of a magnitude larger than what
he proposes), but bird from reptile definitely crosses that line.

Creationists should abandon this slogan.  It's catchy, but it is not
in accord with the actual content of evolutionary theory.  Hence, due
to the inaccuracy, the evolutionist can simply allege the inaccuracy
and reject the whole of any argument in which the slogan is embedded.
As a result, any other point within that argument that may actually
have been valid fails to receive consideration.

-- 
                                                                    |
Paul DuBois     {allegra,ihnp4,seismo}!uwvax!uwmacc!dubois        --+--
                                                                    |
"The presence of weeds in the garden is not explained by            |
  saying that the gardener has not pulled them yet."