Was Darwin Wrong?

physics discussion question and need support to help me learn.

The first writing assignment is the 2004 National Geographic article “Was Darwin Wrong?” by David Quammen (see link below). Please read the article and write a 4 page paper (double-spaced, 10-12 pt font, 1000-1500 words) for submission. Each paper should consist primarily of a very detailed review of the article (use the first 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 pages to tell me what the article was about), with a short discussion section at the end (last 1/2 page). Do not cut-n-paste from the text or other sources, and do not include quotations from the article.
For the discussion section, pick out and discuss some aspect of the article that you found to be the most interesting, surprising, and/or problematic. Please discuss why this topic was noteworthy to you. Feel free to express your personal opinions, including agreement or disagreement with Quammen’s arguments (and your reasoning behind these stances).
Don’t worry about a particular ‘style’ (e.g., APA, Chicago), but do use college-level grammar, paragraph and sentence formatting, spelling, etc.
Be aware that the use of various forms of AI software like ChatGBT and some uses of Grammarly to generate text for this written assignment is considered plagiarism. Use of these programs for submitted work will result in an assignment grade of 0 and submission of your name to the Maxient system for academic dishonesty. Please see the syllabus section entitled “Academic Integrity” for a discussion of plagiarism and associated penalties.
Requirements:
Article 2 Was Darwin Wrong? DAVID QuAMMEN E volution by natural :.election, lhe ccnlral concept or the life’s work of Ch:ule> Darwin, is 😮 theory. It’s a theory about the origin of adaptation. complexity. and diversity among Eanh’s living creatures. If you arc skeptical by nature. unfamiliar will> the terminology of :,cience. and unaware of 1hc overwhelming evidence, you might even he tempted to a me sense, relalivity as described by Albert Einslcin is ‘just” :t theory. The notion that Earth orbits around the suo rather than vice versa, uflered by Copernicus in 1543, is a theory. Continental drifl is a 1hcory. The exi<~cncc. suucrure. and dynamics or atoms? Aromic theory. C\'en elec­tricity i> n theoretical conLlle severely conflicting do1a “‘some bener explanation mizht come alonr,. Tbe rest of us gener.1lly agree. We plug our television, IntO little wall sockets, measure a y~;tr by the lenj!th of Earth’s orbit. und in many Olher ways Jiveou1’lives based on tJlc trusted rculily of those theories. Evolu!ionary lheory, tllough. is a bil me people lind it unacceptable. despite the vast body of supporting evidence. As applied to our own species, llo11w sapiens, it c:u1 seem more threatening stilL Many fundamentalist ChristiMs and ultra<>rthodox Jews take alarm at the thought that human descent from earlier primate’ contradicts a strict reading of lhe Book of Gcnc.,is. Their discomfort is paralleled by Islamic cre­atjonists such as Harun Yahy~ author of a recent volume ti1lc::d Tire E•·olution Deceil, who points to tlle six-day creation story in ~ Koran as literal truth and calls the theory of evolution “nodling but a deception imposed on us by 1hc domina10<> ofthc world system.” The late Sriln Prnbhupada. of the Hare Krishna movement, explained that God created “the 8.400,000 species of life frorn the very bcgilllling;· in order to establish multiple tiers of reincarnation for risin;; souls. Although souls ascend. !he ~·pecies 1hemselves don’t change. he in•i>ted. di evolved from other life­forms without any involvement of a god. The most stanling thing about these poll numbers is not that so many Americans reject c’olutioo. but that the sU>tistical breakdown basn’t changed much in two decades. Gallup inter­viewet·s posed exactly the same choices in 1982. 