Punctuated Equilibrium is again gaining popularity among top scientists. Interestingly, originally the idea was proposed by evolutionists to explain the sudden appearance in the fossil record of a myriad of novel new life forms without any ancestors or precursors. It is now being put forward in goats’ cloths as an argument against evolution by scientists like Michael Denton.
Merriam-Webster definition of punctuated equilibrium: evolution that is characterized by long periods of stability in the characteristics of an organism and short periods of rapid change during which new forms appear especially from small subpopulations of the ancestral form in restricted parts of its geographic range
Denton, in his book Evolution: A Theory in Crisis demonstrates that life forms are fundamentally discontinuous and shows no evidence of the functional continuum predicted by Darwinian theory. The major taxa-defining characteristics, such as mammalian hair or avian feathers, he argued, are not led up to via a series of functional ancestors or intermediates. This according to Denton undermines Darwinian adaptive gradualism.
Denton is a ‘typologist’, holding that there are deep, unbridged divisions in the order of nature. Species proceeds from one type to another and to seek for intermediaries across the gaps is to seek in vain, Denton rejects the Darwinian assumption that nature does not make leaps, but rather slow gradual steps.
Denton describes how the natural world is characterised by discontinuity and what he describes as ‘taxon-defining homologs’ (Taxon: such as a phylum, order, family, genus, or species). He suggests that other unique biological traits shared only by members of a particular group should be the rule for classification. Examples such as the enucleated red blood cell and placenta found only in mammals, the insect body plan, the pentadactyl limb shared by all tetrapods, and the amniotic membrane found only in reptiles, birds and mammals. As Denton makes clear, these ‘types’ are undeniably real and isolate one group from another. Denton believes that these could not have led a series of intermediates. These taxon-defining homologs are distinctives that should be the basis of classification rather that the traditional ‘tree of life model’.
The wolf is still hiding as a goat because despite his rejection of neo-Darwinism, Denton is still a ‘molecules to man’ evolutionist. In stead of the Darwian model of mutation and selection (also known as decent with modification) Denton believes in the self-organising properties of particular classes of matter. As if prehistoric elemental brute matter had a memory of Homo Sapiens build into it.
Descent with modification, says Denton, can explain why all members of a group or branch share a homolog (shared characteristics), but it cannot provide a causal explanation for how the homolog originated.
There is however no evidence that matter contains the information needed to reorganise the genome and generate novel complex biological structures. Neither gradually nor step-wise. Self-organisation as the means by which evolution could have progressed has a growing supporter base and includes a number of leading biologists. Although they have no doubts about the inadequacy of Darwinian explanations, they are clearly unable to present a scientific case for their alternative.
Stephen Jay Gould (palaeontologist and evolutionary biologist) quote: “Can we invent a reasonable sequence of intermediate forms—that is, viable, functional organisms—between ancestors and descendants in major structural transitions? … I submit, although it may only reflect my lack of imagination, that the answer is no”. I submit, Gould is cognitively dissonant. (Cognitive dissonance is experienced by a person who holds two or more contradictory beliefs, ideas, or values. It is triggered by a situation in which a person's belief clashes with new evidence. The ‘belief’ holds sway in spite of the evidence) Note, Gould, a palaeontologist and evolutionary biologist, finds no evidence for evolution.