[Quark2005]

There are roughly 36 phyla give or take a couple depending on who is doing the classification.

That by itself is an important point. (i.e. different life forms are not as easy to discretely categorize as one might like)

I know you realize this, but just thought I'd also point out (to anyone else reading) that there are 36 or so animal phyla; fungi, plants, protists, prokaryotes, archaea, etc. are not included in this total. Another important point, is that in addition to taking tens of millions of years, the Cambrian explosion specifically affected macroscopic, animal life (a relatively small niche on the genetic 'tree') - it is only a universal explosion of diversity from the 'prejudiced' point of view that macroscopic animals are somehow a "directed goal" of evolutionary development (an understandable 'prejudice', considering that we fall in that category, biologically speaking).

[b_sharp]

Thanks Q2.

I thought of including your point about the difficulty in categorization but decided being lazy was more important.

The point about the other kingdoms is important (I should have included it), but the concept of 'goals' is far more important to the understanding of the importance (or lack thereof) of a putative explosion.