1993, 1997, and 1999. The creutionisr conviction-that God alone.. :.nd not evolution. produced humans-bas never drawu les,; thun 44 per­cent. In other word~, nc~ly half the American populnce prefers to believe that Charle< Dm·,•in was "rong where it mattered most. Why W\: there .so many antievolutionist.s? ScripturnJ tiferal­ism c~n only be part of the answer. The American public cer· ulinly iJICludes a large lucidly explained. Sure. we ·,e all heard of Charlc> Darwin. and ()fa vague. ~umber notion about ~truggle and survival that sonlCtimcs goes by thcc:Hchall bbcl “Darwinism.” 13ullhe main sources ofinfom1arion rrum which mw.t Americans have drawn Lheir awa.rcm .. “SS or this subj«t. il ‘CC:m~. arc h3ph:tzard qne…; at best: cultural osmo,is. newspaper and magazine rercreoces. half-baked nature documemaries on the tube, and hearsay. Evolution is both u beautiful concept and an impo11an1 one. more crucial nowadays to human welfare. to medical ‘cicncc. and to our understanding of tllc “orld than ever before. It’s also deeply persuasive–a theory you c•m t.’lke ro the bank. Tbe
ANNUAL EDITIONS essential points are ~lightly more cc.unp1icatcd than most people aSpulatinn growth drives the compelitive struggle. Becau~e Jess ~uccessfu I competitors produce fewer surviving offspring, the useless or ucgative vru~ations tend to disappear. whereas the useful varia· tions tend to be perpetuated and gradually magnified throughout a population. So much for one part of the evolutionary pl'(}(.’eSS. known as anagenesis, during which a single species is transformed. But there~s also a second part. known as speciation. Genetic changes somcLimcs accumulate within au isolatc:d segment or a species. but not d)rough.out tbe whole, as that isolated population adapl.s to its local conditions. Gradually it goes its own w~1y, seizing a new ecological niche. At a certain point it becomes iJTcvcrsibly distind-that is, so different that its members can’t interbreed with the rest. Two species now exist where formerly there was one. Darwin called that splining-and-specializing phenomenon the “principle of divergence.” It was an importam part of his theory, explaining the overall diversity of life as well as the adaptation of individual species. This thrilling and radical assemblage of concepts came from an unlikely source. Ch~1rh.::s O;.lf’\viu was shy (Uld ructkulous. <• wealthy landowner with close friends among t.hc Anglican clergy. He had a gentle, unassuJning manner, a strong ne-ed for p1ivacy, and <.)n excrnordinary comrniuncnt lO imcllcclUa1 honesty. As an undergraduate at Cambridge, he b.ad studied halfheartedly toward becoming a c.;lcrgyu1om himself, befote he <.Jiscovered his reaJ vocation as a scientist. Later, having c~tablishcd u good but conventional reputation in natural history, he spent 22 years secre-tly gathering evidence and pondering argumcnts-tx>th 6 for ;md against his theory-because he dido ‘t wru1t to flame out in a burst of unpersuasive notoriety. He may have delayed, too, bec.ause of h.is anxiety about announcing a theory that seemed to challenge conventional religious beliefs-in particu­lar, the Christian bclicls of his wife, Emma. Darwin himself quietly renounced Christianity during bis middle age, and later descrjbed himself as an agnostic. He continued to beJievc in a distant, impersonal deiry of some $‘ and Varieties Through Nmural Sdt•c· tion, but his publisher found Lhat insufficiently catchy.) The aJanning event was his receiving a leuer and an enclosed manu­script ftom Alftcd Wallace, whom he knew only as a distant pen pal. Wa11ace•s m~muscript :o;ketchcd out the ~unc great idea­evolution hy natur~l selection-that O;lrwin considered his mvn. Wallace had s<:ribblcxlthis paper m1<.l (unaware ol' IJarwin's own evolutionary thinking, which ~o far had been kept private) mailed it tv him from ~he r\:hJJ;;~y A1·chipelagv. alo,lg wilh a requesL for re.lction ;md help. Darwin was holTified. After hv< .. dcc.ades of painstaking cll'ort, now he'd be scooped. Or maybe nol quite. lie forw~1rdL"d \VaJiacc•s paper toward puhlicalion, though rnanag­ing nlso to assert hi~ own prior clttim by releasing t\VO excC1TJIS from his unpublished work. '!'hen he dashed off the Origin. bis "abstract" on the subject. Unlike Wallace. who was younger and less meticulous, Darwin reco&rnized the impurtancc of provic.J­ing an edifice of supporting e\•idence and logic. The evidence~ ns he pre.