(Please note my change of address from sjones@iinet.net.au to
sejones@ibm.net. I was having too many problems with my ISP, so I
have changed. I still will keep the old iinet account open for
another month or so)
In a private discussion with a Reflectorite, I wrote:
The real issue concerns the higher taxa (the Biblical "kinds" eg. Gn
1:11). Even Darwinists are divided on how this came about. The
classic Neo- Darwinists claim that small-scale change
(micro-evolution, eg. Peppered Moth wing colour changes) is
essentially the same tiny step by tiny step mechanism as large-scale
change (macro-evolution, eg. reptiles into birds). But Punctuated
Equilibria proponents like Gould claim that the major taxa arose
potentially in one big step. This latter is IMHO compatible with the
Biblical picture of God's supernatural intervention in creation. For
example, Gould once wrote in a famous paper:
"I do not doubt the supreme importance of preadaptation, but the
other alternative, treated with caution, reluctance, disdain or even
fear by the modern synthesis, now deserves a rehearing in the light
of renewed interest in development: perhaps, in many cases, the
intermediates never existed. I do not refer to the saltational
origin of entire new designs, complete in all their complex and
integrated features-a fantasy that would be totally anti-Darwinian in
denying any creativity to selection and relegating it to the role of
eliminating old models. Instead, I envisage a potential saltational
origin for the essential features of key adaptations. Why may we not
imagine that gill arch bones of an ancestral agnathan moved for- ward
in one step to surround the mouth and form proto-jaws? Such a change
would scarcely establish the Bauplan of the gnathostomes. So much
more must be altered in the reconstruction of agnathan design-the
building of a true shoulder girdle with bony, paired appendages, to
say the least. But the discontinuous origin of a proto-jaw might set
up new regimes of development and selection that would quickly lead
to other, coordinated modifications." (Gould S.J., "Is a new and
general theory of evolution emerging?", Paleobiology, vol. 6(1),
January 1980, p127)
This is my proposal of what happened - God at strategic points
supernaturally injected a new design into life's history (eg. a
change to the genetic code specifying a gill-arch became a jaw).
Thereafter, natural (ie. "evolutionary") processes would take that
change until the next major step (eg. a foot from a fin). This is
fully in accord with the scientific facts and also with the account
of God's progressive acts of creation in Genesis 1.
Comments?
God bless.
Steve
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| Stephen E (Steve) Jones ,--_|\ sejones@ibm.net |
| 3 Hawker Avenue / Oz \ sjones@iinet.net.au |
| Warwick 6024 ->*_,--\_/ http://www.iinet.net.au/~sjones |
| Perth, West Australia v (My opinions, not my employer's) |
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