Whoa, that's a new one on me! Where did Gould & Eldredge ever claim that the Cambrian explosion "completely destroys the theory of evolution"?
Gould and Eldredge completely rejected Darwinian evolution because the Cambrian showed that organisms appeared suddenly and could not have evolved over time. For this reason they took up and formulated what they themselves called punk-eek, a totally silly theory similar to claiming that ghosts exist but have never been photographed because they are too shy to have their picture taken. They said that new species arise suddenly and leave no trace of what happened.
But then you knew that already did you not?
Well, I suspected but didn't know for sure.
Punk eek of course actually says that transitional fossils between closely related species should be rare, not necessarily nonexistent. This is because most speciation happens when small populations breakaway from the larger population & get isolated. Mutations have a much better chance of taking over a small gene pool than a large one. When the breakaway population evolves into something more suited to its new environmental niche, new mutations are less likely to be beneficial, because it's already adapted to the new surroundings, thank you just the same. Plus it starts growing, and so even beneficial mutations would have a harder time taking over.
Also notice I said "transitionals between closely related species are rare". Gould especially has taken pains to point out that transitional species between closely related families & other higher taxa are abundant.
But then you... :-)
No, they did not, as any reading of their works would make entirely clear.
For a succinct example:
"We believe that Huxley was right in his warning. The modern theory of evolution does not require gradual change. In fact, the operation of Darwinian processes should yield exactly what we see in the fossil record. It is gradualism we should reject, not Darwinism."Furthermore, even many people who should know better *incorrectly* claim that Darwin propounded a theory of strict steady gradualism, and that Gould and Eldredge were proposing a departure from Darwin when they championed Punctuated Equilibrium (i.e. the notion that speciation often proceeds by relatively short bursts of change followed by longer periods of stasis).
- Gould, Stephen J. The Panda's Thumb, 1980, p. 181-182
Instead, it's the *gradualist* school of evolution which had drifted away from Darwin, and Gould and Eldredge were *returning* to Darwin's original insights. See for yourself:
I further believe that these slow, intermittent results accord well with what geology tells us of the rate and manner at which the inhabitants of the world have changed." (Darwin, Ch. 4, "Natural Selection," pp. 140-141)This is classic Punctuated Equilibrium -- from Charles Darwin in 1859.But I must here remark that I do not suppose that the process ever goes on so regularly as is represented in the diagram, though in itself made somewhat irregular, nor that it goes on continuously; it is far more probable that each form remains for long periods unaltered, and then again undergoes modification. (Darwin, Ch. 4, "Natural Selection," pp. 152)
"It is a more important consideration ... that the period during which each species underwent modification, though long as measured by years, was probably short in comparison with that during which it remained without undergoing any change." (Darwin, Ch. 10, "On the imperfection of the geological record," p. 428)
"Widely ranging species vary most, and varieties are often at first local, -- both causes rendering the discovery of intermediate links less likely. Local varieties will not spread into other and distant regions until they are considerably modified and improved; and when they do spread, if discovered in a geological formation, they will appear as if suddenly created there, and will be simply classed as new species. [Charles Darwin, Origin of Species 1st Edition 1859, p.439]
[All quotes from Darwin's 1859 "On the Origin of Species"]
So where, exactly, do you think that Gould and Eldredge "completely rejected" Darwin?
because the Cambrian showed that organisms appeared suddenly and could not have evolved over time.
Really? Cite, please?
For this reason they took up and formulated what they themselves called punk-eek,
...returning closer to Darwin by doing so...
a totally silly theory similar to claiming that ghosts exist but have never been photographed because they are too shy to have their picture taken.
Fascinating. Please outline the manner in which you think this actually parallels Punctuated Equilibrium. It bears no resemblance to *my* knowledge of PE.
They said that new species arise suddenly and leave no trace of what happened.
No, they say that as a direct consequence of the manner in which evolution works, species-to-species transitions would be quite difficult to find, because they occur relatively quickly in geological terms, and most often locally rather than over a broad geographical area. Thus tripping over fossils of such transitions is rather like trying to find needles in a very, very large haystack.
Nonetheless, contrary to your implication that such finds are non-existent, due to the large numbers of speciation events in Earth's history, we *are* lucky enough to find some. For details, check out for example the 139 examples presented in Cuffey, RJ, 1984, Paleontologic Evidence and Organic Evolution, in Montagu, A., ed., Science and Creationism: New York, Oxford University Press.
For a quick overview:
Examination and collection of the rock and fossil record (either outcrops or subsurface cores) naturally produces many such stratigraphically, superpositionally, and hence geochronologically successive samples that show gradual and continuous morphologic change from older species into younger species (Cuffey, 1984). Numerous examples of such transitional individuals, consisting of sample by sample intermediate forms, completely documenting morphologic change between species (in some cases connecting more than one higher taxon) exist among protists, several invertebrate phyla, and vertebrates, especially mammals including hominids (Cuffey, 1984, p. 258, 259). Additional research has provided many other examples of transitional individuals in protists (Lazarus, 1983, 1986; Malmgren, Berggren, & Lohmann, 1983, 1984; Arnold, 1983), bryozoans (Cuffey, 1999), brachiopods (Hurst, 1975), conodonts (Barnett, 1972), mammals (Rose & Bown, 1984; Bookstein, Gingerich, & Kluge, 1978; Gingerich & Simons, 1977; Gingerich & Gunnell, 1979; Chaline & Laurin, 1986; Clyde & Gingerich, 1994; Gingerich, 1974, 1976a, 1980, 1985), and hominids (Cronin, et al., 1981; Wolpoff, 1984).I'm sorry, what's that you've been saying about no transitional fossils, and no evidence for evolution?Based upon these data, we can conclude that new species arise by descent with modification that occurs through successive generations, each produced by normal reproductive processes. Furthermore, the rates of morphologic change are highly variable. Some change is essentially constant and unidirectional, slow or fast; this is classic phyletic gradualism (Gingerich, 1974, 1976a). Other change is irregular consisting of intervals of slow change or stasis interrupted by intervals of very rapid change. This rapid change may be clearly resolvable but compressed into a narrow interval (termed punctuated gradualism; Malmgren, Berggren, & Lohmann, 1983) or so rapid that, on a geologic time frame, the transitional samples are not resolvable (termed punctuated equilibrium; Cheetham, 1986). Moreover, such change can proceed in a straight line linking a succession of several species (termed anagenesis or phyletic transformation; Ziegler, 1966; Gingerich, 1974, 1976a, 1985; Sheldon, 1990) or one species can produce two or more species in a branching pattern (termed speciation or cladogenesis; Gingerich, 1974, 1976a, 1985; Lazarus, 1986; Sheldon, 1990). These empirical observations are direct evidence of descent with modification, and lead to the inescapable conclusion that evolution has occurred.
- (excerpt from THE FOSSIL RECORD: EVOLUTION OR "SCIENTIFIC CREATION". The entire paper is excellent and worth a read.)
But then you knew that already did you not?
I'm pretty sure that she was not previously aware of your erroneous statements.