-.:cntcd iL. mostly fell wilhin rour cate­gories: bivgcography, paleontology, emb•yology, and morpho!· ogy. Biogeography is I he swdy or the gcographicaJ di:)tributjou of living creatures-that is. which species inhabit which parts of the planet and why. Paleontology investigates extinct life­forms. a.<; n:ve;ded in the fossil record. Embryology examines the revealing stages of developm~nt (echoing earlier stages of evolutionary history) that embryos pass through before birth or hatching: at a stretch, embryology also concerns the imma· ture forms of animals that metamorphose, such as the larvae of itlSects. Morphology is the science of anatomical shape and design. Darwin devoted sizable sections of The Origin of Species co these categories. Biogeography, for instance, offered a great pageant of peculiar facls aud paucrus. Anyone \VbO co.osiders the biogeog.rapbjcal data, Darwin wrote, must be Strock by the mystet"ioos cluster­ing pattern among what he called "closely allied" specics-th:H is, similru· creatures sharing roughly the same body p.lan. Such closely allied species tend to be found on the same continent (several spccic.s of zebras in Atiica} or within the same group of oceanic islru.1ds (dozens of species of honeycreepe"' in Hawaii, 13 species of Galapagos finch). despite their species-by-species prcfctences for different habitats, food sources. or conditions of climate. Adjoetnt areas of South America, Darwin noted, nrc occupied by two similar spccic.s of large. flightlc.,s birds (the rheas. Rhefl tuncrimna and P1erocnemia pe!lnaUt), not by ostriches a.~ in Africa or emus as in Australia. South America also bas agouti\ and viscacbas (snull rodents) in terrestrial habi­tat<. plu.< coypu~ and capybaras in the well:mds. not-as Darwin wrote-bare;, and rabbit~ in terrc;trial habitats or beavers and m11s~T.lts in t.hc wetlands. During his own youthful visit to tbe Galiipagos, aboard the survey ship Beagle. Darwin himself had dbcovercd three very similar forms of mockingbird, each on a dill'etent island. Why should "closely allied" >es over the eons, lightly peppered with fossils. represent~.; a langiblc r~.X:OI’ll.’!-bOWiJlg which .species lived when. Le.~t; ancient layers of rock lie; a1op more ancient ones (ext-ept where geologic force’ have lipped or •huffied them). and lil.cwbc: with the anim.tl IUld plii.Ot fos.’il’ that the strata CQntain. Whut Darwin noticccJ about this rc~.:ord j, that closely allied species tend to be found adjacent to one onolher in successive SU”Jla. One species endures for millions or years and then make.~ it~ last appearance in, say, the middle Eocene epocb: just above. a •iouilar but not identical specie’ replaces it In North America. for example. a ‘”‘guely horselike creature known as 1/ymrmhtn’tmJ was ~uccccdcd by OrollitJfJUS. then £pi1Jippus. then Mcsohippu.)·, which in tum were succ~d~.!d by a varieLy of horsey American crincr.-.. Some of them even gal· lopct.l acrw:-. the Bcdug land bridge into Asi~ [hen onwunlto Europe and Africa. Ay five million years ago they had nearly all dbappeare that couldn ·, be explained by coincidence. Why docs the embo·yo or a mammal pass Lhrough stages resembling ~rages or the embryo of a replile’! Why is one of the larvrt.l forms of a barnacle:. before metamorphosis, M> ;imilar to the larv:U fonn of a ‘hrimp? Why do the larv:oe of moths. flies. and beetles resemble one :wotber mott th.,n any of lhem resemble thctr respecti\-e adulh? Because, Darwin wrote. “tbc embryo is the unimal in its less modified stmc” and that stale “reveal’ the strucLure of its progenitor.” M01pbology. his