>Writing in the New York Times, Stephen Jay Gould says... So, we have the American Spectator quoting Stephen Jay Gould from a New York Times article in a thread about Barry Commoner on Free Republic...
[laughs]
Sorry, but that bed is way too crowded for me to jump in, and I know that at least some of those people leave nasty crumbs under the blankets...
Mark W.
P.S. I find this debate strangely tame, anyway. Five or six years ago, Rupert Sheldrake wrote extensively on the notion that DNA may be more of an antenna mechanism rather than a causative mechanism in:
Rupert Sheldrake wrote extensively on the notion that DNA may be more of an antenna mechanism rather than a causative mechanismIt's been pretty clear for a number of years that DNA is not a blueprint that can be read to predict the final structure of an organism. In particular you cannot predict the outcome of significant changes (significant meaning something beyond manipulating known genes through a known range of variation.)
So assuming that living things are designed, how does the designer work? And why is there so much wastage and selection going on? Seem like a pretty brutle and incompetent kind of engineering.
I met Sheldrake at the Kronia conference in Laughlin Nev. last summer; one of the brightest people I've ever come across.