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Considered by many during his lifetime as the most well-known
scientist in the world, Stephen Jay Gould left an enormous and
influential body of work. A Harvard professor of paleontology,
evolutionary biology, and the history of science, Gould provided
major insights into our understanding of the history of life. He
helped to reinvigorate paleontology, launch macroevolution on a new
course, and provide a context in which the biological developmental
stages of an organism's embryonic growth could be integrated into
an understanding of evolution. This book is a set of reflections on
the many areas of Gould's intellectual life by the people who knew
and understood him best: former students and prominent close
collaborators. Mostly a critical assessment of his legacy, the
chapters are not technical contributions but rather offer a
combination of intellectual bibliography, personal memoir, and
reflection on Gould's diverse scientific achievements. The work
includes the most complete bibliography of his writings to date and
offers a multi-dimensional view of Gould's life-work not to be
found in any other volume.
Although the species is one of the fundamental units of biological
classification, there is remarkably little consensus among
biologists about what defines a species, even within distinct
sub-disciplines. The literature of paleobiology, in particular, is
littered with qualifiers and cautions about applying the term to
the fossil record or equating such species with those recognized
among living organisms. In Species and Speciation in the Fossil
Record, experts in the field examine how they conceive of species
of fossil animals and consider the implications these different
approaches have for thinking about species in the context of
macroevolution. After outlining views of the Modern Synthesis of
evolutionary disciplines and detailing the development within
paleobiology of quantitative methods for documenting and analyzing
variation within fossil assemblages, contributors explore the
challenges of recognizing and defining species from fossil
specimens and offer potential solutions. Addressing both the tempo
and mode of speciation over time, they show how with careful
interpretation and a clear species concept, fossil species may be
sufficiently robust for meaningful paleobiological analyses.
Indeed, they demonstrate that the species concept, if more refined,
could unearth a wealth of information about the interplay between
species origins and extinctions, between local and global climate
change, and greatly deepen our understanding of the evolution of
life.
According to the idea of intelligent design, nature's complexity is
the result of deliberate planning by a supernatural creative force.
To date, most scientific arguments against this form of creationism
have been made by evolutionary biologists. In this volume, a team
of earth scientists reveals that the flaws of intelligent design
are not limited to the biological sciences. Indeed, the geological
sciences offer some of the best refutations of intelligent design
arguements. "For the Rock Record "is dedicated to the proposition
that the idea of intelligent design should be of serious concern to
everyone. Editors Jill S. Schneiderman and Warren D. Allmon have
gathered leading figures from the geological community with a wide
range of viewpoints that go to the heart of the debate over what is
and is not science. The purveyors of intelligent design theories
and its kindred philosophies threaten the scientific literacy that
our society needs by confusing faith and the practice of science.
This collection offers a much-needed response.
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