founh categot’)’ of evidence, wa~ dle “very h in the 7 Article 2. Was Darwin Wrong? aquarium. Living creatures can be easily soned into a hierar­chy uf cutegories-notjust species but genera, families, orders, whole kingdoms-based 011 which anatomical characters they ;,hare and which they don’t. All vcrtebr:ue animal< have backbone;. Among venebr:ues. birds ha\'C feather... whereas reptiles ha• c: ..:ales. Mammals have fur and mammary glands. D()( feathers or ;calc;,. Among mam­mals. some have pnuches in which they nurxe their tiny young. Among these species, the marsupials, some have huge rear legs and 'tnJng tails by which ~1cy go hopping across miles of arid outback.: we <:<4lthem kangaroos. Bring in modem microscopic and molecular evidence. and you can rrnce the similaritie.~ still further back. All ptanh and fungi, as well a, animal>. have nuclei within their cells. AU living organisms contain DNA and RNA (ex.cept some viru~c.:, wilh RNA only), two related form,-. of informatioo~oding molccuJcs. Such a pattern of tiered resemblances groups of nested within broader grouping<, and all descending from a single sourcc-bn't naturally present among other col­lections of items. Yuu won't find anything equivalent if you t.ry to c~ucgorizc rocks. or musicaJ instrumcnl~. or jewelry. Why nor! Because rock types and styles of jewelry don't reflect unhro~cn descent from common ance..~rors. Biological diversity doc~. The number of ~hared characteristics between any one ~ies and another indicates how recently 1hose two ~iC" have diverged from a ~hnrcd lineage. Tha1 insight gave new meaning to the tnsk of wxonornic clas· si flcation, which had been founded in it> modem form back in 1735 by the Swedish nat.W”.tl.i.St Carolu~ Llnnaeu<. Linnaeu< showed how species could be systematically classified, 3CCOrd ing to tl1eir shared similarities, but he worked from creatinnist assumptions that ofTcn."(l no material cxplanatio11 for the nested p:Htern he found.ln the early and middle 19th century, morpholo­gist~ ~uch a~ George.-. Cuvier and Eaienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire in Froncc :\nd Richard Owen io England improved clasl\ifica. tion with their metieulou< 'htdie.< of internal >S weU a.s external anatomies.. and tried 10 make sense or wh:n lhe ultimate SOtltee or these patterned similarities cou.ld be. Not even Owen. a con­temporary and onetime friend of Darwin’s (lat~r in Life they had a birtcr falling out). took the full step to an evolutionary vision before The Origin r>fSperies wa.’ published. Owen made a major mntribution. though, by advancing tbeconcept ofbomnloguc,,_ thai ;,, ;uperficially dill’erent but fundamentally similar ,..,rsions of a ;ingle organ or t.mit. shared by dissimilar species. Fnr insl~wce. the fi\•e·digil skeletal ~true lUre of the vertebnuc hand appears nol just in humans and :.1pc.\ :md raccoon!) and l>et1N but also. variow:.ly modified. in curs and bats and ro•· .. poi\Cs and lizards and tunics.. The paired “”)ncs of our lower kg, the tibia and the: libula. arc also rcp…,.,nted by bomologou.s bone~ in other mammoh and in reptiles. anc.l e~-en in the long­oxtin(t hirrl-o·eptilc Arf’lweopreryx. What’s the reason behind such V(lried rccun·cnce of a lew basic designs? Darwin. with a uod to Owen’s “mosr interesting work,” supplied the answer: common de.o;cent, a.~ shaped by natural selection, modifying the inh<-ritcd basics for different circumstances. ve ... tigial charactcrhtic~ an: slill anmhcr funn of morpholo~i­cal evidence, illuminaling to contemplate bccau~e rhey show ANNUAL EDITIONS lhnt the living world is fuU of small, tolemblc imperfections. Why do male mammals (including human males) have nipples'! Why do some soakes (ootably boa consuictor<) corry the rudi· mcnt• of a pel vi• :and tiny legs buried inside their sleek profilc1.'1 Why do ccruin species of flightless beetle• have wing•. se:tled beneath wing cover.. that never open? Darwin rn•ut evolution. that is. He wasn’t right about ~vuyrili11g. Being a restless explainer. Darwin Oooted 3 num· her of theoretical notion> during his long working life, some of which were mistAken and illusory. He wo.~;:, wrollg ~\bout what cau~~ vari:u ion within a species. He was wrong :.bout n f:unou.”‘ geologic myMcry. lhe parallel shelves along a Scoui’h valley called Glen Roy. Most notably, his theory of inheritance-which he labeled pwlgcnc.,is and chetished despite its poor I’CCCplion amonl( his biologist colleagues-rumed out to be dead wmng. Fonunntcly J’o1′ Darwin, the con·ectness or his most famou.’ good idea stood indepcndenl nf thai particular bad idea. Evo­lution by n:uura) sc)ccliOD n:presented l)ai’Win :n hi~ bc~t­which is IU ~ay. scientjfic observation and careful thinking al it< be\1. Douglas f'utuyma i• a highly respected evolution:lt)' biolo g.u"t. :lUiflOr or ICAIINV~ a." well as influential research p;.pcr":>. Hi< office, at the Univcl'l>ity of Michigan. is a long narrow room in the naturul ;cicnc:e,o, building, well stocked with journal~ and h<>o”-‘. including volumes about the conllicl between creation­ism ~uuJ evolution. I arrived CaJT);ng a well-thumbed copy vr his own book un that Mlbject. Scie11ct 011 Trio/: Tire Cau for E~·oiHiion. Killing time in the <..-onidor before our 8J)poimmcnt~ I noticed" blue llycr on a departmental buUetin boa,·d, seeming oddly placed (ht:r¢ ~mjd rhe announcements or carcc1· opportu· nitics {Qr gr:.idualc students. ··creation vs. evolution." it S3id ... A seric..< (I)' messages challenging popular 1hough1 wilh DiblicaJ truth and -,cicntHic evidences.'· A traveling lecturer from \OOme·· thing cu.lled the Origins ReseMch Association wnulc.J (leliv~r these """""$"' :1t a local Baptist chureh. Beside the lecturer'< photo wa~ o drawing of a din~ur. ~-Froe pi7.7..a following tbe .,,·ening ,.crvicc.'' s:ud 3 >mall line at the bottom. Dino’-‘!urs. biblical lruth, and piu.a: something for everybody. In n:spon:.c to my questions about evidence, Dr. l’uruyma moved quickly through the traditional categories-p:llcontology. biogeogt:1phy-<~nd lalkcd mostly about modem ACnetics. He pulled out hi10 he:~.vily marked copy of the journal Nmun• for February 15,200 I, n historic issue, fat wilh articles reponing nnd an~lly t.ing rhe re~ult!" of the Human Genome I •rojcct. Bc~idc: it he 8 slapped down a more re<".Cill is~ue of Nutu~. rhi~ one devoted ro the sequenced genome of the house mouse. Ml4s museu/ItS. The headline of the lead editorial announced: "HUMAN BIOLOGY BY PROXY:· The lll()USC genome eff011, according to Nature's editors, had revealed "aboul 30.000 genes. with 99% having direct counterpan.~ in human'\.~· The resemblance between our 30,000 human genes and those 30.000 mousy counterpartS. l'utuyma explained, repre­sents another form of homology. like the resemblance between a live-fingered hand and a live-toed paw. Such genetic homol· ugy i~ what gives •ncaning to biomcc.JicoJ 1'csc.;1rch using mice and other animals, including chimpanzees, which (to their sad misfortune) are our closcslliving relatives. No U..\-pcCt or biomedical r'C.\.Carch SCCrll\ more urgent today than the s1udy of microbial disca.cs. And the dynamics of those microbes within human bodie". within human populations. can only be understood in terms of e'•olution. Nightmarish illnesses caused by microbes include both the infectious son (AIDS. Ebola. SARS) that spread directly from person to person and the son (malaria. We:;t Nile fever) deli•-ered to us by biting insect\ or ocher intcnnediarics. The capacity for quick change :tmong <.l~aM:·causing microbes is what makes them so dangeroua. co large numbers of people and :so difticuh and cxpc:nsivt: lQ trent. They leap from wildlife or Jon1e:o:;tic animals into humans. adnpting co new circumstances as they go. TI1eir inherent variability allow~ them to lind new ways of evading aJld dcfcnrinn htumm immune systems. By natural selection they acquite rcsiswnce to drugs Lhat should kill them. They evolve. There's no bcllcr or ITlOrc immcdime evidence suppon:ing the Darwiniun Lhcory than this proces.~ of forced t.ransformatiou among our inimical germs. Take the common bacterium Stopltylorocc-us auT?us. which lurl;s in hospitals and eau""' .erious infections. especially among surgery patients. Penicillin. becoming available in 1943, pro•·ed almost mirnculou.sly cfl'ecli•e in fighting sl:lphylococ· cus infections. Its deploymenl m•rk•'t long. The first re.,istant strains of Slaphylococcu.< aureus were reported in 1947. A newer slaph-killing drug, methicillin. came into use during the 1960s. but n1cthicilli n-resistaut strains appeared soon, aod by the 198(],; 1hosc s~·nins were widesprea~. Vancomycin became Lhc next great wc.~pon against staph, ami the tirst vanoomycin-rcsistMI strain emerged in 2002. The.«: antibiotic·rcs:istant SlrJins represent r.n evolutionary series, not much different in principle from the fo~il .-,.eries tracing horse e\'Olution from Hyrticmheriwn to Eq11uJ. They make evolution a very prnctic.1l problem by adding cxpcnM:. as "eU as misery and danger. to the challenge of coping with >tapll. 1be biologist Stephen P:llnmhi h~s colculaled lhe cost of treating penicillin-n.-sistant and melhicillin-re.sistant staph infections. just in tbe United States. 3130 billion dollars a year. “Antibiotics exert a powerful evolutionary foree.” he wrote la~t year … driving inf~ctious bacrcrin ro evolve powerfuJ defenses against all but tlte mosl reccnLiy iovcnt..:d OJ·ugs:· A~ reflected in tbelr DNA, which uses the same gcnc1ic code lhund in humans
:md horses and hagfish and honeysuckle. bacteria are pan of the continuum of life. all shaped ;ond diversified by evolutionary fOI’CCS. Even viru~Cf; belong 10 that continuun1. Some viruses cvoJve quickly. some ~lowly. Amo1lg 1he fa.”ttcst i~ HIV. bc..~ause its method or replicating itself involves a high rate of mutation. and !hose murarions allow the viru.> 10 assume new fomt>. Aflcr just a few years of infeclion and drug trca11nem, each HJV p~ttien1 canie~ a unique vel’:-oion of Lhe vinas. lsololiOn within one infected person. plus differing conditions and the struggle to survive. forc;e, each version or HIY to evolve independently. It’s nOibing but a speeded up and microscopic “”‘”‘ of wbat Darwin saw in the Galapagos-except that each human body is m1 island. and the newly evolved l’onns aren ‘1 so channing as tlocbes or mockingbirds. Umle.rstanding bow quickly lilY acquires resist anile to anti­vita) drugs, such as AZT. bas been crucial 10 improving trcal­mcnl by way of multiple drug cocktails. ~This approach has reduced deoth.< due 10 IUY by severalfold since 1996." a~-eord­ing to Palurnbi. •·and jt has grcmly slowed Lhc cvolutioo of chis disease within p:.lticnts." Insects and weeds acquire rcsislance to our insecticides and herbicides through the same process. As we human.< try lo poison them. C\'Oiution by Mtur.tl selection transfonns the population of a mosqujto or thisrlc into :• new son of creature. le-.s ''tolnerablc to thai particular poison. So we invent tutother poison, then nnother.lt's a futileefl'<>o1. Even DDT, wi1h it> fero­cious and lcmg-lasling effects throu~hout ecosystems. produced re.._ist;rnt bou~ nics within a decade of its discO\·cry iu 1939. By 1990 more than 500 species (includmg 114 kinds of mos­quitoes) bad ~uired resis~ance to nt least one pesticide. Based on these undesired resuhs, Stephen Pnlumbi has comrnenled glumly, ”humans 111ay be lhe wol’ld’s Uomina•lf evolutionary force.’• Among mosl lorm~ of living creature.~. evolution proc.ccd.s ;.lowly-100 slowly to be observed by a single scientist within a research tifetimc. But science functions by inference. not just by direct observntion, and the inferenlial wns of evidence such as paleontology ;mel hiogcogl’aphy arc no less cogent si on ply because 1hcy’rc indirect. Still, skeptic.< of evolmionary lhcory :lJ;k: Can we~ evolution in acrion1 Can it be observed io the wild? Can it be measured in the labor.ttory? 111¢ answer i' yes. Peter nnd Ro.emary Gr.tnt. two British­hom researchers who have spent d~"Cadcs where Charle.\ Darwin spent weeks, htovc CUI>tured a glimpse of evolution with their long-tenn studies of bc:lk size among Galapagos finches. William R. Rice and George W. Suit achieved something simi­lar in their lab. thn>ugh an experiment io,•olving 35 generations of lhc fruit fly Drosophila mrltmoflu>ler. Richard E. l.cn,ki and his colleagues at Michigan Stale Urtiversity have done it too, tracking 20.000 generation’ of evolution in the bac1crium Escherichia l'(j/i, Such tield sLudics and lab experiments docu­ment anages\e~i~LhaL is. ~low evolutionary chang..: within a >ingle. unsplit lineage. \\r,th patience il can be seen, like thc nw,-ement of n minute band on a clock. Speciation, when a lineage splitS into IWO specie>. i> the other major phase of evolutionary change, mak.inA possible the 9 Article 2 .. Was Darwin Wrong? divergence between lineages about whicb Drdcd n speciation event, or very nearly so, in their cx1cndcd cxperimem on f111i1 flies. Frorn u small stock or ma1ed female.’ thcy eventually produced IWO di\linct fly populalion> ad;tpted 10 different hnbit01 condilioo<. which tbe researcher.. judged "incipient species:· Afterrnyvisit with Douglas futuymn inAnnArtmr, hpent two hours llt the university llluseum there with Philip D. Gingerich. a paleontologist well-known for his work on the ancesuy of whal~. As we talkec.l. Gingerich guided me through an exhibit of ancieol ce1aceon' on the museum'< scx:ond fl()()(. Amid weird ul whale evolu­lion. A burly man with a hmad open face and the gentle manner of a o;c<>ulnlaster. Ginecrich combines intcllccrual past: a willingnes.’ to :~!mil when he’s wrong. Since the late 1970, Gingerich ha.~ collecled fossil >pcci­rncns of early whnlcs f1·on1 remote digs in l}gypt and PakisU.u1. WOI’;king Wilh Pakisutni colleague~. he discovered Pukicrtus. u terre~Lrial mammal duting rrom 50 million years ago. who:-.ccar bones rcOect its membership in the whllle lineage bul whose skull looks almost doglike. A former student of Gingerich’s, Hans Thcwissen. fuund a slightly more recent form with webbed feet. legs suitabl&: for either walkin~ or swinuning, and a lon~ tOOthy snout. ·n,cwissen called it Ambulocews 1wtwa.\, ur the ”walking·tuld-swimming whulc.” Qjn_gerich and his tcum rumed up sever.:tl more. induding Rodhoa:ws bn/(}(-h­i.~ltlllt’IIJis, which was fully :a se-a creature. its legs more like Oippc”. ib nostrils shined backward on the snout, h:llfway to the blowhole position on a modern whale. The sc<1ucnce of known forms w~1s becoming more ::md more complete. And all alOll£. Gingerich tuld me, he leaned Inward believing thm whale.• had descended from ~ group or carnivorous Eocene mammals known a< mcsonychids. wi1h check teem useful for chewing meat and bone. Just a bit more evidence, he lhoughl. would confirm that rcltotionsbip. Ry the end of the 1990s mo'r palconlologists agreed. Meanwhile. molecular biologiSis 1\(ld explored the same que>tion and arri”cd lll a different an~wer. No. the match to those Eocene camh’Orc;. might be clO<;e. but not close enough. DNA hybridization nnd nther tuggestcd that whale’ had dc. even-toed hert>i\’orcs, ‘uch a.~ nnlclopus and hippos). not from mc<.~l-cating mesonychi<.Js. In the ycar2000 Gin~;crich chose a new field site in Puki>lan. where one of hi’ \tutlellls found a single piece of fossil that chang•-d the prevailing view in paleontology. ll was half of a pulley-shaped anklebone. known 3$ an nw:ogalu>. belonging to another new species or whale.
ANNUAL EDITIONS A Pakistani colleague found the fragment’s other half. When Gingerich filled the two pieces together, he had a moment of humbling recognition: The molecular biologistS were right. Here wa.~ al) a1lklebone, from a four .. fcgged whale daring back 47million years, !hat closely resembled the homologus ani

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